Statement Regarding Visits by Olympic Police Agents

BY GORD HILL

Kwakwaka’wakw, Occupied Coast Salish Territory [Vancouver, BC]

Vancouver’s Incredibly Stupid Unit (VISU), also known as the 2010 Integrated Security Unit, attempted to visit me, Gord Hill, at my residence in downtown Vancouver on Saturday, October 17, 2009. As I was not home at the time, they left unrequested junk mail (their business cards). The next day, two plainclothes cops repeatedly knocked on my apartment door throughout the day, although I declined to answer. They were subsequently observed sitting in a gold-coloured SUV across the street of my apartment building. Perhaps they learned something as they sat watching the homeless, the poor, the drug addicts – casualties of the 2010 Olympics and business greed – who regularly congregate outside my apartment building near Hastings and Carrall. Maybe they saw their compatriots routinely harassing, searching, ticketing and arresting poor people, and thought it unjust. Then again, probably not, cuz they’re the Incredibly Stupid Unit.

I am confident that these visits by the Olympic cops were instigated by my comments to CBC News on October 13, in which I stated I supported direct action and would not be opposed to the downing of power lines or other acts of sabotage. Such are my views, and such are my “legal rights” to express in the nation-state of Canada, which presents itself as a champion of democracy and free speech, and which whores itself around the world as a leader of human rights. Regardless of such propaganda, Canada is in fact a routine violator of human and civil rights and in particular those of Indigenous peoples, who today suffer the highest rates of poverty, suicide, imprisonment, violent death, poor health, substandard housing, etc. The Tar Sands in Alberta, missing and murdered Native women, police violence against Natives (including the deaths of elder Harriet Nahanee, Frank Paul, Kyle Tait, etc.) are also forms of human and civil rights violations against Indigenous peoples. Where is the justice, the alleged fruit of Canada’s laws, in any of this?

Furthermore, the governments of Canada and BC lack the legal and moral authority to govern or carry out business on unceded Indigenous territories. The 1763 Royal Proclamation, which legally bound the British, and later Canada, to negotiate treaties before any trade or settlement could occur, was re-affirmed in the 1982 Constitution and remains law to this day. “BC” exists in violation of this law and is an illegal government; consequently, Canada lacks jurisdiction on these lands. I reject the authority of both the provincial and federal governments. In principle, no person on unceded Indigenous territory is bound to follow the laws of an illegal and immoral government, which in any case only serves the interests of the corporate elite.

Despite my beliefs, the government will seek to impose its rules on me as a “citizen” and to force my conformity to its laws. The government, being little more than organized crime at its highest levels, have at their disposal their gangs of street enforcers (the police), armed with a vast apparatus of social control to ensure we all conform to its dictates (which many do, naively believing in their state and its laws). As such, we must hold these authorities accountable to their own laws, upon which their legitimacy to rule are based, and expose their true nature:

The Charter of Rights and Freedoms, enshrined in the constitution of Canada, guarantees each of its citizens the “freedom” to express our views, thoughts and beliefs, without fear of prosecution, intimidation or harassment, so long as we do not promote hatred against any group of people.

I hereby state: I would not oppose the sabotage of power lines or other critical infrastructure of the capitalist economic system. I support all forms of direct action and resistance against this corrupt and illegitimate government along with its corporate circus, the 2010 Winter Olympics. We must use any means necessary to defend the earth for future generations. Colonialism and genocide are violations of international laws and covenants (as well as being forms of systemic violence). That such conditions have existed for over 150 years shows the futility of negotiations and seeking justice through the courts.

Due to their failure to follow their own laws, whether it is the Charter or the 1763 Proclamation, I know I will be proven correct and that the true nature of the government-corporate system will be revealed. It is a criminal regime with no regard for human beings or the earth, except as resources to be exploited. It will defend its criminal activities by any means necessary, including the establishment of a militarized police state (or the invasion and occupation of other countries). This situation, and that of the world in general, with deepening environmental, economic, and military crises, requires radical social change” a struggle to transform society which will not be achieved through purely legal or reformist methods. This is why I believe, and history shows this to be true, that when the poor and oppressed rise up against their oppressors, they do so by any means necessary. Ghandi and Martin Luther King, prayers and pacifism, did not by themselves liberate India or Blacks in the United States (or anyone, ever). In this struggle, I stand on the side of the oppressed against the oppressor. I stand with the earth and for life. Where do you stand? And if you answer “on the fence,” be forewarned that the fence, along with the power lines, are sooner or later going to come down. Will it be the land defenders or Mother Earth? I don’t know, but either way I would not oppose it.

In the Warrior Spirit of Harriet Nahanee!
No Olympics on Stolen Native Land!