This Earth Day, let's quit being extremists. When huge mineral and fossil fuel companies peel off layers of the Earth for oil and make poisonous tar sands, they are acting like extremists. When they crack and contaminate aquifers for natural gas, a process known as fracking, they are acting like extremists.
It is arrogant, and it is wrong. And often, American Indians pay the price.
The DeBeers mining company has invaded the Cree territory of Canada's James Bay, pulling $5 billion worth of diamonds out annually, and relegating the Cree people to Third World conditions. Their water is contaminated, and scabies and impetigo have hit the tribe.
In Wisconsin, a mining company called Gogebic Taconite helped draft a law that allows it to contaminate the watershed of the Bad River Ojibwe near Lake Superior. Gov. Scott Walker and the Republican legislature did the company's bidding.
But the extremists who would destroy the Earth have not recognized the power of people and resistance.
In Canada, the "Idle No More" campaign has taken root. In Wisconsin, the 11 sovereign Indian governments have united in opposing the new mining law. And across the United States and Canada, a huge grass-roots movement is challenging the Keystone XL pipeline.
The oil and coal companies hold five times more carbon on their balance sheets than we can actually burn.
We won't bow to their extremism. We are intent upon that stand for our Mother Earth.
Winona LaDuke is executive director of Honor the Earth, an American Indian organization that stresses sustainable environmental policies. She wrote this for Progressive Media Project.