For decades, music has been a powerful tool for social change. From the protest songs of the civil rights movement to anthems of LGBTQ+ acceptance to rebukes of sexism and misogyny, music creates empathy, understanding, and inspiration. Looking for some meaningful music to be the soundtrack to your day? Check out our social justice playlist!

Most of us don’t think much about the history of the land we occupy. To us it may be just a hometown, a university campus, or a place of business. But the land we reside on has deep and important connections to Indigenous Peoples. Recognizing that often ignored connection is an essential step in being a meaningful ally to Indigenous communities. 

What is a land acknowledgement?

According to the University of Connecticut, “a Land Acknowledgement is a formal statement that recognizes and respects Native peoples as traditional stewards of lands. The statement highlights the enduring relationship between Native peoples and their traditional territories.” These statements have become a common practice in places like Australia, New Zealand, and Canada. While they are not as widespread in the United States, they are becoming more common, especially in higher education. You can read the Land Acknowledgement for the City's Human Right's Commission and Ad Hoc Truth & Reconciliation Commission here. 

Why are Land Acknowledgements important?

The US has a long and ugly history of disregarding Indigenous Peoples’ sacred connection to their ancestral homelands. By taking the time to remember the history of the land we live on, we can take the first step towards honoring its original inhabitants. 

How can I learn whose land I’m on?

The nonprofit organization Native Land Digital has mapped Indigenous lands, treaties, and languages. You can put your address into the search bar and the site will tell you who originally lived on this land. The site also links to resources so you can learn more about the tribe or tribes that originally inhabited the place you now call home. You can try it for yourself here.

My organization wants to make a Land Acknowledgement. How do we do it?

Making a land acknowledgement at the start of a meeting or event can be an important way to show respect for the people whose land you reside on. The Native Governance Center has put together a great guide on how to give a respectful Land Acknowledgment. That resource can be found here.

How can I go beyond Land Acknowledgements to support Indigenous communities?

Land Acknowledgments are important, but they’re just the first step when it comes to being a real ally for Indigenous communities. If you’re looking for meaningful steps you or your organization can take to better support Indigenous Peoples here are a few suggestions:

• Learn: So much of the history we learned in school undercuts or completely ignores the atrocities committed against Indigenous Peoples. Don’t know where to start? This list from the Daily Californian gives a wide variety of books, documentaries, and short-story collections that can help us decolonize the way we think about Indigenous history. Learn more here. 
• Volunteer: Giving your time/money to support Indigenous organizations can be a great way to show your allyship in a meaningful way. A few great organizations to check out are the Native American Rights Fund, the Association of American Indian Affairs, and the American Indian College Fund
• Return: According to the Native Governance Center, local, state, and federal governments around the world are returning land stolen from Indigenous Peoples. You can learn more about returning land here. 

The History of “Drained Pool Politics”

In the ’30s and ’40s, all across America communities were building their first-ever public pools. These beautiful, taxpayer-funded projects were a center of community life. But these free public resources were not open to everyone. Of the over 2000 public pools created in the early 1900s, almost all of them were whites-only. During the growing civil rights movement of the ‘50s and ‘60s, many of the Black families who lived in communities with public pools began to push back. 

With the Supreme Court’s decision in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, integration became the law of the land. Public pools, which had long rested on legal segregation as a means of depriving Black families access, suddenly had to open their doors to anyone and everyone who wanted to come for a swim. Or so one would think. 

What happened was rather the opposite. White towns got creative. Several of the formerly free public swimming pools were sold to private owners. If they couldn’t sell the pool, many towns decided to drain them and fill them with concrete. White residents decided it was better to lose an excellent free public resource rather than share it with their Black neighbors. While this may seem like a clear example of cutting off your nose to spite your face, the “drained pool politics” practiced in the 1960’s have continued to today.

The term “drained pool politics” was coined by author and political strategist Heather McGhee. It describes a phenomenon where white people, specifically those in the middle and lower class, will oppose policy decisions that would benefit them simply because those decisions would also benefit people of color. In her book The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together, McGhee highlights the way political and economic elites have created a narrative that ties social safety-net programs to racist tropes to get white voters to turn against them. 

This strategy can be seen throughout the history of our country. In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan popularized the idea of the “welfare queen.” The racist stereotype painted a picture of welfare recipients as lazy freeloaders who were getting rich by taking advantage of taxpayer-funded programs. According to the Washington Post, the term was designed as a dog whistle, meant to create images of Black single mothers getting rich off the government’s dime. This narrative was incredibly false. Since the creation of the social safety program, it is white people, not people of color, who have benefited the most from welfare assistance. According to a report by the Center of Budget and Policy Priorities, in 2014 welfare helped lift 6.2 million working-age white people out of poverty as opposed to 2.8 million Black people and 2.4 million Latinx people. Despite this fact, in the past 50 years, the majority of white voters have supported candidates who wanted to cut welfare programs. 

These drained pool politics can also be seen in the healthcare industry. As part of the 2010 Affordable Care Act (ACA), states had the opportunity to receive government funding that would cover 100 percent of the costs of expanding Medicaid in their state for three years, according to the New York Times. This was an exceptionally good deal for states. However, in her research McGhee found that as the Black population of a state increases, the likelihood of that state expanding Medicaid decreases. According to McGhee, the ACA has never reached more than 50 percent approval with white voters. Despite its poor polling with white voters, the law has actually been incredibly beneficial, specifically for working-class white voters. In several Midwestern states, the ACA helped decrease the number of uninsured working-class whites by between 40 and 60 percent, according to The Atlantic. McGhee further explains that while the refusal to expand Medicaid hurts people of color, it’s also hurting rural white Americans. McGhee points to Texas as a prime example. According to the Texas Newsroom and American Public Media, the state has the highest rate of hospital closures in the U.S. McGhee says that a significant number of these closures are due to unpaid medical bills by rural white Texans who would be covered if only the state would expand Medicaid. 

Drained pool politics have a long and ugly history in this country. But McGhee thinks we can learn from the mistakes of our past to improve our future. She points to movements like the Fight for 15 campaign, where organizers have called out the ways racism is used to divide and conquer and chose to reject this "us vs. them” mentality. To overcome this regressive mentality, McGhee says, " in order to counter [drained pool politics] you have to engage with it head on, you have to call it out. Give people a way to recognize it and reject it."

To learn more about the history of drained pool politics and what we can do about it, check out Heather McGhee’s book The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together.

On September 22 at around 7:30 in Chauncey Swan Park, the City of Iowa City’s second annual Climate Fest will screen The Falconer. Hosted by FilmScene, the portrait film features Rodney Stotts, on a mission to build a sanctuary for injured birds of prey. A falconer guided by the healing power of nature, Rodney becomes the unlikely hero of a new environmental movement in his stressed Washington, D.C. community.

The Falconer weaves Rodney's present-day mission with the story of his past, both of which are deeply rooted in issues of social and environmental injustice, and consistently orients the viewer to his worldview: nature heals. And everyone deserves access to it.

Rodney envisions a refuge for the animals he loves and a thriving center for the people in his community, which has so often borne the brunt of the city, and the nation’s, poor environmental choices. He constructs this vision in Southeast Washington, D.C. - the most dangerous neighborhood in what was then the murder capital of the U.S. 

It is through collaboration with his family and friends that he changes a former juvenile prison into an all-around outdoor experience – one that includes raptor education, equestrian practice, gardening skills, and lessons in healthy eating.

This is a story of second chances: for injured birds of prey, for an abandoned plot of land, for a group of teenagers who have dropped out of high school, and for Rodney himself.

He is a former drug dealer, inmate, single father, drive-by shooting victim, and survivor of the crack epidemic in Southeast Washington, D.C. who has found his way through to be one of only a handful of African American master falconers and the founder of his organization, Rodney’s Raptors. He believes, “Falconry can help build character, compassion and caring. Its importance is immeasurable. It changes lives.”