We invite you to join us for Field Notes, a new video series featuring award-winning photojournalist and documentary photographer Orin Langelle, co-founder of Global Justice Ecology Project and author of Portraits of Struggle.
Join Orin as he shares the stories behind the captivating images that document interconnected global struggles for ecological, social, and economic justice across six continents and five decades.
Broadcast every other Thursday.
Transcript:
Welcome to Episode 9 of Field Notes. My name is Orin Langelle. I’m a documentary photographer.
I took this photograph at the 2007 United Nations Climate Change Conference (UNFCCC) in Bali, Indonesia. The photo is of an Indigenous protester with UNFCCC covering his mouth because many Indigenous Peoples felt their voices were being silenced. Indigenous delegates protested being shut out from discussions about forest carbon offsets during the UN Climate Conference negotiations.
The previous day, the Indigenous delegation was physically blocked from attending a meeting with the UNFCCC Executive Secretary on the topic even though discussions on forest carbon offsets were largely focused on Indigenous Peoples’ lands, where most of the world’s remaining intact forests are found. Forest carbon offsets enable companies to continue polluting by supposedly offsetting their carbon emissions through the protection of forests.
One of the Indigenous protesters from Samoa denounced the UN’s focus on forest carbon offsets, saying this process has become nothing but developed countries avoiding their responsibilities to cut emissions and pushing the responsibility onto developing countries. “People are being relocated and even killed. My own people will soon be underwater. The money from these projects is blood money.”
And now for the back story: when this photo was taken, I was a Media Coordinator for both Global Justice Ecology Project and Global Forest Coalition. I was also accredited by the United Nations as a member of the Press. The morning of the protest I was invited to a meeting of the Indigenous Peoples delegation. They were discussing yesterday’s events and planning a response to their delegation being physically blocked from the meeting with the UN Climate Conference’s Executive Secretary.
One of the ideas discussed was wearing UNFCCC gags while holding a press conference. The facilitator of the meeting asked me where a good place would be for this press conference. I said I thought the best place to have it was in front of the media tent because most of the media weren’t leaving the air conditioning because it was so hot and humid outside. I said, “If you want to get the media’s attention, bringing the protest to them would probably be the best way to get coverage.”
I went to the press tent to wait for the protest. When I saw it coming I yelled into the media tent, “There are a lot of Indigenous People coming this way and they look really, really angry.” A media stampede surged outside of the tent and was met by the protesters. It made international headlines and was the main story coming out of the UN Climate Conference that day, helping to elevate the position of the Indigenous Peoples that their land rights had to be respected in any climate mitigation schemes.
Also as a white man from the north, this was one way I felt I could utilize my privilege, to help lift up the voices and first hand experiences of Indigenous Peoples, so their story would be heard in their own words.