Led by community elders, more than 300 people marched almost six miles from Tsha’Hon’nonyen’dakhwa, the Onondaga Nation Arena, to Clinton Square to oppose the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline.

The marchers included both the people of the Onondaga Nation and Syracuse area residents.

Since April, the Sioux people have protested the building of the pipeline that would stretch from Three Forks, North Dakota, to Pakota, Illinois, and transport domestically produced light sweet crude oil.

The Sioux are protesting because the pipeline would cross through the tribe’s ancestral lands and would jeopardize sacred places, according to the Stand with Standing Rock website. There is now an on-reservation camp called Oceti Sakowin, where all supporters of the Standing Rock are welcome to stay. The camp has attracted representatives from different native tribes, including the Haudenosaunee, also known as the Iroquois nation. At its peak, the camp has hosted 13,000 people.

The march in Syracuse was meant to show unity among the tribes and all supporters of Standing Rock. As they marched, protesters held signs and chanted, “Water is life,” and “You can’t drink oil, keep it in the soil.” Singers from the Onondaga Nation sang traditional songs and played hand drums made of buffalo hide.

The march was long, but the large crowd maintained a high level of energy throughout. The main goal, according to the march’s organizers, was to show unity.

Hugh Burnam, a member of the Onondaga Nation and a Ph.D. student at Syracuse University, started the protest with a speech. He thanked the gods of the tribe and made sure the crowd understood the main goal.

“That’s one thing that we have to keep in mind,” Burnam said, “Have a good mind about it. We have to do it in a peaceful way, that’s our way.”

The march was peaceful. While protesters chanted loudly and made their opinions known, there were no physical confrontations. Once protesters arrived at Clinton Square, young people, elders, the Haudenosaunee, university students and Syracuse community members joined hands, sang and danced.

Aline Martins | Staff Writer

Jeanne Shenandoah of the Onondaga Nation said she was glad to see so many people supporting Standing Rock.

“We are all different people,” Shenandoah said, “Many of us don’t even know one and other, but we have one thing in common: We have a responsibility to life, to this earth and to water.”

She said the situation in Standing Rock mirrors the situation with Onondaga Nation: Toxic waste is all around us.

“The water situation is everywhere,” Shenandoah said. “Look where we are, a stone’s throw from this toxic pit of industrial waste right here. This body of water that bears our name right in our homeland, Onondaga Nation.”

Brian Patterson agreed that the issue hits close to home. More importantly, he said, everyone needs to remember that millions of people depend on waters that may be ruined by the Dakota Access pipeline. He added that the issue is not just for indigenous people but also for “all of humanity.”

Jason Corwin, who visited Standing Rock last week, said the young people there give him hope.

“The young people there singing their Lakota songs and those high schoolers that are right on the front lines saying no,” Corwin said, “They’re so beautiful and when I see them I say we’ve already won.”

Corwin, like Shenandoah, said the protest was a success and it brought out people from all walks of life.

Lindsay Speer, a supporter from Neighbors of the Onondaga Nation, a support group made up of non-Haudenosaunee community members, helped organize the event. She said representatives from the Onondaga Nation contacted her to help and it only took about two weeks to plan.

They used social media to get the word out, and she said her goal was to inform the greater community of the issue at Standing Rock.

“We need to do something,” Speer said. “We need to be in the streets so people know this is going on.”

Published on November 14, 2016 at 1:23 am

Contact Aline: amarti22@syr.edu