Real Activist Research Paper

Here in the U.S. we think of an environmental activist as a person with a picket sign fighting to save the whales outside of Sea World. However, we do not realize there is a completely new meaning to the term being built in countries like Brazil, The Philippines, Mexico, and many more. Indigenous people are being slaughtered for protecting their homes and our earth. They are being hunted down and murdered without even a mention in the local news. Injustices are committed everyday not just to the land but to the people protecting it as well. So who are the real activist? Activist killings have become a big problem within the last few years but they really started to gain attention in 2015 where according to GlobalWitness.org there were apparently
Isídos many appeals to the police and other government officials were constantly ignored and his murder was never investigated. Most government interference of lack their of has to do with revenue. Take the Belo Monte Hydroelectric Dam for example their were major concerns over the dams impact on the environment and the community but it is still being built due to its ability to generate over “$40 million for political parties”(ispsnews.net.) If you look at the deaths of many activist a lot of the people who died were in some dispute with either big business or the government directly. Vernico Nico Lapsay was shot dead by a masked gunman the same day his tribe was supposed to meet with the NCIP (National Commission on Indigenous People) to talk about large scale nickel mining. In the very few well documented cases of activism 40 of them were tied to the state or government. Not only do activist now have to worry about being assinated but also becoming fugitives in their home countries. Africa especially has shown signs of this by marginalizing activists and marking their protests