Lyn Cheedy, a Yindjibarndi elder, takes her grandson to the pool most afternoons. At first, the cold water is refreshing. Then a gust of wind hits. The wind burns you, she says. I have to keep splashing my face, and your hair is drying that quick it's like you're sitting in front of an oven. In the Pilbara, heat and cyclones are nothing new, says Cheedy. Her people have survived extreme conditions for millennia.
J ulian Canadien, a Dene man from Kakisa, Northwest Territories, is swarmed by black flies while he pulls weeds from the soil beneath his feet. The bugs don't bother him much. He's the only paid employee at the community garden, where his job is to prune and clear the rows of vegetables, water the produce, and churn the compost. And he likes his job.
White supremacy is a pandemic. In this moment in time, the shared global narrative centers around COVID-19. But white supremacy is a more pernicious virus, permeating every strata of human life for at least the last 500 years.