Everyone—everything—is dying. But in this urban jungle we only see the endless repetition of the same. When a cell phone dies, we get a new one. When the ink in this pen runs dry, one can just get another. Living in this way, it’s hard to believe that things could change in a way that can’t be undone.

Spending last summer inside a tent in the Whiskey Jack Forest, about 1500 miles northwest of Toronto, I became very aware of my mortality. Judy DaSilva, a clan mother of Grassy Narrows First Nation, took me to a section of the woods where she used to come with her family to pick herbs and berries, to hunt and to trap.

That spot is now a field of dust: small evergreens planted in neat rows by university students mark the spot where the forest used to be. (Because of pesticides in the saplings, planters are warned not to take the job if they’re planning on giving birth within the next few years.) No moose, or deer or even chipmunks are in sight.

But it’s not just the wildlife that’s dying. Every year, it becomes more difficult for people from the surrounding community to live in the area. As the past is hacked away, those living on reservations are forced either to move away from their cultural communities to urban centres, or to risk dying off like the plants and animals that had once surrounded them.

Judy finds it hard to step up to the podium, before the crowd of more than 200 people at Queen’s Park last Friday. She clings to her wobbly cane. Steve Fobister’s teeth have vanished. The Grassy Narrows Band Councilor responsible for forest issues, Steve jokes that he wants shark teeth as replacements. A cotton ball is taped to one of his arms and a yellow plastic hospital band dangles from the other.

The after effects of mercury poisoning from pulp and paper mills are clearly visible from the marks on Steve’s skin. Judy says tests done on the lake sediment last year still show high levels of mercury from when the mills contaminated the rivers and lakes in the ’70s. The chemical gets passed on to Judy and Steve through the wild fish that they eat.

The changes in their aging bodies are representative of a broader global devastation. Floods, hurricanes, and tsunamis were the big headlines in the last few summers. And then there were the heat waves that swept Europe. Five hundred people died in Romania. Global warming is with me as I sit down to write on the sunny patio of a Toronto coffee shop. The temperature is in the mid-twenties and it’s almost October.

Our only chance for redemption is to be found in the carbon sinks of large woodland areas like the Boreal Forest in Northern Canada. But, even there, the strain is showing. Every day, the hairline of the Boreal recedes further, thanks to clearcut logging. The Northern Boreal is the largest intact forest left on earth, but how much longer will it stay that way?

Grassy Narrows, Ardoch Algonquin, Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug First Nations, and the Nishnawbe Aski First Nation (representing 49 First Nations in northern Ontario) are calling for a moratorium on resource extraction on their traditional land—land that locals have used for hunting, trapping, and picking berries and medicinal herbs for hundreds of years. For them, the moratorium is a matter of survival. On reservations like Grassy Narrows, where there is mass unemployment, hunting and gathering practices sustain the people financially, physically and spiritually.

For folks like me living in the big smoggy city, it is also a matter of survival—but the conveniences found in this consume/dispose cycle shelters us from that reality. We know the effects of global warming are inevitable. But in the disposable society where nothing ever really dies because everything can be replaced, we’ve remained oblivious to the consequences of our consumption.

Politicians feel they can delay a decision. Many “talk the talk” when it comes to First Nations issues, but this has yet to translate into anything other than noise here in Ontario. There is a simple reason: “Companies feed the government. They give them millions of dollars,” explains Judy. “Our protection is at the bottom of their priorities.”

After last summer’s roving blockades around Grassy Narrows reservation brought First Nations issues to the media’s attention, the provincial government entered into talks with Grassy Narrows, and former Supreme Court Justice Frank Iacabucci was appointed to lead the discussions. Iacabucci is respected by many for having negotiated settlements for members of First Nations communities who had been forced into residential schools.“I don’t know how it’ll work out,” says Judy. “But I don’t really trust the government because it’s never worked out before. I’m crossing my fingers.”

Last Friday, more than 200 environmental advocates joined Judy and other Grassy Narrows members to pressure both MPPs and electoral candidates to take action. Representatives from Christian Peacemakers Teams, Rainforest Action Network, the U of T Native Students’ Association, GlobalAware, and the Raging Grannies gathered at Queen’s Park. A ribbon for each of the 107 ridings was placed in front of the legislature to remind MPPs of their responsibilities and commitments to the Canada’s First Nations’ peoples. To remove any ambiguity, supporters laid out a 75-metre arrow which read ‘Native Land Rights Now’ to bring the message home.

Settlers living throughout Canada might find it useful to be reminded of their own past. Otherwise history will keep repeating itself: the natural world will continue deteriorating, whether we have the means to reproduce it at that same rate or not.

Carmelle Wolfson

Carmelle Wolfson

Carmelle Wolfson is a journalist based in Toronto. Her work can be found here.