goddess divine

The Directions Tree (pictured above) was felled today at around 1.30 pm Australian Eastern Standard time.

This tree was over 300 years old. It was a place where the Djabwarrung people could go to seek spiritual guidance and to feel connected to their ancestors.

And it was cut down today, to make way for a road that has multiple other viable routes.

This has been an ongoing battle since 2018. There have been protectors on site since June 2018, and multiple attempts over the years by VicRoads to bully or intimidate protestors off the land, including getting the police to show up in drives to arrest protectors. Police have also spent the last two years specifically targeting known protectors, going so far as to jailing one (indigenous) man for six months because he had an expired drivers licence. When that one finally made it to a judge, the judge was disgusted and and threw the whole case out, cause who the hell imprisons someone for six months for having an expired licence?? Cops with a vendetta, thats who.

There have been multiple legal challenges from multiple directions over the route of this road, and the fact that the planned route requires the destruction of three indigenous heritage sites. There is an open court case at the moment, set for December, and by moving ahead with works and destroying one of the sites, VicRoads is in direct contravention of a court order.

Not only did they cut it down, they also then loaded the tree onto a truck and drove it up and down the stretch of road past one of the other sites where the protectors are camped. They know full well how devastating this destruction is, and they drove thw felled tree back and forth in front of the people who've spent three years protecting this tree, deliberately taunting them.

The destruction of the Directions Tree is an abominable crime. And its one that they want to commit again. Theres a Grandfather tree -- over 700 years old -- that is next in their firing line.

If youre in Australia, please call or email Dan Andrews (Victorian premier), Sussan Ley (Federal Environment Minister) or your local MP and protest the destruction of the Directions Tree, and ask them to protect the Grandfather Tree.

If youre international, please email them. Feel free to call, too, but international rates are pricey, and them getting flooded by international emails will be really, really helpful and will show them that the world's eyes are on them.

Dan Andrews: [email protected] . Phone number: 03 9651 5000.

They had riot police there, with machine guns.

The protectors comprise mainly of indigenous Australians, the protests have always been peaceful and there are no weapons on site with any of the protestors, and many of them are women and children, some as young as three years old.

And before anyone comes at me with "what were children doing there" let me remind you that this was a) a peaceful protest, and b) this protective camp-site has been established for over two and a half years, and has been a gathering sute for friends and family of the Djabwarrung - its been a community space, where it has been 100% safe for children to be. It has been a home, for two and a half years. The children have never been at any risk, being there ----- until the police showed up enmasse with fucking machine guns yesterday.

There are several people we havent heard from since this all went down. The last updates from some of them were just after the Direction Tree's destruction, and we haven't heard from them since. Its very probable that they're simply grieving and haven't picked up their phones. But I havent ruled out that they may have been arrested. Its unusual for all three of them -- and their kids -- to be so silent. Especially in the wake of something like this.

Until we hear definitively that theyre ok, I'm concerned. I'm emotionally devastated by this, and I wasnt on the ground at the site when it happened. I'm not indigenous, either, so while my grief over this is huge, it doesn't have remotely the depth or history of devastation that the Djabwarrung do. I cant even imagine the grief that theyre experiencing right now.

But what's absolutely without a doubt is that the Ararat Police deployed fifteen squad cars and a fucking riot squad, with machine guns, against peaceful protesters who are primarily indigenous, and women and children. Australian police, threatening indigenous women and children on their own land with machine guns.

Heres the phone number for Ararat Police, who deployed machine guns against unarmed Australian civililians: 03 5355 1500

Heres the phone number for VicRoads, who committed this crime: 13 11 71

Neither of them appear to have direct email addresses, unfortunately.

And I'll say again: VicRoads didnt just cut this tree down. They then loaded it into a truck, and drove it up and down the road in front of those who had been protecting it, like they were dragging a corpse behind a chariot. The level of disrespect is staggering. The tree shouldn't have been killed in the first place, but once it had been, at the ABSOLUTE VERY LEAST, it should have been left for the Djabwarrung to claim and do with what they will, not paraded around like a grotesque fucking trophy -- like a head on a fucking spear. Its barbaric and way beyond the pale.

Fuck, if they cut down the Grandfather tree too, its gonna be. Fucking beyond devastating, shit. Fuck

Here's a facebook page with various live updates. I cant remember if it's public or if you have to join, but its got updates from people on the ground.

[email protected] .

me:

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me: it is because I am a failure