This is a short video promoting the October 15, 2011 Day of Action that kicked off the Occupy Vancouver (and Occupy Canada) demonstrations and encampment at the Vancouver Art Gallery. It was made using footage from earlier protests against the takeover of areas of Downtown East to accommodate the activities of the 2010 Winter Olympics. These protests were part of a movement unmasking the Olympics as a massive exercise in blatant profiteering from the theft of unceded Coast Salish territory, on which Vancouver sits. What’s more, First Nations culture was co-opted and commodified in the usual fashion to help sell the games to the world.
The Occupy movement in Vancouver was forced out of downtown in late November, 2011 and pretty much fizzled without leading to much substantive change. It has developed into other movements fighting state and corporate oppression, however, and was still an exciting moment. BC’s First Nations continue to protest the theft of their land and the ongoing genocide and marginalization of indigenous peoples in Canada.
