Native Hawaiians like myself call ourselves Kanaka Maoli (Kanaka means human being. Maoli means true, real, genuine). We are the original Indigenous inhabitants of the Hawaiian islands. Thousands of years ago, we traveled from Aotearoa (otherwise known as New Zealand) and settled on the shores of Maui. We made these voyages using only traditional navigation techniques and large open canoes across thousands of miles of open Pacific Ocean. Once on the islands, we developed a highly advanced communalistic and sustainability-focused society with carefully controlled agriculture and practices to preserve the land and ensure our people could live well.

Our traditions, such as surfing, farming, astronomy (we have more than 270 Hawaiian names for various stars), and voyaging, live on. Groups like the Polynesian Voyaging Society continue demonstrating these ancient navigational techniques (think Disney’s Moana!). Hōkūleʻa, one such voyaging canoe, has traveled over 140,000 miles to discover stories of hope that are being shared with students and learners of all ages.

However, these traditions have been and continue to be under threat. Hawaii was a self-governing, sovereign, and advanced nation (think electricity and flush toilets before the White House!), with representation in pre-U.N. global political bodies, right until July 1898 when the United States annexed the Kingdom of Hawai’i. This was only after the US supported an illegal overthrow of our sovereign Queen Liliʻuokalani in 1893. Since then, Native Hawaiian culture was marginalized and oppressed, with land being stolen and given to plantation owners, the language being banned (and almost extinct), and Native Hawaiians being treated like second-class citizens in their own homes. Over a century later, the impacts are still being felt, with health outcomes, literacy, and graduation rates lagging.

The past century has had a few positives, with the United States formally apologizing to the Hawaiian people and acknowledging their participation in the illegal overthrow in 1993, and more recently, a Hawaiian cultural revolution ensuing (and continuing now), with scores of our people returning to the islands, learning our language (ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi), and engaging with our traditions and customs. We have lots of hope, but little help.

Hawaii must be seen through the words of Maui Mayor Michael Victorino: “A community first and a vacation destination second."

Hawaii has been in an unhealthy, abusive relationship with tourism for a long time. This has been long known and written about since the 90s! Tourism represents Hawaii's largest industry, around 21 percent of the state’s economy. However, few (if any) of this trickles down to locals. Tourism money goes to large off-island hospitality companies who rarely engage Kānaka Maoli (Native Hawaiians) except as cheap labor and a smiling face to say “Mahalo” insincerely to tourists like you!

These companies exploit and commodify Kānaka Maoli knowledge, culture, and labor for tourist consumption. This situation means that much of the money tourists spend in Hawaii does not stay in the local economy. For example, conference hotels tend to be owned by one of the same short list of companies we see worldwide. In fact, the CHI’s conference venue, The Hawaii Convention Center, is owned by the Hawaii Tourism Authority and managed by Los Angeles-based company AEG Live, a subsidiary of The Anschutz Corporation - an oil and gas company.

It is more accurate to say that tourism has replaced the local economy and driven out educated young professionals born on the islands. Tourism has also replaced many local industries (including tech and computing!) and displaced many Kānaka Maoli. Large percentages of Kānaka Maoli cannot afford to own homes [1, 2, 3] or live on their own islands. Over 300,000 Kānaka Maoli are displaced across the broader United States.

Locals and even political leaders in Hawaii (especially in Tech industries) often talk about the “brain drain” where the poor climate for anything but tourism and the impacts of a tourism-focused economy (i.e. high housing costs), lead some of the best and brightest locals to leave the island. This has gotten to the point where the Hawaiian government has commissioned studies to figure out the extent of young, educated professionals leaving the island.

Over-tourism in Hawaii has long been a problem and appears to be getting worse. Other figures and facts include:

• Tourism accounts for 44.7 percent of total water consumption.

• Hotels and their guests sometimes consume around 60 percent of Hawaii’s fuel and electricity.

• For decades, tourists have participated in illegal short-term vacation rentals (now via Airbnb and VRBO), eager to capitalize on the islands’ popularity. These rentals are almost exclusively owned by white non-residents, contributing to the impossibly high housing costs for locals.

• Tourists have desecrated sacred lands and touched or harassed endangered species on the island, along with significant litter and pollution.

• Homeless locals are being chased out of Waikiki to be hidden from tourists, with city officials cracking down on free food programs run by local churches.

In the eyes of most locals (Kama aina) and Native Hawaiians (Kanaka Maoli), we don't see a difference. CHI has not engaged with any local communities beyond a sliver of the University of Hawaii at Manoa’s CS department (none are Native Hawaiian or born on the island). The general chair and the entire organizing and steering committee do not live in Hawaii. The venues and organizing companies ACM CHI has contracted are not known to enlist local businesses or attempt to employ Native Hawaiians while providing benefits and livable wages. The reality is that off-shore/mainland corporations likely own most vendors large enough to accommodate CHI. Worse, the venue where CHI will be held is managed by an off-island company that is part of a large Oil/Gas conglomerate!

While some efforts were made to create a “Native Chair” (I declined to take the position) and open up CHI to school children on the island, the current lack of care exhibited on the website, social media, and elsewhere seems to say CHI will be just another conference parachuting in to enjoy the tourist scene, and then leaving for good.

In this instance, history is a guide: previous conferences that have come to Hawaii in the Human Computer Interaction area (such as UIST), never managed to make a single dent on the current low STEM-based educational outcomes for Native Hawaiians and most public schools on the island. Tourists are held in a bubble, and without concerted and long-term efforts from ACM CHI, there is likely little positive long-term outcomes for increasing STEM participation.

Conferences like CHI don’t inherently increase local participation in computing, related fields, or knowledge production more broadly. In fact, this is something that often appears in CHI conferences talking about the harms of parachute research!

Other than a handful of Indigenous scholars supported by an advisor or program, the only significant involvement of local communities in the conference is as low-paid service works or vendor support.

Solidarity with you as you try to navigate this. I appreciate your sense of justice and know this has put you in a tough spot where you worry about burning bridges and hurting your burgeoning career. This is even more important if you are in a community marginalized by computing (Women, BIPOC, Latina/x, LGBTQIA).

The gist of my advice is this: we need you here in the fight for the next (few) decades, so make choices accordingly.

I'm a well-known researcher with job security at a top place leading a (very) well-resourced lab. This is why it had to come from me– I've seen so many promising young academics with a strong sense of justice leave or get pushed out. We need you to remain.

Our liberations are intertwined, but we must care for and nurture each other, intelligently sharing the burden. When you are established, even tenured, don't forget this, and maybe take a turn at leading the way on a more just SIGCHI and ACM and beyond. Read the website, consider alternative venues, and maybe attend virtually. Make smart choices that allow you to survive and thrive, but hold on to this for the rest of your career when you have the chance to lead the way as a senior researcher on behalf of those your junior.

Generally, land acknowledgments are viewed as the bare minimum regarding respecting culture and place. They often serve merely as Moral Exhibitionism that relieves the speaker/conference and the audience of the responsibility to think about Indigenous peoples, at least until the next public event—similar to when someone says “no offense” and then proceeds to say something offensive.

Of course, some acknowledgments are sincere and come with real action, and maybe even represent positive steps in a process that continues for some communities. A land acknowledgment for Hawaii does feel odd, as the people are still on the island and working in tourism industries. So it stings!

This particular land acknowledgment from ACM CHI is particularly problematic. It was apparently lifted from a speech by the University of Hawaii Leadership when they were advocating hard to build (another) telescope on lands that have long been considered sacred. This statement was a slap in the face, a dishonest statement, to so many Native Hawaiians who were strongly against the building, many of whom are currently awaiting trial for protesting the construction.

Hawaii is beautiful, and it is important that we keep it that way. Green space on the islands has already been greatly reduced to make space for hotels and large properties. Natural resources are over-taxed because of so many tourists. Natural spaces are being ruined by visitors polluting the land and beaches with litter, and the waters with chemical sunscreen[6]. Key coral reef ecosystems are damaged by the high number of visits [5], and freshwater is an increasingly limited resource due to overuse, and pollution.

Relatedly and like in many other eco- and cultural tourism destinations, there is an often damaging physical and ecological impact on places that are sacred to Indigenous communities associated with higher traffic, and an insensitive prioritization of recreation. The increased tourism of the past decades has demanded access and a level of ownership to places of cultural relevance, means of subsistence, and even sources of freshwater that belong to the historical caretakers of the islands.

Well, hosting CHI in Eastern Asia or Oceania would be even better for people from Eastern Asia or Oceania. While Hawaii is geographically closer to Eastern Asia and Oceania than Western Europe, for example, holding CHI in Hawaii means that expensive plane travel is the only option for all. For people living in Eastern Asia or Oceania, this still means flight times of at least 7 hours or more. Furthermore, Honolulu International Airport is increasingly overcrowded and dysfunctional due to the historic increases in tourism. This means customs are slower, coming and leaving, making it more difficult for non-US citizens coming to Hawaii. This makes attending CHI expensive, inconvenient, and with no viable budget travel options, also unsustainable in light of the climate crisis.

Thank you! Right now, Hawaii is suffering from compound disasters from climate change, over-tourism, historically terrible resource management, and economic struggles. Many of these factors led to the Maui fires, which have left 90+ people dead and over 1000 people missing, along with destroying a historic and culturally significant township of Lahaina. The fires have gotten so bad that Native Hawaiians are taking matters into their own hands, delivering aid to others on the island.

The most immediate way to help is to donate to the Maui Strong Fund.