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Gaia's Fist was founded in the early 2010s by a charismatic leader known as Hawke. Hawke was a former environmental scientist disillusioned by what he saw as the ineffectiveness of peaceful protest and policy advocacy in combating environmental degradation and climate change. The group initially formed from a collective of like-minded individuals, including environmental activists, disillusioned scientists, and radical thinkers who believed that drastic action was necessary to save the planet. The organization was named after Gaia, the ancient Greek personification of the Earth, to symbolize their commitment to protecting the planet by any means necessary.
In its early days, Gaia's Fist focused on direct action tactics such as tree sits, blockading machinery in logging areas, and sabotaging equipment used for fossil fuel extraction. Their operations were mainly localized and aimed at drawing attention to environmental issues while preventing specific acts of ecological harm. Over time, as their actions failed to yield the significant change they sought, the rhetoric within Gaia's Fist became increasingly radical. Encounters with law enforcement and private security at protest sites led to a hardened attitude against what they saw as a system rigged in favor of ecological destruction for profit. By the mid-2010s, the group had escalated to more destructive tactics, including arson at construction sites for pipelines and luxury resorts on environmentally sensitive land.