Editor’s note: The following event is not being organized by DGR. We stand in solidarity with it and encourage our readers to get involved if possible.
Webinar on Pornography
Our conversation will be led by Hugh Esco, a member of the Green Alliance for Sex Based Rights, an officer of the Georgia Green Party. Hugh has for years researched the pornography industry and its impact on the often trafficked ‘performers’, on consumers and their families and as a contributor to rape culture which poses a growing threat to the mental health of adolescent girls and young women; of the boys and men who want to be a part of their lives. He will be sharing a presentation first developed five years ago, which examines the pornography industry, efforts by the church, state, the courts, feminists and others to regulate it; and which has recently been updated to share new material about the current state of feminist resistance to the monopoly currently controlling the industry. After his presentation, we will open the floor for questions and discussion among the participants.
Saturday, November 4th at 2:00 pm, Eastern time zone, please translate to your timezone for your calendar.
You need to register for the event. You can do it here. You have to open in Firefox to register. The tickets are available at different rates, from $0 to $100.
A Note of Gratitude
As most of our viewers are already aware, DGR conducted an event on Ecology of Spirit on October 21. We would like to thank all who attended and showed us your support. Your kind words encourage us. We would also like to thank those who donated to us through our fundraiser and our auction. Your support will go a long way in building grassroots movements.
For those who missed, you can view the recording here:
Editor’s Note: The following is a summary of the proposed copper mining site Copperwood. Like any other mining, the proposed mine will have dire impacts on the ecology, health and human rights of the area, in this case, the Porcupine mountains and Lake Superior. The following text is compiled from the website Protect the Porkies.
Protect The Porkies is a grassroots campaign dedicated to resisting the development of a metallic sulfide mine in extreme proximity to Lake Superior, Porcupine Mountains State Park, and the North Country Trail. There has never been a metallic sulfide mine which did not contaminate water; Copperwood would be the closest such mine to Lake Superior in history; Lake Superior is the largest freshwater lake on the planet, representing 10% of the world’s surface freshwater.
It’s not hard to piece these facts together to see why the proposed mine is an atrocious and criminal idea. In a world which is getting hotter and drier, in which many cities must import water from hundreds of miles away, protecting freshwater is THE battle of our time.
All of the images on this piece were taken from Protect the Porkies.
Metallic sulfite mine would poison Lake Superior
Canadian company Highland Copper Inc. wants to drill under the Presque Isle River to seize minerals from directly beneath Porcupine Mountains State Park, the largest tract of mixed old growth forest remaining in the Midwest.
Unlike the White Pine North Mine (closed 1997 due to environmental concerns) which consisted of ore graded at 20% purity, Copperwood’s ore grade is estimated at only 1.5%, meaning that nearly 99% of mined material will be stored as 50+ million tons of heavy-metal laden waste rock on topography that slopes towards Lake Superior. Toxins of concern include mercury, arsenic, selenium, and lead. The data show that more than a third of tailings dams are at high risk of causing catastrophic damage to nearby communities if they crumble, and there are already multiple instances of serious failures.
Canadian company Highland Copper is a junior exploration company with zero experience opening and operating a mine, which already has a track record of violating permits and degrading wetlands. But they aren’t letting that slow them down: even though they lack key permits related to stream alterations and engineering of their tailings disposal facility, they have already begun their “summer site prep” of clearcutting and wetlands destruction.
Freshwater seas need protection
In addition to destroying 50+ acres of wetlands and forever altering the course of 5 streams, the project would be permitted to dump half a million gallons of wastewater per day into Namebinag Creek, which empties into Lake Superior. Namebinag Creek is also home to populations of Redside Dace, classified in Michigan as an Endangered Species requiring legal protection.
97% of Earth’s water is salt water and thus not potable. Of the remaining 3%, the majority is frozen in the ice caps and thus not accessible. Of what remains, Lake Superior represents a full 10% of the world’s surface freshwater.
There has never been a metallic sulfide mine which did not contaminate local water. The Chopperwood Mine would erect a tailings disposal facility holding 50+ million tons of heavy-metal laden waste-rock on topography sloping towards Lake Superior.
Even if the tailings dam holds, acid mine drainage is a certainty: sulfides will combine with water and air to create sulfuric acid — a.k.a. battery acid — which then steeps over waste-rock and river sediment to leach heavy metals into the environment.
The last old-growth forest
98% of this planet’s old growth forest have been cut. The 35,000 acres in Porcupine Mountains State Park represent the largest tract of mixed old growth remaining in the Midwest.
Let’s be clear: Porcupine Mountains State Park is not just any park. In 2022, the Porkies were ranked by users of Yelp.com as the “most beautiful State Park in America.” But company maps suggest Highland Copper seeks to drill beneath the Presque Isle River and extract minerals from directly under old-growth forest on Park property.
The mine would subject the area to heavy metal dust spewed up from hundreds of meters underground, to catch and carry on the wind for miles in all directions; twice-daily subterranean blasts which are known to disrupt the reproductive cycles of aquatic life; noise pollution and light pollution which will further impact the mating rituals and calls of wildlife. And it’s unlikely that acid mine drainage will turn around upon reaching the Park entrance, only a 15 second drive from the mine entrance road.
Clearcutting enables wildfires
Already Highland Copper has clearcut hundreds of acres of so-called “secondary” forest in preparation for the Chopperwood Mine. But there’s nothing secondary about the importance of such woods— in addition to existing for their own sake and providing homes for countless organisms, forest which is allowed to mature becomes a barrier against wildfires. As trees grow old, they develop thick fire-resistant bark and shed their lower limbs, thus creating a diverse canopy which is difficult to burn. In the dense shade below, mosses, lichens, and liverworts move in, and the ground grows into a moist sponge.
By replacing moist, shady conditions with hot dry desert with increased airflow, right in the middle of the woods, Highland Copper has greatly increased this area’s risk of wildfire. Not convinced? Consider that the Peshtigo Fire, the deadliest fire in American history, started specifically in a logging town.
At a time when wildfires are ravaging so many parts of the world, we should be doing everything we can to help our secondary forests mature, not replace them with a desert.
No more dark night skies
On the bluffs overlooking Lake Superior, the Presque Isle Campground at Porcupine Mountains State Park is one of the most popular in the Midwest. As a rustic campground, there is no electricity and no sewage dump. In just a short walk, visitors may reach three stunning waterfalls on the Presque Isle River or go fishing or swimming at the lakeshore.
Unfortunately, the Chopperwood Mine — in addition to subjecting the area to subterranean blasts, air pollution, and noise pollution — would be lit up like a casino all night long, effectively eliminating a clear view of the starry sky not just for the Presque Isle Area, but for miles around, potentially as far as Black River Harbor, another area of outstanding beauty.
In the 21st century, is there anything scarcer than a good view of the stars?
Home of wolf packs and fish
The 1500 acres encompassed by the mine site fall smack in the middle of a wolf pack’s territory, specifically the pack which travels between Black River Harbor and Presque Isle. It is one of only three wolf packs in the region.
A healthy, happy wolf pack is far scarcer than copper, and more valuable too. It is well known that large deer populations may over-browse riverbanks and bluffs around lakes. By keeping the deer population in check, wolves effectively prevent erosion— quite the opposite of Highland Copper, which is actively annihilating wetlands and rerouting streams.
The Anishinaabe Indians — also known as the Ojibwe — have fished the Presque Isle River and Lake Superior for hundreds of years and always been well-nourished. Unfortunately, fish are bio-accumulators of heavy metals, just like the kind which would be spewed from Chopperwood’s exhaust vents and leached from river sediment via acid mine drainage.
Redside Dace — an endangered species
In the 2009 biological monitoring report, populations of Redside Dace were found in both Namebinag and Unnamed Creek — two streams passing through the mine site which are planned to be rerouted. The Redside Dace is an Endangered Species in Michigan, and the Fishbeck, Carr, and Thompson report clearly states:
“Populations of Redside Dace within the Copperwood site should be protected from human-related impacts.”
Reishi provides medicine
Among the inhabitants of the ecosystem directly adjacent to the mine site is the Northern Reishi Mushroom (ganoderma tsugae). Prized for thousands of years in Chinese and Japanese medicine as “the Mushroom of Immortality,” the Reishi grows exclusively on Eastern Hemlock trees. Given that the Porkies hold the largest remaining tract of old growth Eastern Hemlocks — which have been all but eradicated in the East by the woolly adelgid — it is thus host to the largest and purest population of medicinal Reishi mushrooms in the country.
Unfortunately, like fish, mushrooms are bio-accumulators of heavy metals. One day, will mushroom foragers stop picking the Reishi for fear that a medicine has become a poison?
The last wild coastline
Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither was industrial sprawl. First you build a network of roads, then you build a mine, then you build parking lots for your 100 or so employees, then those employees want to live nearby so they buy up land and build houses, before you know it there’s a sewage system, an electrical grid, and a proposal to connect the Presque Isle Scenic Area to Black River Harbor via highway, right along some of the last wild coastline remaining, and though such a thing was once inconceivable, it now strikes us as perfectly reasonable, because the mine and its infrastructure have already paved the way.
You may think this scenario sounds like fear-mongering, but just look around you and the proof is everywhere: roads already press against the North Shore in Minnesota and Canada and along all the other Great Lakes. None of it happened overnight: such development unfolds not at the pace of a Hollywood action film, but at an ooze over the course of years, decades, lifetimes. Ecologists refer to this as the Shifting Baseline Syndrome. If we don’t draw a line in the sand now, soon there will be nothing left to draw a line in front of.
A temple in hell
As we moderns come to spend our time increasingly immersed in artificial environments — staring at screens and slogging through traffic — pilgrimages into the peace of Nature fulfill a crucial role: walking along the Presque Isle River, breathing deep the conifer-filtered air while listening to the hush of waterfalls— such experiences are sacred to many. Hindus, Christians, Muslims, Buddhist, atheists and animists too — all are welcome in the Universal Church of Nature.
By threatening this thriving outdoor recreation area with rock grinding, heavy metal exhaust, light pollution, industrial traffic, and acid mine drainage, Highland Copper might as well be burning a temple.
The operation would likely lead to audible rock grinding and subterranean blasts using toxic ammonium nitrate which would be felt for miles around, both on the North Country Trail and in the Presque Isle Scenic Area of the State Park, and possibly even at Black River Harbor. As with the development of Eagle Mine in Marquette County, we can expect non-stop industrial traffic on County Road 519, heavy metal-laden dust from exhaust vents which travels far from its source on the wind. Given that the Copperwood is a metallic sulfide mine, there remain concerns regarding acid mine drainage — irreversible contamination of wetlands and waterways.
Indigenous history
Nawadaha, Manido, and Manabezho— these are the three waterfalls of the Presque Isle Scenic Area, which still bear the names of Anishinaabemanitous.
Long before Michigan, long before the arrival of Europeans, the Anishinaabe fished and foraged these lands. There was a nomadic settlement at the mouth of the Presque Isle River. Later, at that same beach, the Anishinaabe met to trade with French trappers. To this day, park-goers find arrowheads and other artifacts on the shore.
What tribute do we pay to this fine history by allowing a foreign company to contaminate these waters, spew heavy metal dust on the wind, and potentially even drill beneath the River, beneath the old growth, even beneath Lake Superior?
Though the situation may seem dire, there is still time to build opposition:
Highland Copper will not decide whether or not to greenlight construction until 2024, and they are still lacking $250 million required to initiate their project. But in the meantime, they are already clearcutting forest, rerouting streams, and destroying wetlands, so there is no time to lose.
If we as a society do not draw a line in front of protecting freshwater seas and old growth forest, then it means we won’t draw a line anywhere, and that is a very scary place to be as a species. So please, join the campaign today by taking action:
Sign thepetitionand pass it on to others; in 2024, we plan to bring the petition off the Internet and into the real world by hand-delivering it to the Governor’s office.
Reach out to Michigan’s politicians; even if you are not a resident, tell them that the outdoor recreation industry in Michigan is over 10 times the size of mining, and no state which entertains such an atrocious project will receive a single dollar of your tourist money.
And remember, Protect The Porkies is not an organization— we are a movement, and everyone is invited to be a part. We won’t win by following their playbook, but by using our creativity to come up with our own.
DGR conducted its annual fundraiser on Ecology of Spirit. If you have missed it, you can view it here. You can also visit our auction for paintings, books, brownies and conversations. The auction will remain open till October 31.
Editor’s Note: The following is a testimony that Will Falk gave at Truth, Reckoning and Right Relationship with the Great Lakes on October 16 at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on the shore of Lake Erie, Cleveland. Here, Will relates Robert J. Lifton’s concept of claims to virtue to the destruction of the natural world. No matter how many stories we build to justify our destruction, at the end, the destruction of the natural world is never going to be ethical, and is going to destroy all life on Earth – including humans.
On April 17, 2013, while living in Milwaukee, WI and working as a public defender, I tried to kill myself in my apartment a few blocks from the shore of Lake Michigan. After I was released from the hospital – and while I was recovering, trying to understand what led me to the decision to try to take my own life – I spent every morning that spring and summer on a big red granite boulder listening to and watching Lake Michigan.
I heard her gentle freshwater waves breaking on sand. I heard the cries of sea gulls. I heard soft summer rains fall on the lake with the joyful song of water completing the long journey from the Earth’s surface to the clouds, across oceans and continents, to fall into the welcoming arms of more freshwater. I saw great blue herons stalking bluegill fish in the shallows. I watched bugs, butterflies, and songbirds crisscrossing the breeze, their flight patterns sewing stitches of color in the air. I smiled while children, celebrating their summer freedom, swam, played, and learned what it means to be human in a classroom far older than school.
Listening and watching like this pulled me from the despair that caused me to attempt suicide. Lake Michigan gave me the medicine I needed to recover. Lake Michigan truly saved my life. And, through my memories of that beautiful time, Lake Michigan continues to save my life.
Of course, the natural world also gives us life. All life depends on clean water, healthy soil, a habitable climate, and complex relationships formed by living creatures in natural communities. The Great Lakes are some of these natural communities. Because so much life depends on the Great Lakes, the needs of the Great Lakes are primary. Social morality must emerge from a humble understanding of this reality. Law is integral to any society’s morality, so law must emerge from this understanding, too.
One breezy June day in 2013, filled with gratitude because the natural world saved, gave, and continues to give me my life, I vowed to spend the rest of my life trying to save the natural world’s life. I am a lawyer. Law is one tool we have in the fight to protect the natural world. One of the first problems anyone who tries to use law to protect the natural world encounters is that our legal system is rooted in an assumption that the natural world is mere property for humans to use, exploit, and destroy. This is one of the main reasons we’re living in a time of intensifying ecological collapse – a time when humans may, in fact, be capable of destroying Earth’s life support systems.
I do not believe it is human nature to destroy the natural world. I believe it is human nature to recognize our kinship with the natural world, to recognize that the natural processes giving us life are sacred. I believe that it is human nature to insist that all of our relatives in the natural world, all of the processes giving us life, must be protected. My beliefs are supported by the reality that our ancestors lived for hundreds of thousands of years in traditional cultures that did not push the planet to the brink of total ecological collapse. All of those traditional cultures taught that nature is sacred and that we have a responsibility to protect our other-than-human kin.
So, what happened? If it is human nature to treat the natural world as sacred, why does our legal system currently objectify the natural world?
The simple truth is that people who are willing to exploit the natural world will, in the short term, always have more power than those who respect the boundaries of nature. Human cultures that are willing to take more from the land than the land freely gives eventually exhaust their land. When this happens, these cultures are confronted with a choice: either they look for new lands to take what they need or they collapse. Either they impose boundaries on themselves or they find new boundaries to break. When these exploitative cultures conquer new peoples and lands, their exploitative ideologies replace life-centered, traditional ideologies.
The history of the colonization of this continent is a crystal clear example of how this process has played out in history. Europeans exceeded the carrying capacity of their homelands and began establishing colonies around the world to funnel resources back to Europe. This process, which is ongoing, is genocidal and ecocidal. Traditional communities are massacred for defending the land. Traditional cultures are destroyed or driven underground because their teachings question whether all of this is inevitable. And, all of this is done, ultimately, to control the land and resources.
The psychologist, Robert Jay Lifton, who devoted his career to understanding the psychological justifications that made the Holocaust possible wrote in a 2014 New York Times opinion piece, “Over the course of my work, I have come to the realization that it is very difficult to endanger or kill large numbers of people except with a claim to virtue.” Lifton explained that the Nazis didn’t characterize their actions as mass murder, they were “purifying the Aryan race” and “creating more living space for Germans.” Here, Americans have made and use similar claims to virtue to justify atrocities. As Americans pushed Native peoples onto reservations and stole their land, they weren’t engaged in genocide against Native peoples, they were manifesting their destiny.
We can extend Lifton’s idea to the natural world. It is very difficult to destroy the natural world and kill large numbers of other-than-humans except with a claim to virtue. At the heart of one of the most dominant European mythologies – Judeo-Christianity – are claims to virtues like the one found in the Bible’s Book of Genesis where people were taught that they “have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on earth.” Armed with that justification, and the technologies made possible by that justification, Europeans have come to dominate this land and her indigenous peoples.
Western legal systems, heavily influenced by Christianity, provide more of these claims to virtue. Humans are not destroying whole natural communities with mines, pipelines, crops, and clearcuts, they are simply exercising their property rights. Corporations that pump toxins into lakes and rivers are not polluting, they are complying with democratically-enacted regulations. Conversely, humans trying to pass rights of nature laws are not protecting their kin, they are depriving corporations of due process and equal protection.
I hate to reduce the Great Lakes – beings so ancient and so powerful – to an argument based in human self-interest. Regardless, know this: Human bodies are mostly water. If you’re one of the estimated 35 million people in the United States and Canada who depend on Great Lakes watersheds and you’re hydrated right now, the Great Lakes are literally part of you. If carcinogens continue to be pumped into the Great Lakes, if climate change burns more of the Great Lakes away and causes algal blooms to become worse and more frequent, if oceangoing, industrial vessels continue to drag species that push native species to the brink of extinction into the Great Lakes, you will be harmed. No claim to virtue can protect you from that. This is, unfortunately, ecological reality.
If we’re truly going to stop the destruction and return human cultures to right relationship with the natural world, we must change our legal system from one that objectifies nature to one that recognizes that the needs of the natural world are primary, that the health of the Great Lakes is more important than the health of the economy, and that in killing our relatives in the natural world, we are killing ourselves.
We must insist that our legal system becomes biophilic or biocentric as opposed to anthropocentric. Biophilia means the love of life – of all life. Law must protect sea gulls and summer rain; blue herons and bluegill; bugs, butterflies, and songbirds; rivers, forests, grasslands, the Great Lakes, and all the human children who depend on them.
Anything less is simply suicidal.
Will Falk is an attorney, writer, poet, activist, and organizer with Protect Thacker Pass. Protect Thacker Pass is an “independent, grassroots collective of people” protecting the land and all life from a proposed lithium mine in the Central Basin, Nevada. For Thacker Pass Facebook click here.
DGR conducted its annual fundraiser on Ecology of Spirit. If you have missed it, you can view it here. You can also visit our auction for paintings, books, brownies and conversations. The auction will remain open till October 31.
Editor’s Note: Since the 2009 climate conference in Copenhagen, states and corporations alike have relied on the assumption that energy companies can be persuaded to rethink their business and initiate a transition process towards “renewable” energy and engagement in the “green” economy. That reliance has only increased since the climate talks in Paris in 2015.
Carbon trading and REDD+ are only some examples. In this scheme, every country gets a quota of carbon emissions. Heavily industrialized countries, instead of trying to meet the quota, can pay to exceed the quota. This fund is then used to reimburse less industrialized countries who emit less carbon than their quota.
In other words, they get paid to not deforest. While it may seem like a win-win situation, it is difficult to justify how this scheme actually helps reduce carbon emissions. This article from 15th September 2023 highlights some of the problems with the carbon credit system.
“Biodiversity, the climate, and Indigenous people or local communities are losing out on what should have been a system to drive meaningful financial flows to the forest conservation projects that so desperately need it,” said one expert.
Echoing previous warnings from climate advocates and studies, an environmental watchdog on Friday released research from experts at the University of California which shows that trying to offset fossil fuel emissions with popular forest carbon credit projects “is a pipe dream.”
As the new Berkeley Carbon Trading Project assessment—funded by Carbon Market Watch (CMW)—explains, “The voluntary carbon market generates credits, each nominally equivalent to one metric ton of carbon dioxide reduced or removed from the atmosphere, from a wide range of projects around the globe.”
Carbon credits don’t stop deforestation
Critics have long argued that carbon credit schemes are “false solutions” that harm poor communities where such projects are based and enable companies worldwide to greenwash their polluting activity rather than implementing reforms or investing in action to actually combat deforestation and the climate emergency.
“Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) is the project type that has the most credits on the voluntary carbon market—about a quarter of all credits to date,” the assessment details. “These projects pay governments, organizations, communities, and individuals in forest landscapes (primarily tropical ones in the Global South) for activities that preserve forests and avoid forest-related greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.”
Over the past two decades, more than $3 billion has been poured into REDD+ and nearly half a billion carbon credits have been awarded, yet “deforestation is still continuing at an alarming rate,” the report notes. Berkeley researchers’ analysis of four methodologies that have generated almost all REDD+ credits—under Verra, the largest voluntary carbon market registry—revealed that estimated GHG emissions reductions were dramatically exaggerated.
“We found significant over-crediting from all of the factors we reviewed, the core causes of which are a combination of incentives and uncertainty,” said Barbara Haya, who led the research. “Everyone involved in the voluntary carbon market, from the buyers and sellers of credits, to the registries who write the rules and the auditors who enforce them, all benefit from more credits.”
“Large uncertainty in climate benefit calculations creates many opportunities for market participants to choose assumptions that inflate credits issued,” Haya added. “Drawing on all evidence, we conclude that REDD+ is ill-suited for carbon offsetting.”
As a CMW briefing published with the assessment summarizes:
Project baselines are significantly overestimated, the research found, leading to the creation of carbon credits that represent imaginary emission reductions.
Similarly, leakage is systematically underestimated by projects, which make use of flexibilities provided to them by the methodologies to downplay the risk of deforestation moving to areas outside of their project.
The creation of low-quality carbon credits is further fueled by exaggerated estimates of the quantity of carbon stored within the trees that are protected by projects.
The risk that the trees protected by REDD+ projects will die in the future is also drastically underestimated by projects, which again use methodological flexibility to misrepresent the real deforestation threat that forests will face in the future.
Finally, the safeguards implemented by Verra are weak, do not protect communities from harm, and are not properly upheld by the validation and verification bodies.
Business over conservation projects
Verra released a lengthy response to the new assessment, which welcomed “the insight of the broader scientific and environmental community into our work on nature-based solutions,” but also said that “it is important to note that the vast majority of findings and recommendations from this research align with extensive and systematic work to update the Verified Carbon Standard (VCS) Program that Verra has carried out over the last two years.”
Inigo Wyburd, a CMW policy expert on global carbon markets, said that “we welcome Verra’s willingness to engage with our research and hope that it will take on board our findings and implement all of our recommendations.”
“Businesses are offsetting their emissions on the cheap by buying low-quality carbon credits connected to forest protection projects in the Global South,” the expert added. “When only 1 in every 13 carbon credits represents a real emissions reduction, their action is lost in the forest.”
Meanwhile, as Gilles Dufrasne, CMW’s policy lead on global carbon markets, highlighted, “biodiversity, the climate, and Indigenous people or local communities are losing out on what should have been a system to drive meaningful financial flows to the forest conservation projects that so desperately need it.”
“Offsetting should be axed,” he argued. “It cannot work in its current form, and carbon markets must evolve into something different. The focus should be on getting money to the right place, rather than getting as many credits as possible.”
This is absolutely STAGGERING.
The #UAE is reportedly set to buy 10 PERCENT of #Liberia in a bid to offset its carbon emissions
The territory, which includes already protected land, holds no guarantee it will actually offset any emissions at all #COP28https://t.co/qfaY1OYq7r
— Patrick Galey is on @patrickgaley.bsky.social (@patrickgaley) September 15, 2023
As Patrick Galey, senior fossil fuels investigator at Global Witness, pointed out on social media Friday, the new research was released as the African nation Liberia is preparing to sign an offsetting agreement conceding 10% of its territory to Blue Carbon, a private company in the United Arab Emirates led by a member of an Emirati royal family.
Middle East Eyereported late that month that the deal for “control of one of the most densely forested territories” on the continent “would violate a number of Liberian laws, including the 2019 land rights law.” Additionally, as CMW policy expert Jonathan Crook told the outlet, “there’s no clarity as to what will be done to calculate what emission reductions have taken place.”
IndoMet in the Heart of Borneo, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
DGR conducted its annual fundraiser on Ecology of Spirit. If you have missed it, you can view it here. You can also visit our auction for paintings, books, brownies and conversations. The auction will remain open till October 31.
Editor’s Note: The following is an excerpt from Wild Yoga by Rebecca Wildbear. It pushes us to connect with the land. The Earth is suffering due to us. The excerpt encourages us to feel her suffering, which is intricately connected to our suffering. Finally, it inspires us to make amends by showing up, by our actions in defense of her.
Nature is an unrelenting symphony. Everywhere there is life, there is song. Flowers bloom. Mountains stand. The moon glows. The planet is always singing. Each note is a unique contribution that tends to the well-being of the whole. Humans are meant to live in sync. For decades, I have asked trees and birds, ocean and sky, canyons and creeks to help me be as authentic and soulful as they are. The world needs the bitter and resonant cry of every creature, even humans, attuning with the song of the world.
We can connect to our bodies, hearts, and souls and bring our presence to the unfolding moment. And remember how to play in the improvisational spontaneity of the universe. Lying under an oak, I am mesmerized by the long, wavy branches that stretch parallel a few feet above the ground. The shape of the oak’s branches reminds me of a song. Music is a human instinct found everywhere. It is a social glue that brings people together and creatively expresses what can’t be put into words. What if we could engage with each other and the world the way jazz musicians make music?
Playing our notes is not only a sound we make with our voices or instruments. It is our soul taking form through the shapes we make with our lives when we embody the truth of our nature, live our purpose, and offer ourselves in relational flow with other humans and the Earth. Those who live their souls are playing their notes, being their melody.
The Earth needs us to become who we are. Perhaps she longs for humans to honor and contribute to her magnificence. Our souls can only be lived in union, playing our notes while attuning to the symphony that connects us to ourselves, others, the land, and those who came before and will go after.
The symphony of the Earth is life-giving. But how can we harmonize with our dominant culture rapidly removing so many wild voices from the orchestra? Some birds — like the once abundant regent honeyeater — are forgetting their song. With hardly any adult birds left, young birds cannot find other honey-eaters to teach them. As we witness species dying and the murder of eco-systems, what difference can our notes make amid this dissonant nightmare?
I have rarely asked mind-altering plant medicines for help. This is because I have already received so much guidance from nature and my dreams. But in my late thirties, I was wrestling with the horrors of ecological devastation and wanted more help. So I asked ayahuasca, an Amazonian brew made from the stalks of the Banisteriopsis caapi vine and leaves of the Psychotria viridis shrub, and I participated in six ceremonies with a curandera who sang sacred prayer songs while playing her guitar. The first two rituals steeped me in the love of my tree mythos. The third forced me to wrestle with the horrors of the world.
After drinking the tea from these plants, the intensity hit me in the belly. I felt panic like I was about to disappear and would no longer feel my arms and legs; I feared I would eventually lose my mind. Trying to remain in my body, I stomped my feet and hit my hands against each other. Everyone else must be fine, I thought, blaming myself for feeling crazy. I went outside and wrapped my body around a juniper. One of the helpers came out.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
“I’m having a hard time,” I admitted.
“Surrender,” she said. “It’s our egos that are the problem.”
I went back inside, lay on the ground, and let myself disintegrate. It was peaceful, like going to sleep. But when I got up, waves of horror consumed me. I felt like I was drowning in raw sewage with no way out. After one wave passed, I thought it was over, but there were more. They seemed endless. Some waves were a sludge of overwhelming emotions — confusion, dread, disappointment, devastation. I looked around the room. Everyone was suffering. I realized, This is not a trip; it is life, the state of the world. We are suffering. The Earth is suffering.
The music had stopped. Some people were throwing up. An older man with white hair and blue jeans got up. He held a couple of large hawk feathers and gently waved them over a bowl of water in the center of the room.
“Water,” he said softly, “we’re so sorry.” Gently, he walked around the bowl, humbly speaking to the water. “It’s our fault you suffer. We are suffering with you. Thank you for all you give, for nourishing everything. We don’t deserve your help, but please help us.”
Earlier, I had seen the white-haired man chain-smoking and had judged him. I had not realized that he was so eloquent, more than I could be. I felt ashamed I had not seen his wisdom. He moved around the circle and prayed over each of us, one by one.
The waves of horror were hard to tolerate. My chest was tight. I could barely breathe. My lungs worked hard to expand as I fought for air. I had the visceral sense that this was what forests, oceans, and mountains experience all the time. The impact the Earth feels from our dominant culture. It was not a thought but an overwhelming, full-bodied experience.
“Offer something,” the ayahuasca seemed to say.
“I have nothing valuable to give,” I said.
“All the world is suffering, and you’re just going to sit here!” She seemed incredulous.
“I don’t sing well,” I said.
“You could pray … or something.”
“I can’t come up with anything.”
“You’re a guide,” she pointed out.
“The suffering is too intense,” I responded.
“The world needs you to show up,” she reminded me.
I realized that sometimes I get consumed by suffering and discount what I might have to give. She was imploring me to show up and be available to the song that wanted to come through me. Everyone is suffering, she was showing me, and the symphony is dissonant. Yet the Earth suffers and gives. We can too. It is not a matter of healing first, then acting. It is a matter of connecting with yourself and the Earth and singing.
No one knows what will happen next. Injustice and genocide have been going on for a long while. Land and people have been exploited and destroyed for thousands of years. We need to be with the horror and the beauty. Psychic numbing removes us from the symphony. Compassion means “to suffer with.” Feeling pain may be a sign we are present with what is happening and aware of our connection to it.
Nature and our souls can give us visions so we can face the challenges of our times and engage. I guide others in their deep imagination to see back in time and remember. To return to places on the land where they have a deep connection. To listen to what the land needs. To call forth an image of the myth they were born to live. To move and dance the mysteries of what they came to embody in the world.
Horror is part of the symphony. The world needs our ensouled presence. Listen. Feel. Be present. Offer your note. Our engagement is our love.
Wild Yoga Practices for Playing Your Part in the Symphony
Attune to the world and explore ways to play your part. Trusting what you have to offer or hearing those around you may take time.
Listen to the songs of ancient cultures or your ancestors. What do they evoke in your heart, body, and imagination? Journal about or move to embody what you discover.
Wander in the wilderness. Listen to the sounds you hear from trees, water, wind, insects, and birds and the sounds you experience visually and through your other senses. Notice what or who allures you. Engage by offering sounds or movement in response.
Go out on the land and play. Offer your melody. If you don’t know what that is, explore different sounds or movements. Perhaps create a song for the land and sing it aloud. Notice where you feel drawn to offer your song. Listen for anything you hear back.
Track your dreams. Do any of them carry the theme of ancestral music, playing your note, or hearing the world’s symphony? Speak one of your dreams aloud in nature, using the present tense, and then enact it. Play your part by embodying what the dream asks.
Go to a wild place and witness how the land plays. Notice how each being engages with all the others in an improvisational movement. Try joining in. Let go of expectations and see what co-arises mutually.
Do you feel conflicted about playing your note in a broken world? Or about how to harmonize with the natural world when our dominant culture is killing the other voices? Wander on the land and share your questions and feelings. Ask for help.
# # #
Rebecca Wildbear is the author of Wild Yoga: A Practice of Initiation, Veneration & Advocacy for the Earth. She is also the creator of a yoga practice called Wild Yoga, which empowers individuals to tune in to the mysteries that live within the earth community, dreams, and their own wild nature so they may live a life of creative service. She has been leading Wild Yoga programs since 2007 and also guides other nature and soul programs through Animas Valley Institute. Visit her online at http://www.rebeccawildbear.com.
Species extinction. Plastic pollution. Global warming. Catastrophic floods. Raging fires. The failure of coral reefs. Whales dying en masse. Forever chemicals contaminating mothers’ breast milk. Where is our spirit?
Our planet is in crisis. And while the wealthy and governments pour trillions into technological so-called “solutions,” things are spiraling out of control.
What if solving the ecological crisis depended on falling in love with the natural world, and acting to defend those we love?
What if a biocentric worldview — one which places the natural world at the center of our morality — could help us access the courage needed to stop the destruction?
On October 21st, join us for special 3-hour live streaming event on Facebook or Givebutter:
Ecology of Spirit: Biocentrism, Animism, and the Environmental Crisis — “the spirituality of the front lines.”
This live event will explore the connectedness of all life and focus on organized resistance to the destruction of the planet.
It starts at 1pm Pacific Time / 20:00 UTC, and features selectedspeakers including:
Tiokasin Ghosthorse
Tiokasin Ghosthorse is a member of the Cheyenne River Lakota Nation of South Dakota and has a long history with Indigenous activism and advocacy. Tiokasin is the Founder, Host and Executive Producer of “First Voices Radio” (formerly “First Voices Indigenous Radio”) for the last 27 years in New York City and Seattle/Olympia, Washington.
In 2016, he received a nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize from the International Institute of Peace Studies and Global Philosophy. Other recent recognitions include: Native Arts and Cultures Foundation National Fellowship in Music (2016), National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship Nominee (2017), Indigenous Music Award Nominee for Best Instrumental Album (2019) and National Native American Hall of Fame Nominee (2018, 2019).
He was also awarded New York City’s Peacemaker of the Year in 2013. Tiokasin is a “perfectly flawed human being.”
Suprabha Seshan
Suprabha is a conservationistand environmental educator committed to the rewilding of habitat and human beings. She lives and works at the Gurukula Botanical Sanctuary (GBS) in the Western Ghat Mountains in India, which she often describes as a refugee center for hundreds of species of plants which are rescued from threatened places, and for the wildlife who they support.
Learning from nature to protect nature better is the work of GBS, through its integrated conservation practices in land, species and community-based ecological nurturance. On behalf of the GBS team, Suprabha received the prestigious Whitely Award for Nature in 2006.
Derrick Jensen
Derrick Jensen is a leading voice of cultural dissent. A longtime activist living in Northern California, he has been described as an “ecophilosopher in the anarcho-primitivist tradition.”
He explores the nature of injustice, how civilizations devastate the natural world, and how human beings retreat into denial at the destruction of the planet. His work examines the central question, “If the destruction of the natural world isn’t making us happy, then why are we doing it?”
Keala Kelly
Keala Kelly is a filmmaker and journalist living on Hawai’i Island. Her works depict the critical links between cultural, Film, and spiritual survival in the movement for Hawaiian self-determination and Indigenous peoples’ struggles for territorial and environmental survival.
She is an outspoken advocate for Indigenous self-representation in mass media. Keala is a Ted Scripps Environmental Journalism Fellow and has an MFA from UCLA’s School of Theater, Film and Television.
Lierre Keith
Lierre Keith is an American writer, radical feminist, food activist, and environmentalist. She began her public involvement in the feminist movement as the founding editor of Vanessa and Iris: A Journal for Young Feminists (1983–85).
During this same period, she also volunteered with a group called Women Against Violence Against Women in Cambridge, where she participated in educational events and protest campaigns.
In 1984 she was a founding member of Minor Disturbance, a protest group against militarism from a feminist perspective. In 1986 she was a founding member of Feminists Against Pornography in Northampton, Massachusetts. She is a founding editor of Rain and Thunder, a radical feminist journal in Northampton.
Sakej Ward
Sakej (James Ward) belongs to the wolf clan. He is Mi’kmaw (Mi’kmaq Nation) from the community of Esgenoopetitj (Burnt Church First Nation, New Brunswick). He is the father of nine children, four grandchildren and a caregiver for one. He resides in Shxw’owhamel First Nation with his wife Melody Andrews and their children.
Sakej has a long history of advocating and protecting First Nations inherent responsibilities and freedoms, having spent the last 21 years fighting the government and industry. This deep desire to bring justice to all Indigenous people has given Sakej experience in international relations where he spoke on behalf of the Mi’kmaq Nation at the United Nations Working Group for Indigenous Populations (WGIP).
For his efforts in protecting Indigenous people, freedoms and territory he has received the National Aboriginal Achievement Award.
Will Falk
Will Falk is a writer, lawyer, poet and environmental activist. The natural world speaks and Will’s work is how he listens. He believes the ongoing destruction of the natural world is the most pressing issue confronting us today. For Will, writing is a tool to be used in resistance.
Will graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School and practiced as a public defender in Kenosha, WI. He left the public defender office to pursue frontline environmental activism.
So far, activism has taken him to the Unist’ot’en Camp – an indigenous cultural center and pipeline blockade on unceded Wet’suwet’en territory in so-called British Columbia, Canada, to a construction blockade on Mauna Kea in Hawai’i, to endangered pinyon-juniper forests in the Great Basin, and to Thacker Pass in northern Nevada where Will is trying to stop an open pit lithium mine from destroying a beautiful mountain pass.
Rebecca Wildbear
Rebecca Wildbear is a river and soul guide who helps people tune in to the mysteries that live within the Earth community, dreams, and their own wild Nature, so they may live a life of creative service. She has been a guide with Animas Valley Institute.
A long-time yoga teacher (since 2003) and a former faculty member at Nosara Yoga Institute (2008-2017), Rebecca created Wild Yoga™ — a practice of worship, veneration, and advocacy for Earth — while teaching yoga in a variety of wild places, including the tide pools of Costa Rica, the mountains and rivers of Colorado, and the ancient red rock canyons of Utah.
Max Wilbert
Max Wilbert is a third-generation organizer who grew up in Seattle’s post-WTO anti-globalization and undoing racism movement. He has been an organizer for more than 15 years. Max is a longtime member of Deep Green Resistance and serves on the board of a small, grassroots non-profit. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Environmental Communication and Advocacy from Huxley College.
His first book, a collection of pro-feminist and environmental essays written over a six-year period, was released in 2018. He is co-author of the forthcoming book “Bright Green Lies,” which looks at the problems with mainstream so-called “solutions” to the climate crisis.
Alan Clements
Alan Clements was one of the first Westerners to ordain as a Buddhist monk in Myanmar (formerly Burma). In 1984, forced by the dictator Ne Win to leave the country, Clements returned to the West and lectured on ‘The Wisdom of Mindfulness.’
In 1988, Alan integrated into his Buddhist training an awareness that included universal human rights, social injustice, environmental sanity, political activism, the study of propaganda and mind control in both democratic and totalitarian societies, and the preciousness of everyday freedom.
In the jungles of Burma, in 1990, he was one of the first eye-witnesses to document the mass murder and oppression of ethnic minorities by Burma’s military dictatorship, which resulted in his first book, ‘Burma: The Next Killing Fields?’ In 1995 a French publisher asked Alan to attempt re-entering Burma with the purpose of meeting Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of her country’s pro-democracy movement and 1991 recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.
The transcripts of their five months of conversations were smuggled out of the country and became the book ‘The Voice of Hope’.
Other special guests will attend the session as well. There will be opportunities to ask questions and participate in dialogue.
The mainstream environmental movement is mostly funded by foundations which don’t support revolutionary change. Radical organizations like Deep Green Resistance rely on individual donors to support our activism around the world, which is why “Ecology of Spirit” is also a fundraiser.
We’re outnumbered and we need your help.
There is a path out of the this crisis, and DGR is one of the organizations leading the way. But we can’t do it without you. We’re raising funds to support global community organizing, fund mutual aid and direct action campaigns, and sustain our core outreach and organizational work.
Whether or not you are in a financial position to donate, we hope you will join us on October 21st for this opportunity to connect with kindred spirit offering light in dark times!–
Editor’s Note: This is a press release regarding the wildlife photographer of the year selected by Natural History Museum, London. Nature photography, in the correct context, can be an efficient tool for conservation efforts. It not only helps to know about any given piece of land, but also is a powerful tool to raise mass awareness regarding conservation and endangered species. In a world where most humans live their lives, to a large extent, disconnected from the natural world, nature photography can help remind people of the natural world and to inspire a sense of respect for her.
French underwater photographer and marine biologist Laurent Ballesta was awarded for Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2023 for ‘The golden horseshoe’, an otherworldly image of a tri-spine horseshoe crab accompanied by a trio of golden trevallies.
The tri-spine horseshoe crab has survived for more than 100 million years but now faces habitat destruction and overfishing for food and for its blue blood, used in the development of vaccines. But, in the protected waters of Pangatalan Island in the Philippines, there is hope for its survival.
Chair of the jury and editor, Kathy Moran says, ‘To see a horseshoe crab so vibrantly alive in its natural habitat, in such a hauntingly beautiful way, was astonishing. We are looking at an ancient species, highly endangered, and also critical to human health. This photo is luminescent.’
Laurent is only the second photographer in the competition’s fifty-nine-year history to be awarded the Grand Title award twice. He was first awarded Wildlife Photographer of the Year in 2021 for his intriguing image of camouflage groupers exiting a milky cloud of eggs and sperm in Fakarava, French Polynesia.
Young Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2023
Seventeen-year-old Carmel Bechler from Israel was awarded Young Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2023 for his ‘Owls’ road house’, a dynamic frame of barn owls in an abandoned roadside building. Using the family car as hide, Carmel made the most of natural light and long exposure times to capture the light trails of passing traffic.
Carmel was just 11 years old when he began wildlife photography, and this is his first award in the annual competition. ‘I hope to share with my photography that the beauty of the natural world is all around us, even in places where we least expect it to be, we just need to open our eyes and our minds,’ says Carmel.
‘This photograph has so many layers in terms of content and composition. It simultaneously screams “habitat destruction” and “adaptation”, begging the question: If wildlife can adapt to our environment, why can’t we respect theirs?,’ says Kathy Moran.
Catalyst for change
The two Grand Title winners were selected from 19 astounding category winners that showcase the rich diversity of life on Earth. In an intensive process, each entry was judged anonymously by an international panel of experts on its originality, narrative, technical excellence, and ethical practice.
Dr Doug Gurr, Director of the Natural History Museum comments, ‘Whilst inspiring absolute awe and wonder, this year’s winning images present compelling evidence of our impact on nature – both positive and negative. Global promises must shift to action to turn the tide on nature’s decline.’
The newly redesigned exhibition also features videos showing the impact wildlife photography can have, and insights from jury members, photographers and Museum scientists to invite visitors to advocate for the natural world. The journey continues online with planet-positive actions audiences can take. The exhibition will tour across the UK and internationally to venues in Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, New Zealand, Singapore, and more.
Exhibition at Natural History Museum, London
Opens Friday 13 October 2023 and closes Sunday 30 June 2024.
The exhibition is open Monday – Sunday, 10.00-17.50 (last admission at 16.30), and weekends sell out quickly.
Adult tickets from £17.50*, concession tickets £14.00*, and child £10.50*.
Off-peak Ault tickets from £15.00, off-peak concession ticket £12.00, and off-peak child ticket £9.00 (*Prices excluding optional Gift Aid donation to the Museum.)
Get behind the lens of some of the world’s best wildlife photographers with a new Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition tour: www.nhm.ac.uk/events/wildlife-photographer-of-the-year-tour
Sixtieth Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition
Opens for entries on Monday 16 October 2023.
Closing for entries at 11.30am GMT on Thursday 7 December 2023.
Entrants to the adult competition may enter up to 25 images for a £30 fee, which increases to £35 in the final week of the entry period from 11.30am GMT 30 November to 11.30am GMT 7 December 2023.
An entry fee waiver has been introduced for photographers entering the adult competition who live in Africa, Southeast Asia and Central and South America.
Entrants aged 17 and under may enter up to 10 images for free.
Editor’s Note: The impact of climate change has begun to impact the financial market. Insurance companies aim to make profit on risk coverage. However, if the risk for any sector runs too high, they tend not to invest in that. Nuclear reactors are a common example. Private insurance companies do not insure nuclear reactors as the associated risks are too high. With the rapidly increasing climate change, however, insurance in even the housing market has become too costly. The article describes this phenomenon.
From California to Florida, homeowners have been facing a new climate reality: Insurance companies don’t want to cover their properties. According to a report released today, the problem will only get worse.
The nonprofit climate research firm First Street Foundation found that, while about 6.8 million properties nationwide already rely on expensive public insurance programs, that’s only a fraction of 39 million across the country that face similar conditions.
“There’s this climate insurance bubble out there,” said Jeremy Porter, the head of climate implications at First Street and a contributor to the report. “And you can quantify it.”
Each state regulates its insurance market, and some limit how much companies can raise rates in a given year. In California, for example, anything more than a 7 percent hike requires a public hearing. According to First Street, such policies have meant premiums don’t always accurately reflect risk, especially as climate change exacerbates natural disasters.
This has led companies such as Allstate, State Farm, Nationwide, and others to pull out of areas with a high threat of wildfire, floods, and storms. In the Southern California city of San Bernardino, for example, non-renewals jumped 774 percent between 2015 and 2021. When that happens, homeowners often must enroll in a government-run insurance-of-last-resort program where premiums can cost thousands of dollars more per year.
“The report shows that actuarially sound pricing is going to make it unaffordable to live in certain places as climate impacts emerge,” said David Russell, a professor of insurance and finance at California State University Northridge. He did not contribute to the report. “It’s startling and it’s very well documented.”
Russell says that what’s most likely to shock people is the economic toll on affected properties. When insurance costs soar, First Street shows, it severely undermines home values — and in some cases erodes them entirely.
The report found that insurance for the average California home could nearly quadruple if future risk is factored in, with those extra costs causing a roughly 39 percent drop in value. The situation is even worse in Florida and Louisiana, where flood insurance in Plaquemines Parish near New Orleans could go from $824 annually to $11,296 and a property could effectively become worthless.
“There’s no education to the public of what’s going on and where the risk is,” said Porter, explaining that most insurance models are proprietary. Even the Federal Emergency Management Agency doesn’t make its flood insurance pricing available to the public — homeowners must go through insurance brokers for a quote.
First Street is posting its report online, and it also runs riskfactor.com, where anyone can type in an address and receive user-friendly risk information for any property in the U.S. One metric the site provides is annualized damage for flood and wind risk. Porter said that if that number is higher than a homeowner’s current premiums, then a climate risk of some kind probably hasn’t yet been priced into the coverage.
“This would indicate that at some point this risk will get priced into their insurance costs,” he said, “and their cost of home ownership would increase along with that.”
Wildfires are the fastest growing natural disaster risk, First Street reported. Over the next 30 years, it estimates the number of acres burned will balloon from about 4 million acres per year to 9 million, and the number of structures destroyed is on track to double to 34,000 annually. Wildfires are also the predominant threat for 4.4 million of the 39 million properties that First Street identified as at risk of insurance upheaval.
“You don’t want someone to live in a place that always burns. They don’t belong there,” he said. “We’re subsidizing people to live in harm’s way.”
First Street hopes that highlighting the climate insurance bubble allows people to make better informed decisions. For homeowners, that may mean taking precautions against, say, wildfires, by replacing their roof or clearing flammable material from around their house. Policymakers, he said, could use the information to help at-risk communities adapt to or mitigate their risk. In either case, Porter said, reducing threats could help keep insurance rates from spiking.
Ultimately, though, Russell says moving people out of disaster-prone areas will likely be necessary.
“Large numbers of people will need to be relocated away from areas that will be uninsurable.” he said. “There is a reckoning on the horizon and it’s not pretty.”
Photo: Wildfire in Santa Clarita, California in October 2007. Photo by Jeff Turner via Wikimedia Commons
Ecology of Spirit
Species extinction. Chemical pollution. Global warming. The death of the oceans.
Our planet is in crisis. And while the wealthy and governments pour trillions into technological so-called “solutions,” things are spiraling out of control.
What if solving the ecological crisis depended on decolonizing our minds and altering our very cosmology?
What if a biocentric worldview — one which places the natural forces shaping our world at the center of our morality — could help us access the courage we’ll need to stop the destruction?
On October 21st, join us for special 3-hour live streaming event: Ecology of Spirit: Biocentrism, Animism, and the Environmental Crisis. Access the event on https://www.facebook.com/events/
This event will explore issues of biocentrism with a focus on direct relationship to the spirit world and on organized political resistance to the destruction of the planet. There will be opportunities to ask questions and participate in dialogue.
The mainstream environmental movement is funded mainly by foundations which often do not support foundational or revolutionary change. Radical organizations like Deep Green Resistance therefore rely on individual donors to support our activism around the world, which is why “Ecology of Spirit” is also a fundraiser.
We’re raising funds to support global community organizing, fund mutual aid and direct action campaigns, and sustain our core outreach and organizational work.
Editor’s Note: Today we bring to you a podcast episode of the Chris Hedges Report, where Chris Hedges talks to Will Potter about the resistance of the people against the mega-project Cop City in Atlanta, Georgia, US. Will Potter is an investigative Journalist and the author of Green is the new Red. Down below the video you’ll find the transcript. And news about a similar destructive city-project is coming up:
Stop Eco City – Indonesian mega-project threatens local communities
Indonesian officials want to evict 7500 indigenous villagers from their homes on Indonesian Island Rempang near Singapore to make way for an industrial and tourism hub called Rempang Eco City. With this 17.000 hectar project the Indonesian government aims for $26.6 billion in investment by 2080 and for creating 35.000 Jobs.
Local residents and advocates oppose the eviction and take part in mass protests. They say that the development will remove them from their traditional fishing communities. A part of the mega-project will be the construction of a Chinese glass factory: Xinyi Glass – the world’s largest producer of glass and solar panels.
Environmental activists fear that Eco City, just like the mentioned Cop City, will harm the environment. On the Archipelago one hour by boat from Singapore the shorelines contain silica sand and quartz sand which will be used as raw materials for producing solar panels. This is one of several development projects by Indonesia’s president with the goal of increasing Indonesia’s GDP and global competitiveness.
Chris Hedges:
When police in Atlanta stormed a music festival in March being held by activists protesting Cop City, the proposed $90 million police and firefighter training center that would be built on forest land, 23 of the activists were arrested and one, Tortuguita, a 26-year-old Indigenous environmental activist and community organizer was shot and killed. Those who were arrested were accused of carrying out acts of vandalism and arson at a Cop City construction site over a mile from the music festival under Georgia’s domestic terror statute, although none of the arrest warrants tie any of the defendants directly to any illegal acts.
Cop City is yet another complex designed by the corporate state to train police in urban warfare. The plans include military-grade training facilities, a mock city to practice urban warfare, explosives, testing areas, dozens of shooting ranges, and a Black Hawk helicopter landing pad. “It is a war base where police will learn military-like maneuvers to kill Black people and control our bodies and movements,” Kwame Olufemi of Community Movement Builders points out. “The facility includes shooting ranges, plans for bomb testing, and will practice tear gas deployment. They are practicing how to make sure poor and working class people stay in line so when the police kill us in the streets again like they did to Rashard Brooks in 2020, they can control our protests and community response to how they continually murder our people,” he said.
But just as ominous as the militarization of domestic police forces and training complexes to turn police into internal armies of occupation is the use of terrorism laws to charge and imprison activists, protestors and dissidents. Former Chicago Tribune reporter Will Potter, in his book, Green is the New Red, documents how terrorism laws are used to crush dissent, especially dissent carried out by animal rights and environmental activists. He likens the campaign to McCarthyism in the 1950s and warns that we are on the cusp of cementing into place a police state.
Potter, who became a vegan when he was a student at the University of Texas, participated in a canvassing campaign organized by a group called Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty while working at the Tribune. The goal was to close down the laboratory of Huntingdon Life Sciences, which still uses animals for testing. The organizers were arrested for trespassing, and then Potter got a firsthand look at what was happening to civil liberties in the United States. Two FBI agents appeared at Potter’s apartment demanding information about the group. If he refused to cooperate, he was told his name would be included on the domestic terrorist list. Potter would eventually leave the paper to report on the government’s intimidation of activists, including nonviolent activists who spoke out against the corporate state and the seizure of political and economic power by the 1%. Joining me to discuss the Orwellian world being erected around us is Will Potter.
You open the book in the Chicago Tribune newsroom. We both come out of the newspaper industry. I think we both worked at one point in the Dallas Morning News, and there’s a story, you’re sent out to cover the killing of a child. And I think for those who don’t come out of that environment, they don’t understand the cynicism, maybe even numbness that takes place in those newsrooms and how difficult that is if you actually care. I mean, I always say there’s two types of reporters, the ones who care and the ones who don’t. That’s the real divide in a newsroom. It’s not politics. But let’s just open with that since we both come from that environment.
Will Potter:
Yeah, I think that’s a great observation. I mean, it’s something that journalists, we rarely ever talk about. That kind of environment is one in which in order to survive just the onslaught of daily news and blood and guts and violence and kind of despair that comes with it, you have to really get a hardened shell. And I think that’s kind of fetishized a little bit in journalism. We embrace that machismo and just kind of push full steam ahead without acknowledging trauma and acknowledging some of these things that we encounter. And that’s certainly an environment I felt I encountered at multiple newspapers. Like you said, I think like a lot of people, you go into news with ideas about making a difference in the world, educating the public, allowing and creating an environment for change and social change to happen. But it can be quite crushing and cynical, as well.
Chris Hedges:
Well, those news organizations will beat that out of you if you let them.
Will Potter:
Very quickly.
Chris Hedges:
Very quickly. Exactly. Let’s talk about the Huntingdon Labs. You were just handing out leaflets, I think, or something. I mean, it was pretty innocuous.
Will Potter:
Yeah.
Chris Hedges:
Explain what it was, why it’s important, and then I want to go in, because this was a pivotal moment in the animal rights movement.
Will Potter:
It was. This was a pivotal campaign, and in that moment when the FBI agents came to my door, that time period was pivotal in the campaign, also. And so as a little bit of background, this laboratory had been exposed multiple times by undercover investigators working with groups like PETA, and they had documented egregious acts of cruelty, things like punching beagle puppies repeatedly in the face because the technicians were frustrated at their small veins to get an injection or dissecting a monkey that was still alive. And all of this was caught on video and was used in a very savvy way to mobilize and push forward this emerging movement.
What was different about this campaign compared to other animal rights or other protest campaigns is they operated quite differently. I mean, they were not intended on having signs and banners outside of the laboratory because they knew the lab didn’t care. The people in the lab didn’t care and the people investing in this lab didn’t care. So they started targeting the finances of this company. They went after everyone from UPS to toilet paper suppliers. Anyone who had business in any way with the laboratory was the target of protests. Sometimes this was kind of spontaneous demonstrations, sometimes this was as simple as people anonymously putting stickers or wheat paste or breaking out a window. I mean, the campaign was really that diverse, from these really kind of small, seemingly insignificant acts of sabotage or even harassment to mass protests outside the laboratories.
What happened is that it was so incredibly successful internationally that it brought the campaign near bankruptcy. And as that was happening, these corporations mobilized their allies in Congress and they worked together behind closed doors in order to label these protest groups as terrorists and ultimately to convict them and send them to prison as terrorists, as well.
Chris Hedges:
And we should be clear, so Huntingdon, which still exists under another name, but it’s Envigo I think is who bought up-
Will Potter:
That’s right.
Chris Hedges:
Right. So at the time, it was killing between 71,000 and 180,000 animals a year, and these animals were being killed to test for household cleaners, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, pesticides, and food ingredients for major companies such as Procter and Gamble, Colgate, Palmolive. In the book, you write about the two kind of major organizations that confront of animal activists. One is the underground organization, that’s groups like Animal Liberation Front, and then the aboveground groups. And the underground groups I think at one point invaded the labs and caused significant damage. And the aboveground groups, the ones who ended up being prosecuted, engaged in nonviolent activity and organizing. But the relationship between those two groups, we’ll get into it later, but the ones who engaged in nonviolent traditional organizing ended up in essence being charged for the crimes of the underground organizers, even though they had nothing to do with it. But talk about those relationships.
Will Potter:
That’s really the heart of this entire protest campaign and the heart of why I think this case sets such a dangerous precedent for social movements. In the sixties in the anti-war movement, there was a phrase among activists that, “We didn’t do it but we dug it,” meaning I was not engaged or I don’t know who was engaged in illegal protest activity against the war, but it was loosely in the name of the same cause and it was nonviolent, and so I will support it. And that was the mentality of Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty. And specifically they ran a website, and on this website everything related to the campaign was published. Everything from those stickerings and wheat pastings that I mentioned all the way up to groups like the Animal Liberation Front doing things like stealing animals from laboratories and breaking into facilities connected to HLS, and also property destruction, vandalism, sabotage. In the scheme of this protest movement, though, there were no targeting of human beings. I mean, this is something that Animal Liberation Front has made sure of for decades and something the organizers of SHAC were very passionate about.
Chris Hedges:
SHAC, by the way, is Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty.
Will Potter:
That’s right.
Chris Hedges:
That’s the organization that was organized to confront Huntingdon.
Will Potter:
They’re the ones who were organizing this protest campaign. And really by organizing, the government said this was a couple of people in a house in Philadelphia and in New Jersey that were running a website. And as news came in on the website, there was a real intensity around this at the time. I mean, this was kind of pre-social media. In a lot of ways, I would argue this was one of the first digital campaigns of this new era that relied heavily and even almost exclusively on online organizing. And so what the government argued, as you indicated, is that by the SHAC organizers, by the aboveground lawful groups saying through their words and their website that they support the ideology of those crimes and they also support people doing them, they thought that this was all legitimate in the name of this struggle, the government argued that this created a conspiracy and that conspiracy created an environment that allowed the illegal activity to take place.
So in other words, the people who ran the website were never accused at any point of doing any of the illegal things that were on the website or for that matter, the legal things that were on the website, but the government in this ambitious court case argued that they needed to be held responsible for creating a criminal conspiracy under the Animal Enterprise Protection Act. So these activists were convicted of animal enterprise terrorism, is the name of the charge, conspiracy to commit that and conspiracy to violate the telecommunications law, which means that they were collaborating across state lines in order to protest this multinational company.
Chris Hedges:
So in your book, you write that the reason terrorism laws, this of course was in the wake of 9/11, the reason terrorism laws were employed against animal rights activists was because the corporations were being hurt. And they essentially prodded the political leadership in both parties, beholden to corporate money, of course, to declare these kinds of activities, even nonviolent activities, as acts of terrorism. They also, through tremendous resources, surveillance resources at these groups, I think if I remember correctly, in your book you say it’s the longest criminal investigation by the FBI in US history or something. You write about a woman, her name, she went by the name Anna. Her real name was Zoe Elizabeth Voss, a paid FBI informant. We saw this with Muslims after 9/11, where she provided the money, the logistics, at one point a cabin that the FBI wired to essentially prod people to discuss carrying out a bombing that never took place.
There’s this one poor 26-year-old kid who kind of falls for her and it was entrapment. I think he ended up spending a decade in prison, but the FBI withheld 2,500 pages of evidence. And so he got a what, a 20-year sentence roughly and served 10. You write that the FBI is estimated to have had 15,000 informants in these environmental and animal rights groups. Let’s talk about the tactics that were employed against these groups.
Will Potter:
I think the most important tactic is the recognition of the power of language. And that’s something that began really in the 1980s when industry groups made up, I mean they actually invented the term ecoterrorism and they were quite proud of it. And for the next several decades, as you know, there was an international focus on terrorism in a very different context. So in that time through the eighties and nineties, there wasn’t a lot of headway on these corporate efforts. I mean, there were gains being made, without a doubt, but what I found in my research is that after September 11th, the infrastructure and the strategies that were being developed and honed for decades leading up to 9/11 were implemented incredibly quickly and boldly after the attack, to the point where as first responders were still trying to clear survivors from the rubble after 9/11, you had multiple members of Congress speculating that the terrorist attacks were the work of environmentalists or animal rights activists. I mean, that’s the kind of climate that these groups created.
In that climate where the unreasonable becomes reasonable, where you’re blaming nonviolent groups or saboteurs for the most costly loss of life in US history, in that environment, they were able to kind of manipulate other structures to push this agenda. And what I would kind of summarize is that they really did this in three ways. There were three parts to their playbook. There were legal efforts, there were legislative efforts such as creating new terrorism laws and new protest restrictions, and then there was what I would call extra legal or operating outside of the law. And that’s where some of these informant tactics come in.
The FBI has been called to the carpet multiple times by their Inspector General’s office and oversight boards for the rampant misuse of informants. And that certainly has taken place in the animal rights and environmental movements, but this has also been corporate-driven, as in corporations hiring private investigators in mercenary firms that operate outside of the very little restrictions that the FBI has to pursue activists and to create dossiers on them. We’ve seen this not just in the campaigns we’ve talked about so far, but also in things like the Standing Rock protest and the Keystone Pipeline protests where these major corporations are sitting down, and I literally have some of the documents showing it, that they give PowerPoint presentations to law enforcement. They identify protestors, they recommend prison sentences in specific criminal statutes that can be used to go after their opposition. At really every step of the way, these corporate groups have sat down and worked in lockstep with the FBI and with those mercenary companies.
Chris Hedges:
Yeah. Well, you talk about fusion centers, so these are state programs that essentially collate or put together information coming from various law enforcement agencies, but they also work, as you point out in the book, with these corporate security firms. When I went to Standing Rock or you couldn’t, they blocked the roads, and the people blocking the roads were wearing Kevlar vests and carrying long-barrelled weapons with no identification. They were private security drawn from police, drawn from military. And so there’s this kind of centrifugal force where all of these entities are coming together to target these activists with tremendous amounts of resources. The film The Animal People is a documentary about this campaign, and in that documentary you show or there’s an attempt to show the staggering kind of sums of money and manpower that’s been put in to crush these groups.
Will Potter:
Oh, the amount of resources is just, it’s unbelievable. I mean, as you all with this show, you’re monitoring social movements and protest campaigns and you know how little resources these activists have. And so as one of the defendants, one of the protestors put it, when you see those court papers that say the United States versus Will or versus Chris or whatever it is, it really is that full weight of the US government combined with the full weight of the corporate state. In addition to some of the things you’ve mentioned like how this was the largest domestic terrorism investigation in US history, they’ve thrown just an ungodly amount of money into making these policies happen.
One thing that I would throw out is when these activists were awaiting prison sentences on the Huntingdon campaign, so they were already convicted under this ambitious previous law called the Animal Enterprise Protection Act. They were already being sentenced to prison as terrorists for a protest campaign. And politicians and members of Congress and also these corporate representatives were simultaneously arguing, “Our hands are tied. We need more power, we need more money, we need more funding, police resources.” And like you said, I think you put it quite well, that there is this kind of centrifugal force that emerges of this revolving door of state agencies and private sector, and really that’s what’s happened with this issue. Those forces together have worked over the last several decades to turn nonviolent protestors into the FBI’s, “Number one domestic terrorism threat.” And it’s really because of their money and influence.
Chris Hedges:
They also have twisted the courts. Maybe you can talk about the terrorism enhancement laws. These can add 20 years to sentences. They can, in some cases, quadruple sentences. And let’s be clear, these are nonviolent crimes.
Will Potter:
And this was something, the terrorism enhancement is something that was passed by Congress after the Oklahoma City bombings by right wing groups who killed, up until that time, was the most civilians that had ever been targeted. So in this kind of specter of fear of violence, that’s when this provision was passed. And instead, it’s been deployed to elevate the sentences of nonviolent environmental protestors that were convicted, for instance, as part of the Earth Liberation front. Those sentences not only are exacerbated by the terrorism enhancement, but it also redefines who these prisoners are.
I saw that personally visiting prisoners after they’ve been sentenced, and also in my interviews with countless former prisoners, that their experience once they’ve been classified that way is quite different. These activists in general have very little priors. They have no serious criminal history, and yet after being sentenced for their protest activity, they can end up in medium or even maximum security facilities. They are called red tagged by the BOP, by the Bureau of Prisons, and red carded. That means they have to sometimes carry and wear a large red card identifying them as a high risk terrorism inmate. They’re treated differently by guards, they’re singled out.
The ramifications of this in terms of from a human rights perspective extend far beyond just the disproportionate and I would call malicious sentencing of these protestors. It really redefines them. And I think that’s, to me, one of the most surprising takeaways of this language of terrorism is that even though it began as a public relations maneuver, it’s completely taken on a life of its own to the point where it’s worked its way into bureaucracies within power that kind of self-replicate these systems after people have even been convicted.
Chris Hedges:
Well, they’re put in management control units. I went out to Marion, Illinois, and I know you went out there as well in the book, which replaced Alcatraz as the kind of supermax prison. Now we have in Florence the kind of latest iteration of that. But I went out to visit Daniel Hale, who leaked the drone papers, and he, again, it’s a nonviolent crime. In fact, he shouldn’t even be in prison, but he, like these activists, was placed in a high security prison in the middle of farmland, the middle of nowhere, but in a special, highly restrictive unit. And that’s what’s happened to many of these activists.
Will Potter:
To be clear, I think when people, in my experience, start hearing about things like this, there’s a tendency to either think one, that can’t be true because this is the United States, or similarly, something like, “Well, this only happens in X, Y, or Z other country that has a disdain for human rights.” And the truth is that there’s actually a long history of using political prisons in the United States in these types of cases, including for social movements that we now regard by members of Congress even in these kind of heroic terms, the anti-war movement, the Black liberation Movement, the American Indian movement, all have been targeted. And many of those protestors ended up in experimental prisons.
What’s I think significant here is these communications management units were opened as clearly, explicitly political prisons for political prisoners, targeting prisoners because of their communications and their ideology. People were sent there because of their, “Anti-corporate and anti-government beliefs,” according to government documents. And as this is happening, it further codifies and cements political repression. It is stabilizing and really introducing what are quite extreme tactics of destroying and subverting social movements, and has turned them into something that’s now part of the official government apparatus. And these CMUs, these secretive prisons are now being codified into the law, and they are receiving more and more prisoners every year. What started as an, “Extreme response by the government for dangerous and violent prisoners,” is now being used against people that are very far from that. And I think that’s the mission creep that we see and that you’re really pointing to here.
Chris Hedges:
Yeah. We just have a few minutes left right in there about the loyalty oaths that mainstream environmental groups, Sierra Club, Greenpeace, National Wildlife Federation, were kind of called upon to denounce these underground groups, which unfortunately most of them rapidly did or quite willingly did. But let’s talk about where we are now. This has created the foundation for a very frightening kind of police state where any kind of dissent becomes terrorism. And that’s why I opened with the incident in Cop City.
Will Potter:
And that’s exactly why I’ve been following Cop City so closely as well, because the dynamics that we’ve talked about are really starkly on display in that campaign. Not just the repressive tactics, but the movement tactics, as well. I mean, it’s a similar dynamic to that Huntingdon Life Sciences campaign where in the Cop City protest, you have people that are protesting, writing letters, working with church groups, running websites, doing free concerts like you mentioned, offering free childcare, food, all of these kind of multiple aspects of movement organizing. And then you also have people that have sabotaged property and broken the law.
And what the state has done in this case is argue that all of it, the entire campaign is reflective of domestic terrorism, anarchism and threats to public safety. So that dynamic is still at play. So is that, I think it’s right to call a loyalty oath that’s being put on mainstream organizations. If you run a national group, it’s understandable why it would be tempting to come out and publicly condemn someone who vandalized a bulldozer because you run a nonprofit, you have donations and staff, and you’re not involved in protest activity like that, and you certainly don’t want to be at risk threatened by the FBI. And that’s the type of fear that they prey into.
And what happens, though, is when more mainstream and established groups start making public comments about the radicals with Cop City or the Anarchists, which is the kind of classic boogeyman that has rolled out, it drives a wedge. And I think in terms of state repression, the intention is to drive a wedge between these social movements inside themselves, between the aboveground and the more radical groups, and then to drive a wedge between Cop City protestors and everyone else in the more liberal or mainstream left. And they do that by really tightening the screws on mainstream organizations that have something to lose.
Chris Hedges:
Yeah. Although as you point out in your book, these nonviolent protestors ultimately get charged for acts they did not commit. I’m not going to go into the details. People should read the book and watch The Animal People, the documentary, but they weren’t even physically there. They didn’t even know these things were happening in many cases, but they’re charged.
Will Potter:
In the Cop City case, it gets even more just kind of surreal. I mean, you have bond hearings where protestors are being denied and police are pointing to mud on their shoes as evidence-
Chris Hedges:
Right, right, right.
Will Potter:
[inaudible 00:30:33]
Chris Hedges:
That’s right, muddy clothes.
Will Potter:
Muddy clothes, black hoodies. The raids of some of these activists that happened recently in Georgia, the warrant, I have to tell you, I don’t think either of us would look very good if we were raided, Chris. I mean, our bookshelves can be quite incriminating. And that’s the type of stuff that they’re listing in these warrants and then dragging into court as evidence of illegal activity. And I think that’s why it’s so important for mainstream organizations to fight back militantly against what is happening right now. Staying silent has never protected social justice groups from political repression like this, period. Historically, it has never worked. It has never worked to try to cozy up to corporations or to politicians hoping that they’re not going to be targeted in the backlash, because what happens every single time is at the point you become truly effective, at the point you become a true threat to business as usual is when the full weight of that apparatus is deployed.
So I think that what we’re seeing in Cop City, I’m not going to say I’m I optimistic or hopeful yet. I mean, I am a journalist after all, but it is quite inspiring, I’ll say, to see church groups, community groups, and the diversity of voices that have come out against Cop City. And to me, I think that’s really the best defense that we can have against these tactics is bringing everyone under the tent and saying very loudly that we’re part of this same movement, the same cause, and we’re not going to be singled out as terrorists to stop us.
Chris Hedges:
Great. I want to thank The Real News Network and its production team, Cameron Granadino, Adam Coley, Dwayne Gladden, David Hebdon, and Kayla Rivara. You can find me at chrishedges.substack.com.
Speaker 4:
And the Chris Hedges report gets some extra time now with a few minutes of bonus material with Chris and his guest.
Chris Hedges:
So in this second part, I want to ask you about the underground/aboveground groups. I was very involved in the Occupy movement and very critical of the black bloc and critical of property destruction, because I thought it was effectively used by the police and the state to demonize the Occupy movement. And it didn’t achieve much, especially in cities like Oakland, where throwing a trash can through a window in a Oakland is… Ishmael Reed, who lives in Oakland said, “If they want to throw a trash can through a window, why don’t they go up to La Jolla where the rich people live and throw a trash can through,” Mitt Romney apparently has some kind of estate up there, his place.
So I’ve always been very critical. The other thing, and I think this is captured in your book, and it was something that I often said to Occupy activists, is you just go back and read COINTELPRO. That’s kind of the primer on how it works. They have so many resources that the only effective strategy is transparency and the kind of the azan provokatörs, they love the black bloc because they could cover their faces so they couldn’t be identified. But you’re much more forgiving to the underground groups. But I just wanted you to address that.
Will Potter:
Yeah, I think those are valid critiques. I feel like the more I’ve been immersed in this for so many years now, the more I’ve kind of come to believe one, how little I know about ultimately what tactics work and what don’t, but to a greater point, seeing the response of the FBI and the state to a wide range of protest activity. So I think that the argument could be made that seeing property destruction like you see in a black bloc protest, it could give the immediate pretext in that moment for a political crackdown on those groups of spreading to other movements at that time. But what I’ve seen more broadly is that the repression that activists experience seems to have very little to do with the legality or the tenor of their actual tactics, if that makes sense.
So for instance, the underground groups who have done things like break into laboratories, steal animals, burn down buildings, I mean, at some cases these are very serious property crimes that someone could have been hurt. But what we’ve seen in the last few years is the FBI and the industry, I guess on the animal rights side of things more broadly, has focused on national groups. They’ve been much more concerned with undercover investigators in criminalizing photography and people that document animal abuse on farms.
And so I guess to respond to your question, I see that there is kind of a spectrum that exists in protest activity, and really the determining factor of whether any of that activity is going to be hit with intense state repression is whether it starts moving the needle. I feel a little bit naive, I’ll admit, in the last few years to see how quickly, rapidly and forcefully these tactics have been deployed against activists who had no sensible connection whatsoever to anything illegal. Right? I mean, for years, that’s what they said in going after the Animal Liberation Front and Earth Liberation Front. “We have to crack down on these radicals. We have to go after the black bloc.”
And what we’re seeing is that the FBI seems much less concerned with that on the whole right now than it does about true movement building. So I don’t know where this goes from here. I don’t know if those tactics are going away. I feel like anytime that there is a heavy-handed or a violent response from the state, we might see protest tactics like that, but we’re also seeing in Cop City, I think a lot more sophistication and movement creation and bringing lots of different people together and not, I guess I’ll say not turning some people off with some of those tactics that you mentioned.
Chris Hedges:
I want to talk about what’s happened. At the end, the movement, the Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty Movement does cripple the lab, but it’s bailed out, and then eventually it merges with other laboratories, Harlan Labs, NDA Analytics, et cetera, and creates this new super company, Envigo. What’s the lesson from that?
Will Potter:
Well, it’s kind of a similar story from your time in Occupy, right? That they’re too big to fail. That’s what the industry said with HLS, with vivisection industry, but also just all these diverse industries that have something to do with animals rallied behind them because they said, “If HLS falls, if this lab falls, everybody’s going to be vulnerable.” And I think that kind of too big to fail mentality is what caused people to rally behind such an abusive, corrupt facility as this one. And it also really speaks to just the overwhelming power of these industries.
My work focuses on political repression, which is pretty dark and depressing beat, but you also see the strength of social movements. And in this case, the industry was absolutely terrified about a protest campaign that was being run by a half a dozen people, allegedly in the United States with a couple of computers and who were bringing a multinational company to the point where it’s kicked off the New York Stock Exchange and kicked down to the pink sheets in the market makers. I mean, this was the power of this movement, and it just rattled them to their core. And I think that fear is still there. I mean, that’s why we still, there isn’t a campaign like this happening right now, but I think you’re still seeing this level of repression and kind of paranoia by corporations because they know it’s possible and they know this is always right around the corner.
Chris Hedges:
Well, they also know what they’re doing, which is why they hide it.
Will Potter:
Oh, without a doubt. Without a doubt. Jon Stewart used to do a good bit on his show called Evil or Stupid, where he would debate something and be like, “Oh, this is happening because they’re so horribly evil.” And then the other guy would say, “Oh no, it’s because they’re so stupid.” And I kind of do that a lot with this issue, but I think I firmly come down on the side of evil. I have to say that after seeing this for so long, there is nothing unintentional about any of these maneuvers. There’s some people that are just following orders. But as you mentioned with the SHAC case, when that was happening in New Jersey, Chris Christie was one of the people that was really trying to make a name off of it, just to give you an idea. And these are political opportunists. They’ve used this war on activism to make a name for themselves as being tough on crime or tough on terrorism and to catapult their careers.
I think we’re still going to be seeing that for quite some time. In the fallout of January 6th and the rise of fascist groups internationally, more and more people are going to be fighting back because we don’t have a choice but to fight back against it. And I think that state apparatus is going to be employed against them, as well.
Chris Hedges:
Great. That was Will Potter. His book is Green is the New Red, and you can see the documentary, which he is in, The Animal People, it’s on, where is it? On Amazon?
Will Potter:
Yeah, you can watch it on all the streaming stuff.
Chris Hedges:
All the streamings have it. Yeah, it’s a great documentary. Thanks, Will.
Stop Eco City – an Indonesian megaproject threatens local communities
Indonesian officials want to evict 7500 indigenous villagers from their homes on Indonesian Island Rempang near Singapore to make way for an industrial and tourism hub called Rempang Eco City. With this 17.000 hectar project the Indonesian government aims for $26.6billion in investment by 2080 and for creating 35.000 Jobs.
Local residents and advocates oppose the eviction and took part in mass protests. They say that the development will remove them from their traditional fishing communities. A part of the Eco City will be the construction of a Chinese glass factory: Xinyi Glass – the world’s largest producer of glass and solar panels.
Environmental activists fear that Eco City, just like the above mentioned Cop City, will harm the environment. On the Archipelago one hour by boat from Singapore the shorelines contain silica sand and quartz sand which will be used as raw materials for producing solar panels. This is one of several development projects by Indonesia’s president with the goal of increasing Indonesia’s GDP and global competitiveness.
Editor’s Note: We bring to you a combination of two posts. The first is about a mass arrest of activists during climate protests on September 18. The protests were part of a global coordinated climate action. The second is about the new permits issued in the US for offshore oil drilling. For a president who ran his election on not allowing any more drillings, the move is a shift from his electoral promises. Though reflecting a lack of integrity, it still does not come as a surprise. Both the Democratic and Republican parties have shown, time and again, to favor corporations over nature, people, justice and freedom. This crackdown on protestors and permission for new drilling projects are just a reflection of that. As much as we oppose fossil fuels and oil drilling, DGR does not believe a renewable transition to be a solution to it. And calling a climate emergency to pursue that purpose would be folly.
114 Climate Defenders Arrested While Blocking Entry to NY Federal Reserve
A day after tens of thousands of climate activists marched through Manhattan’s Upper East Side demanding an end to oil, gas, and coal production, thousands more demonstrators hit the streets of Lower Manhattan Monday, where more than 100 people were arrested while surrounding the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to protest fossil fuel financing.
Protesters chanted slogans like “No oil, no gas, fossil fuels can kiss my ass” and “We need clean air, not another billionaire” as they marched from Zuccotti Park—ground zero of the 2011 Occupy Wall Street movement—to pre-selected sites in the Financial District. Witnesses said many of the activists attempted to reach the New York Stock Exchange but were blocked by police.
“We’re here to wake up the regulators who are asleep at the wheel as they continue to let Wall Street lead us into ANOTHER financial crash with their fossil fuel financing,” the Stop the Money Pipeline coalition explained on social media.
Protests against 300-mile-long oil pipeline through the Appalachians
Local and national media reported New York Police Department (NYPD) officers arrested 114 protesters and charged them with civil disobedience Monday after they blocked entrances to the Fed building. Most of those arrested were expected to be booked and released.
“I’m being arrested for exercising my First Amendment right to protest because Joe Manchin is putting a 300-mile-long pipeline through my home state of West Virginia and President [Joe] Biden allowed him to do it for nothing in return,” explained Climate Defiance organizer Rylee Haught on social media, referring to the right-wing Democratic senator and the Mountain Valley Pipeline.
As she was led away by an NYPD officer, a tearful Haught said Biden “sold us out.”
“He promised to end drilling on federal lands, and he’s selling out Appalachia’s future for profit,” she added.
The demand is: declare a climate emergency
Responding to the “block-long” line of arrestees, Climate Defiance asked: “Why are we getting handcuffed while people who literally torch the planet get celebrated for their ‘civility’ and their ‘moderation’?”
Alicé Nascimento of New York Communities for Change told WABC that the protests—which are part of Climate Week and are timed to coincide with this week’s United Nations Climate Ambition Summit—are “our last resort.”
“We’re bringing the crisis to their doorstep and this is what it looks like,” said Nascimento.
As they have at similar demonstrations, protesters called on Biden to stop approving new fossil fuel projects and declare a climate emergency. Some had a message for the president and his administration.
“We hold the power of the people, the power you need to win this election,” 17-year-old Brooklynite Emma Buretta of the youth-led protest group Fridays for Future told WABC. “If you want to win in 2024, if you do not want the blood of my generation to be on your hands, end fossil fuels.”
‘Gross Denial of Reality’: Biden Infuriates With Approval of More Offshore Drilling
Rejecting the corporate media’s narrative that U.S. President Joe Biden’s newly-released offshore drilling plan includes the “fewest-ever” drilling leases, dozens of climate action and marine conservation groups on Friday said the president had “missed an easy opportunity to do the right thing” and follow through on his campaign promise to end all lease sales for oil and gas extraction in the nation’s waters.
The U.S. Interior Department announced Friday its five-year plan for the National Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program, including three new areas in the Gulf of Mexico where fossil fuel companies will be permitted to drill.
Government won’t reach it’s climate goals whith new drilling leases
Biden promised “no new oil drilling, period” as a presidential candidate, but he announced the plan six months after the administration’s approval of the Willow oil drilling project in Alaska incensed climate advocates.
The industries have already bought 9,000 drilling leases – to which the new leases will be added. This is “incompatible with reaching President Biden’s goal of cutting emissions by 50-52% by 2030,” said the Protect All Our Coasts Coalition, citing the findings of Biden’s own Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and its Office of Atmospheric Protection earlier this year.
Texan citizens suffer under pollution in the Gulf region
While the final plan scales back from the eleven sales that were originally proposed, said the coalition, “the plan is a step backwards from the climate goals the administration has set and for environmental justice communities across the Gulf South, who are already experiencing the disproportionate impact of fossil fuel extraction across the region.”
The coalition includes the Port Arthur Community Action Network, which has called attention to the risks posed to public health in the Gulf region by continued fossil fuel extraction.
“Folks in Port Arthur, Texas die daily from cancer, respiratory, heart, and kidney disease from the very pollution that would come from more leases and drilling,” said John Beard, the founder, president, and executive director of the group. “If Biden is to truly be the environmental president, he should stop any further leasing and all forms of the petrochemical build-out, call for a climate emergency, and jumpstart the transition to clean green, renewable energy, and lift the toxic pollution from overburdened communities.”
Our fossil fuel-lifestyle incompatible with the survival of the earth
Kendall Dix, national policy director of Taproot Earth, dismissed political think tanks that applauded the “historically few lease sales” on Friday.
“The earth does not recognize political ‘victories,'” said Dix, pointing to an intrusion of saltwater in South Louisiana’s drinking water in recent weeks, which has been exacerbated by the fossil fuel-driven climate crisis.
“As the head of the United Nations [António Guterres] has said, continued fossils fuel development is incompatible with human survival,” he added. “We need to transition to justly sourced renewable energy that’s democratically managed and accountable to frontline communities as quickly as possible.”
Biden’s drilling plans break his campaign promises
Along with groups in the Gulf region, national organizations on Friday condemned a plan that they said blatantly ignores the repeated warnings of international energy experts and the world’s top climate scientists who say no new fossil fuel expansion is compatible with a pathway to limiting planetary heating to 1.5°C.
“Sacrificing millions of acres in the Gulf of Mexico for oil and gas extraction when scientists are clear that we must end fossil fuel expansion immediately is a gross denial of reality by Joe Biden in the face of climate catastrophe,” said Collin Rees, United States program manager at Oil Change International. “Doubling down on oil drilling is a direct violation of President Biden’s prior commitments and continues a concerning trend.”
Rees noted that 75,000 people marched in New York City last week to demand that Biden declare a climate emergency and end support for any new fossil fuel extraction projects.
Protesters fear the destruction of land based communities and wildlife
“End Fossil Fuels is pretty clear,” said Rees, referring to campaigners’ rallying cry. “Not ‘hold slightly fewer lease sales,’ not ‘talk about climate action’—End. Fossil. Fuels.”
Despite Biden’s campaign promises, Rees noted, the U.S. is currently “on track to expand fossil fuel production more than any other country by 2050.”
“I feel disgusted and incredibly let down by Biden’s offshore oil drilling plan. It piles more harm on already-struggling ecosystems, endangered species and the global climate,” said Brady Bradshaw, senior oceans campaigner at the Center for Biological Diversity, another member of the Protect All Our Coasts Coalition. “We need Biden to commit to a fossil fuel phaseout, but actions like this condemn us to oil spills, climate disasters, and decades of toxic harm to communities and wildlife.”
The lease sales, said Sarah Winter Whelan of the Healthy Ocean Coalition, also represent a missed opportunity by the administration to treat the world’s oceans “as a climate solution, not a source for further climate disaster.”
Under the Inflation Reduction Act, negotiated by the White House last year, the government is required to offer at least 60 million acres of offshore gas and oil drilling leases before developing new wind power projects of similar scope.
“A single new lease sale for offshore oil and gas exploration is one too many,” said Whelan. “Communities around the country are already dealing with exacerbating impacts from climate disruption caused by our reliance on fossil fuels. Any increase in our dependence on fossil fuels just bakes in greater impacts to humanity.”
Gulf communities, added Beard, “refuse to be sacrificed” for fossil fuel profits.
