by DGR News Service | Apr 15, 2014 | Listening to the Land
By Max Wilbert / Deep Green Resistance Great Basin
Ely, Nev. – A camping tour of the region that will be affected by the Southern Nevada Water Authority (SNWA) groundwater development project is taking place over memorial day weekend – and you’re invited.
The trip, which will take place from May 24th to 26th, will begin at the north end of the water grab region, at the Confederated Tribes of the Goshute Reservation in Ibapah, Utah – a community which has been organizing to stop the groundwater project for years.
Trip organizer Max Wilbert says the goal is to get to know the land threatened by water extraction.
“These regions of eastern Nevada are some of the most beautiful, remote landscapes in the West,” Wilbert said. “Once you see that beauty, you want to fight to protect it.
Members of the Goshute and Shoshone tribes are holding the event in collaboration with community members from across the southwest (Tuscon, Moab, and Salt Lake City). Their goal is to raise awareness of the unique natural and cultural heritage of the region.
“My people have lived here sustainably for over 10,000 years,” said Rick Spilsbury, a Shoshone man and area-resident who is guiding the tour. “We want that for all of the Earth for another 10,000 years.”
SNWA is the organization that delivers water to Las Vegas and the surrounding area, and is planning a $15 billion project to extract groundwater out of mountain valleys in eastern Nevada.
Proponents of the project say that the water and pipeline is required to meet rising water demand in Las Vegas, especially as water levels in the Colorado River and Lake Mead continue to decline. Critics say the pipeline will decimate ecosystems and small farming, ranching, and indigenous communities, and that Las Vegas residents will be stuck with a massive bill.
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | Jan 22, 2014 | Education
Lierre Keith has been selected to give a keynote speech at this years Public Interest Environmental Law Conference. The annual meeting will be held February 27th – March 2nd in Eugene, Oregon and features over 125 panels, workshops and multimedia presentations addressing a broad spectrum of environmental law and advocacy.
This year PIELC’s theme is “Running Into Running Out” and focuses on the escalating environmental crisis. PIELC will be a space for critical assessment of past strategies – honestly measuring failures and successes – and, of course, new solutions dedicated to ending the destruction. Lierre is a natural choice as a keynote speaker- as an impassioned writer Lierre has forcefully advocated direct action to address our dire environmental crisis for years. Instrumental to the creation and organization of Deep Green Resistance, Lierre continues to be at the forefront of the fight to save the planet.
Lierre is perhaps best known as the author of The Vegetarian Myth: Food, Justice, and Sustainability, which has been called “the most important ecological book of this generation.” and as the primary author of the book Deep Green Resistance: Strategy to Save the Planet. Her writing and lectures focus on civilization’s violence against the planet, male violence against women, and the need for serious resistance to both.
As an outspoken advocate for radical feminism and a leader of the radical environmental movement, the selection of Keith as a keynoter continues a long tradition of controversial speakers at PIELC. Past speakers have included Ralph Nader, Julia Butterfly Hill, Ward Churchill, Winona LaDuke and Paul Watson.
The keynote speech also highlights the increased participation of Deep Green Resistance members at this year’s event. In addition to Lierre’s speech, DGR members will host four more panel sessions throughout the conference on topics including the failure of “green” energy, the pitfalls of radical subcultures, and the connections between misogyny and ecocide. DGR members participated in PIELC last year as well, providing two workshops- recordings of which are available on DGR’s YouTube page .
DGR is also expected to have a a large contingent of members and supporters in attendance at the conference. As a social and ecological justice network, DGR has experienced rapid growth in recent years, as increased numbers of activists see the accelerated destruction of our planet and the lack of effective action by traditional and mainstream environmental organizations.
Read more about PIELC on their website: http://pielc.org/
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | Dec 17, 2013 | Education, Mining & Drilling
By Deep Green Resistance Great Basin
It sounds like a bad business plan: Las Vegas is planning a $15 billion project to extract water from the driest places in the country. Ranchers, farmers, indigenous and rural communities, hunters, and
environmentalists are coming together to oppose the project, and clean air activists from Salt Lake City are worried that the project might cause major dust issues in the valley.
Join community organizers Saturday, January 11th at the downtown library in Salt Lake City to learn more about the so-called “Water Grab” – the project that is the epitome of unsustainable development and massive public subsidy to the rich. Despite a recent court ruling that deals a major blow to the project, opposition continues as SNWA will not give up on their desperate gamble.
Prepare to learn about the burden this project would put on taxpayers, the stunning natural places it would turn into deserts, the communities that would be impacted, and the political scheming going on in Las Vegas to make it happen.
Join us on January 11th to stand up for what is right. We say, “Stop the Water Grab!”
The event will take place at 3pm on Saturday, January 11th at the Downtown Salt Lake City library – 210 E 400 S, in Meeting Room A, downstairs in the main foyer of the library.
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | Nov 18, 2013 | Education
Deep Green Resistance has just updated the REAL: Resistance Education At Libraries project. This easy to use website helps identify libraries lacking our targeted resistance media, and makes it easier to contact each library or “Suggest a purchase” to fill in the gaps. The new updates include an improved user interface, many new libraries from college towns, and libraries in Canada.
REAL initially focuses on three foundational works of the Deep Green Resistance and strategic anti-civ movement:
- Deep Green Resistance by Derrick Jensen, Aric McBay, and Lierre Keith is crucial reading for anyone who has accepted that civilization is destroying the planet, but hasn’t known how to respond. This is the single most useful book to grow our movement of strategically thinking resisters. Deep Green Resistance is a plan of action for anyone determined to fight for this planet — and win.
- Endgame, by Derrick Jensen, gives readers a crash course in anti-civ critique, an excellent and (relatively) succinct summary of what’s wrong with this culture and why. Many people already know this in their bones, but will benefit from Jensen’s eloquence and analysis to help them piece together a coherent big picture. By challenging readers to seriously ask themselves what it will take to make them fight back, and what that might look like for them as individuals and as a movement, this volume builds an important foundation for Deep Green Resistance. This book has awakened and radicalized many people, and has the potential to reach many more.
- Franklin Lopez’ film END:CIV offers a powerful visual introduction to some of Endgame‘s premises and arguments, on which it is based. The movie simultaneously presents some of the worst atrocities of civilization and argues for the necessity of fighting back. It has the potential to reach many people new to anti-civ critique who otherwise might not pick up one of the above books for a “casual” read.
Many people first came to their awareness of the problems of civilization and the need to fight back thanks to these works. Getting them into public libraries will make them more accessible to people who find them by accident, or who seek them out after hearing about Deep Green Resistance and anti-civ activism.
You can help by using the website tools to make suggestions to your local library and to encourage friends and family to do the same. You can also contribute funds to help us donate copies of these media to libraries which can’t afford them from their own acquisition budgets.
To learn more about the project, or to get started, please visit http://deepgreenresistance.org/libraries
by Deep Green Resistance News Service | Jul 31, 2013 | Mining & Drilling, Obstruction & Occupation
By Christopher Smart / The Salt Lake Tribune
Several environmental groups protesting tar sands development in the Book Cliffs region of southeast Utah stopped work Monday on a road that will serve a strip mine to be operated by Calgary-based U.S. Oil Sands.
Celia Alario, a spokeswoman for Canyon Country Rising Tide and Peaceful Uprising, said dozens of protesters had peacefully stopped road building on Seep Ridge Road and also interrupted mining operations at the East Tavaputs Plateau site. Protesters surrounded heavy equipment and, in some cases, chained themselves to it, she said.
No one was arrested or cited, said Uintah County Chief Deputy Sheriff John Laursen. He confirmed that 50 to 60 protesters halted road work and, for a time, closed the county road.
“Mostly we just wanted to make sure no one got hurt,” Laursen said.
The CEO of U.S. Oil Sands said his company is not building the road. It does, however, have a small test mine at the site but is not now producing oil. In a telephone interview, Cameron Todd said the oil sands mining operation is scheduled to ramp up in 2014.
The protest came after a week-long training camp that brought environmentalists to Utah from around the region for instruction in nonviolent, civil disobedience, according to a statement released by the organizations.
“The devastating consequence of dirty energy extraction knows no borders,” said Emily Stock, a Grand County resident and organizer with Canyon Country Rising Tide. “We stand together to protect and defend the rights of all communities, human and non-human.”
The U.S. Oil Sands CEO said he would not respond to the environmentalists’ claims.
“There is a [county] road contractor that is using our site as a staging area,” Todd explained. “I feel sorry for the contractor.”
Uintah County had long planned improvements on Seep Ridge Road, said Cheri McCurdy, executive director of the county’s Transportation Special Service District.
Public hearings on the Environmental Assessment were held in May 2009. The BLM gave approval for the road expansion in 2011. The road will serve the general public, ranchers, recreationists and energy companies, she said.
U.S. Oil Sands has received all the required regulatory permits to mine for tar sands in the region, according to a spokeswoman for the Utah School Institutional Trust Lands Administration (SITLA), which is leasing the land to the Canadian interest.
“They are generating money for public schools,” said Deena Loyola. “That’s our legislative mandate.”
Currently, tar sands from mining operations in Alberta, Canada, are being refined in Salt Lake City by Chevron Corp.
Members of the environmental coalition have not planned any activities for the remainder of the week, Alario said. But they do expect to organize future protests on the East Tavaputs Plateau, and other energy extraction sites.
From The Salt Lake Tribune: http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/politics/56659831-90/alario-county-energy-mine.html.csp
