Editor’s Note: The following Mongabay article is based on a recent study that found that marginalized subsistence communities are driving deforestation due to poverty. The article also writes that deforestation caused by these communities cannot still be compared to industrial deforestation. It is understandable that basic needs may drive people towards deforestation. But where does the poverty come from? It is unfortunate that the communities that once lived harmoniously with the forests are now doing the opposite. Why are they now unable to do so in the same forests? It may be that the forests that they live in now do not produce as much as they used to in the past, or that the number of people dependent on the forests now exceeds the carrying capacity of the forests. Both of these are a possibility. Humans are currently in a population overshoot. Forests across the world are being used for industrial purposes, leaving less for the subsistence communities. In addition, the overall destruction of the environment has impacted the health, and hence productivity, of natural communities. In technical terms this is called “absolute poverty,” where a person’s basic needs are unmet. A related concept is that of “relative poverty,” where a person’s income is far less than the societal norms. In this type of poverty, the person thinks of himself/herself as poor in comparison to others he/she is exposed to on a daily basis. Exposure to the industrial culture is a tool that different states have employed to assimilate indigenous populations and, thus, destroy their culture. This turns indigenous cultures against their landbases: harmonious relationships are replaced by exploitative ones. While it is necessary to acknowledge this trend, it is also worth pointing out that a lot of the indigenous communities are risking their lives to protect their landbases.

By Carl van Warmerdam

In the last few years whales stranded on the beaches of the East Coast have become common. In just the past two months there have been over a dozen. And that does not include the whales who have died in that time and sank to the bottom of the ocean. Fishermen blame industrial wind farm surveys, the wind industry blames climate change, and the vessel strikes of the global supply chains of civilization will not slow down. All the while mainstream “environmental” groups have become PR people for industrial energy. That stance is mutually exclusive from their professed goal to protect wildlife like desert tortoise, sage grouse, bats and to Save The Whales.

Editor’s Note: A week after the killing of a land-defender, the Governer of Georgia has signed an executive order to prepare national guards for protests against police brutality. Georgia has one of the highest incarceration rates in US. The protestors were defending a forest that was ordered to be cut down to build a “Cop City.” The protestors had set up camps and treehouses, which were being demolished by the cops before Tortuguita, the land-defender was shot. While the police claim that the victim had first attacked the police, it remains disputed by other demonstrators. As a resistance gets more effective, the powerful use all means necessary to crush the resistance. Police crackdown is one of those tactics. Some activists, regardless of their dedication, may not be in a position to bear it for one reason or another. There will be others who are prepared to be on the frontline. Good organizing includes preparing the frontliners for any anticipated events.

Editor’s Note: Plastic is not found in nature, so no microorganisms evolved to break it down completely. Microplastics are often too small to pick up or even notice, but they are everywhere: in the air, dust, and rain . They have been found in placentas and breast milk, and they appear especially abundant in baby poop — 10 times more than in adult feces. Plastic is a toxin and pollutant that is a byproduct of the production of fossil fuel manufacturing. People never asked for plastics, they were forced on us by industry. Eighty years ago there was no plastic in the stores. Today you would be hard pressed to find a product that is not covered in plastic. Deemed the “greatest thing since sliced bread,” plastic has brought convenience at a terrible cost. We have saturated the planet with a material that does not biologically break down, forever plastics. An EWG study shows the astounding level of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) in freshwater fish.

Editor’s note: The 2011 nuclear disaster in Fukushima, triggered by an earthquake and a tsunami, was one of the worst nuclear accidents of the twenty-first century to date. Nevertheless, worse ones might come in the future. In the quest for energy to fuel the machine, industrial civilization has built many vulnerable hazardous structures that can unleash highly toxic materials in the case of an “accidents.” Despite eleven years since the incident, TEPCO and the Japanese government haven’t been able to manage the waste water. Now, they are planning to dump it into the Pacific Ocean. Not only is the Pacific Ocean home to numerous marine creatures, it is also a source of livelihood for the humans who live near: the humans that the Japanese government claims to care for as their citizens. This decision by the Japanese government demonstrates, yet again, that decisions in this civilization are not made based on public welfare. More nuclear power means more weapons, more mining on indigenous lands,  more CO2 emissions, more radioactive waste and more accidents.

Editor’s Note: Even when local governing units make decisions for the welfare of the environment, state laws are designed to crush them. The following story covers how a small town is getting sued for passing a local ordinance to prevent pollution from factory farms. The basis of the lawsuit is that the ordinance is against the state law of Wisconsin. This story was originally published by Grist. You can subscribe to its weekly newsletter here. This lawsuit is far from one of its kind. Similar lawsuits have been filed against a local government for trying to protect the environment against corporate interests. DGR News Service covered a series regarding the fight of Lake Eerie Bill of Rights in the state of Ohio. Read more about it here.

Editor’s Note: Although it is taught in college, there are no business ethics. Industries have no morals. Their only purpose is to make money. There is no honor among thieves. If they have to kill to make a profit, so be it. It is most easily seen in the military industrial complex.

“War is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious”. - Major General Smedley Butler

Editor’s Note: Saplings cannot replace mature forests, with their hundreds of years of biodiversity and carbon sequestration. The biomass industry is destroying mature forests with a promise of planting saplings. Even if it had come from “waste wood,” huge amounts of energy is still involved in cutting, chipping, transporting and manufacturing of biomass pellets. Adding to that is the emissions involved in the actual burning. Biomass manufacturing is not green, clean or renewable. The sooner we stop doing it, the better.

Editor’s note: Dams change the way rivers function and they impact water quality. Slow-moving or still artificial lakes heat up. This results in abnormal temperature fluctuations which affect sensitive species and lead to algal blooms and decreased oxygen levels. Organic materials build up behind dams and start to produce the perfect environment for carbon dioxide and methane producing microbes. Particularly, migratory species are badly affected by the presence of dams. Although dams are being taken down in Europe and the US because people have begun to realize the dam-age they do to ecosystems, they are not coming down fast enough. Additionally, new ones continue to be built. At this point in the human caused ecological collapse of the planet’s life support systems, it would be best to leave dam building to the beavers.

Editor’s Note: The UN Biodiversity Conference (COP 15) was held from the 7th to 19th of December, 2022 in Montreal, Canada. This article was published shortly before that. It highlights how the COP has been hijacked by corporate interests. Corporate capture of the environmental movement is not new. For a long time now, corporations have been trying to push their agenda in the form of greenwashing. Unless we reject these tactics and any form of corporate influence over these conferences, there is little benefits that they could bring to the natural world.