Editor’s note: “President Donald Trump has been pushing the U.S. to barrel ahead on deep-sea mining. The country plans to permit mining in international waters under an obscure U.S. law from 1980 called the Deep Seabed Hard Mineral Resources Act(DSHMRA), which predates the Law of the Sea treaty. Congress wrote the law to serve as an ‘interim legal regime’ — a temporary way to grant mining licenses until the United Nations-affiliated regime took shape.

Editor’s note: “Never underestimate the power of a small group of committed people to change the world. In fact, it is the only thing that ever has.” ~ Margaret Mead. Several Chelemeras look out on the nursery before submerging themselves in the lagoon. After inclement weather, they return to the mangrove shelters to repair them. Image by Caitlin Cooper for Mongabay. Keila Vazquez walks through a higher-elevation area in Progreso, Yucatán. Las Chelemeras are currently working to level the topography of the area so that freshwater can reach the mangroves naturally. Image by Caitlin Cooper for Mongabay. By Astrid Arellano / Mongabay

Editor’s note: Want to try lab-grown salmon? The US just approved it. Who needs wild salmon.

By Colin Todhunter / COUNTERCURRENTS

Sainsbury’s is one of the ‘big six’ supermarkets in the UK. In 2019, it released its Future of Food report. It is not merely a misguided attempt at forecasting future trends and habits; it reads more like a manifesto for corporate control and technocratic tyranny disguised as ‘progress’. This document epitomises everything wrong with the industrial food system’s vision for our future. It represents a dystopian roadmap to a world where our most fundamental connection to nature and culture — our food — is hijacked by corporate interests and mediated through a maze of unnecessary and potentially harmful technologies.

Editor’s note: The folly of controlling the rivers. “What will those who come after us think of us? Will they envy us that we saw butterflies and mockingbirds, penguins and little brown bats?” - Derrick Jensen   Or will they despise us because we built dams which kill butterflies and mockingbirds, penguins and little brown bats?

China Starts Construction on World’s Largest Hydropower Dam Brazil & China move ahead on 3,000-km railway crossing the Amazon

Editor’s note: Indonesia’s capital relocation mirrors the move of the country’s former colonisers

By Hans Nicholas Jong / Mongabay

JAKARTA — Indonesia’s national human rights commission has found a slew of legal and rights violations in a government-backed project to establish large-scale plantations in the eastern region of Papua.

The so-called food estate project, categorized by the government as being of strategic national importance, or PSN, aims to clear 3 million hectares (7.4 million acres) of land in Merauke district, two-thirds of it for sugarcane plantations and the rest for rice fields — an area 45 times the size of Jakarta.

This lithium company is trying to sue Indigenous land defenders into silence

by Maximillian Alvarez, The Real News Network May 9, 2025

https://open.spotify.com/episode/4bT1oQv4m9xpi42O9TU5oH?si=d7db06343fce4142

Vancouver-based Lithium Americas is developing a massive lithium mine in Nevada’s remote Thacker Pass, but for nearly five years several local Indigenous tribes and environmental organizations have tried to block or delay the mine in the courts and through direct action. Six land defenders, known as the “ Thacker Pass 6,” are currently being sued by Lithium Nevada Corporation and have been barred by court injunction from returning to and peacefully protesting and praying at the sacred site on their ancestral homeland. TRNN Editor-in-Chief Maximillian Alvarez speaks with two members of the “Thacker Pass 6,” Will Falk and Max Wilbert, about the charges against them and the current state of the struggle over the construction of the Thacker Pass mine.

DGR’s next annual conference

August 1-5, 2025 in Philadelphia.

The Deep Green Resistance Annual Conference will make its East Coast debut this year in Philadelphia. This is an opportunity to build our movement with activists who may have been unable to attend our previous conferences on the West Coast. Your conference ticket includes all meals, overnight accommodations (beds are limited, so some people may be on couches or floors), great workshops and discussions, and a chance to talk to Derrick Jensen in an intimate setting.

By Mike DiGirolamo / Mongabay

In 2006, a group of international NGOs and the government of Kazakhstan came together to save the dwindling population of saiga antelope of the enormous Golden Steppe, a grassland ecosystem three times the size of the United Kingdom. Since that moment, the Altyn Dala Conservation Initiative has successfully rehabilitated the saiga ( Saiga tatarica) from a population of roughly 30,000 to nearly 4 million.

For this monumental effort, it was awarded the 2024 Earthshot Prize in the “protect & restore nature” category. This prize, launched by David Attenborough and Britain’s Prince William, also provides a grant of 1 million pounds ($1.32 million) to each winner.

Editor’s note: When you invent nuclear energy (nukes) you invent radioactive waste

Some proponents of nuclear energy refuse to give up on the technology. They blame the decline in nuclear energy and the high costs and long construction periods on the characteristics of older reactor designs, arguing that alternative designs will rescue nuclear energy from its woes. In recent years, the alternatives most often advertised are small modular (nuclear) reactors—SMRs for short. These are designed to generate between 10 and 300 megawatts of power, much less than the 1,000–1,600 megawatts that reactors being built today are designed to produce.

Editor’s note: Result of deeper structural failures

Speaking at a media briefing to raise awareness on the importance of accountability when such maritime disasters occur, Anita Perera, Campaigner for Greenpeace South Asia, said that when a team visited Mannar on June 19, they noticed a significant number of plastic pellets even after one round of cleanup operations. “The Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) is responsible for cleaning up the oil spill, but so far, they haven’t communicated their response to expedite the cleaning of nurdles or the oil spill. This isn’t an isolated incident but a result of deeper structural failures in how we are governing our oceans and environmental safety. These are critical ecosystems, and there are people(and all of the other species) whose daily livelihoods would be affected as a result of such disasters. We need to hold these companies accountable for such incidents,” she underscored.

Editor’s note: Indonesia lifts its ban on sea sand exports

More than 250 members of Indigenous and local communities gathered in Indonesia’s Merauke district to demand an end to government-backed projects of strategic national importance, or PSN, which they say have displaced them, fueled violence, and stripped them of their rights. PSN projects, including food estates, plantations and industrial developments, have triggered land conflicts affecting 103,000 families and 1 million hectares (2.5 million acres) of land, with Indigenous communities reporting forced evictions, violence and deforestation, particularly in the Papua region. In Merauke itself, the government plans to clear 3 million hectares (7.4 million acres) for rice and sugarcane plantations, despite Indigenous protests; some community members, like Vincen Kwipalo, face threats and violence for refusing to sell their ancestral land, as clan divisions deepen. Officials have offered no concrete solutions, with a senior government researcher warning that continued PSN expansion in Papua could escalate socioecological conflicts, further fueling resentment toward Jakarta and potentially leading to large-scale unrest.

Editor’s note: The International Day for Biodiversity was celebrated on May 22, which commemorates the adoption of the Convention on Biological Diversity, a global treaty. What lessons have we learned from undoing past harms and conserving biodiversity for our planet’s future?

Global efforts to restore forests are gathering pace, driven by promises of combating climate change, conserving biodiversity and improving livelihoods. Yet a recent review published in Nature Reviews Biodiversity warns that the biodiversity gains from these initiatives are often overstated — and sometimes absent altogether.

Indigenous land defenders face rising threats amid global push for critical minerals

The past decade has seen “a consistent, sustained pattern against people who speak out against business-related human rights" abuses.

“This story was originally published by Grist. Sign up for Grist’s weekly newsletter here.”

Miguel Guimaraes, a Shipibo-Konibo leader, has spent his life protesting palm oil plantations and other agribusiness ventures exploiting the Amazon rainforest in his homeland of Peru. Last spring, as he attended a United Nations conference on protecting human rights defenders in Chile, masked men broke into his home, stole his belongings, and set the place on fire. Guimarares returned days later to find “he will not live” spray-painted on the wall.

Declaration of Yajxonax*

Today, October 12th of 2024 –a symbolic date for Indigenous Peoples of this territory we call Abya Yala– we have gathered in these territories of resistance in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, at the Continental Encounter Building an Alliance Against Gas Pipelines and Other Megaprojects in Defense of the Territories of Indigenous Peoples.

We are 374 delegates including representatives and spokespersons of Indigenous Peoples and organizations, environmentalists, people from the academia, communicators and free media journalists, coming from 20 states of the part of the Planet some call Mexico, 22 Indigenous Peoples and 11 countries, we have gathered in order to strengthen and amplify the alliances and networking initiatives of the Peoples of the Americas.

How Electricity was (and is) Sold to America

By Elisabeth Robson / RadFemBiophilia’s Newsletter

In 1915, General Electric released a silent promotional film titled The Home Electrical offering a glimpse into a gleaming, frictionless future. The film walks viewers through a model electric home: lights flicked on at the wall, meals cooked without fire, laundry cleaned without soap and muscle. A young wife smiles as she moves effortlessly through her day, assisted by gadgets that promised to eliminate drudgery and dirt. This was not a documentary—it was a vision, a fantasy, a sales pitch. At the time, only a small fraction of American households had electricity at all, and nearly 90% of rural families still relied on oil lamps, wood stoves, hand pumps, and washboards. But the message was clear: to be modern was to be electric—and anything less was a kind of failure.

Editor’s note: Brownsville, Texas - “ Element Fuels has received the necessary permitting to construct and operate a refinery capable of producing in excess of 160,000 barrels, or approximately 6.7 million gallons, per day of finished gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel,” said Founder and Co-CEO John Calce. “A permit for a greenfield refinery of this size, scope, and functionality has not been granted in the United States since the 1970’s. This speaks to the innovative approaches we are taking to address climate and sustainability concerns in cleaner, greener ways that are new to the refinery space.”

Editor’s note: “The 2025 Queensland floods refer to significant flooding that impacted the northeast Australian state of Queensland in late January, early February, into March and April 2025. The disaster resulted in at least two fatalities from flooding, 31 fatalities from a disease outbreak and prompted mass evacuation orders in Queensland’s coastal regions.”

According to flood gauges, the enormous body of water has surpassed the 1974 event, widely considered the largest flood in Queensland history. But it was still sitting within the floodplain, Sheldon says, just “reaching the edges” of where people thought it would go.

Editor’s note: “What if you could save the climate while continuing to pollute it?” If that sounds too good to be true, that’s because it is. But corporations across the globe are increasingly trying to answer this question with the same shady financial tool: carbon offsets.

To understand what’s going on with the carbon market, it’s important to know the terms(term-oil), vocabulary and organizations involved. For starters, a carbon credit is different from a carbon offset. A carbon credit represents a metric ton of carbon dioxide or the equivalent of other climate-warming gases kept out of the atmosphere. If a company (or individual, or country) uses that credit to compensate for its emissions — perhaps on the way to a claim of reduced net emissions — it becomes an offset.

As a private university expands its footprint and threatens the amphibian’s habitat, residents are voicing their opposition and searching for another way forward.

By Lee Hedgepeth

April 10, 2025

This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy and the environment. Sign up for their newsletter here.

HOMEWOOD, Ala.—Ellen McLaughlin said she wasn’t speaking for herself.

“I speak for the salamanders,” she told those gathered at a community meeting in late March.

Editor’s note: “A new report from Harvard’s Electricity Law Initiative says unless something changes, all U.S. consumers will pay billions of dollars to build new power plants to serve Big Tech.

Data centers are forecast to account for up to 12% of all U.S. electricity demand by 2028. They currently use about 4% of all electricity.

Historically, costs for new power plants, power lines and other infrastructure is paid for by all customers under the belief that everyone benefits from those investments.

Editor’s note: “I think we’re in the midst of a collapse of civilization, and we’re definitely in the midst of the end of the American empire. And when empires start to fail, a lot of people get really crazy. In The Culture of Make Believe, I predicted the rise of the Tea Party. I recognized that in a system based on competition and where people identify with the system, when times get tough, they wouldn’t blame the system, but instead, they would indicate it’s the damn Mexicans’ fault or the damn black people’s fault or the damn women’s fault or some other group. The thing that I didn’t predict was that the Left would go insane in its own way. I anticipated the rise of an authoritarian Right, but not authoritarianism more generally, to which the Left is not immune. The collapse of empire results in increased insecurity and the demand for stability. The cliché about Mussolini is that he made the trains run on time, that he brought about stability.” - [Derrick Jensen](http://I think we’re in the midst of a collapse of civilization, and we’re definitely in the midst of the end of the American empire. And when empires start to fail, a lot of people get really crazy. In The Culture of Make Believe, I predicted the rise of the Tea Party. I recognized that in a system based on competition and where people identify with the system, when times get tough, they wouldn’t blame the system, but instead, they would indicate it’s the damn Mexicans’ fault or the damn black people’s fault or the damn women’s fault or some other group. The thing that I didn’t predict was that the Left would go insane in its own way. I anticipated the rise of an authoritarian Right, but not authoritarianism more generally, to which the Left is not immune. The collapse of empire results in increased insecurity and the demand for stability. The cliché about Mussolini is that he made the trains run on time, that he brought about stability.)

A Wild Earth Day !

On April 22:

Meet free-roaming bison and baby prairie dogs!                                                                             Learn about oceans that need us and fires that don’t!                                                                     Take a fast trip through human history, from cave art to the current mess!                                       Get inspired by tales of resistance and songs of love!                                                                         All donations go directly to help fund our annual conference.

And you can double your impact by giving during A Wild Earth Day!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Lisa Linowes (603) 838-6588 lisa@saverightwhales.org

Save Right Whales Coalition Files Supreme Court Brief Challenging BOEM’s Unlawful Offshore Wind Approvals

NEW HAMPSHIRE (April 14) — The Save Right Whales Coalition (SRWC) has filed an amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court urging the Court to review two cases challenging the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management’s (BOEM) approval of the Vineyard Wind 1 offshore wind project. The brief argues that BOEM unlawfully reinterpreted the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act (OCSLA) to expand its discretionary authority and bypass statutory protections for ocean users and marine ecosystems.

Editor’s notes: “A Washington state city has granted part of the Snohomish River watershed legal rights that can be enforced in court. In nearly all cases, state legislatures heavily lobbied by commercial industries have preempted the laws, rendering them unenforceable. But the Everett initiative could be the first to withstand such a challenge. Democrats, typically more open to stronger environmental protections than Republicans, currently control Washington’s Legislature and governorship.”

Efforts to apply the rights of nature in Ecuador have often failed. Legal challenges can become highly politicised and there is little legal infrastructure beyond general constitutional principles.

Editor’s note: “Most people don’t realize that part of gas extraction is a liquid condensate, the origin of plastics, which is being pumped, defying Climate Chaos, via the maze of fracking pipelines to the Gulf Coast, where the US is set on cornering the world plastics market, as well as shipping the LNG gas it has forced on its European vassals.” In a bid to become a world plastics monopoly, Exxon quietly plans to erect a new $8.6 billion plastics plant. The proposal calls for a steam cracker, a facility that uses oil and natural gas to make ethylene and propylene — the chemical building blocks of plastic. “Besides ethylene and propylene, steam crackers produce climate pollution and hazardous chemicals like ammonia, benzene, toluene, and methanol.”

By Tom Murphy / Do the Math

Surfing YouTube, I came across an interview of Ezra Klein by Stephen Colbert. He was promoting a new book called Abundance, basically arguing that scarcity is politically-manufactured by “both sides,” and that if we get our political act together, everybody can have more. Planetary limits need not apply. I’ve often been impressed by Klein’s sharp insights on politics, yet can’t reconcile how someone so smart misses the big-picture perspectives that grab my attention.

Editor’s note: “A study published in 2024 found that a change in insecticide use was a major factor in driving butterfly declines in the Midwest over 17 years. The authors, many of whom were also part of the current study, noted that the drop coincided with a shift to using seeds with prophylactic insecticides, rather than only spraying crops after an infestation.”

“Only the Pacific Northwest didn’t lose butterfly population on average. This trend was largely driven by an irruptive species, meaning one with extremely high abundance in some years – the California tortoiseshell. When this species was excluded from the analyses, trends in the Pacific Northwest were similar to other regions.”

Editor’s note: “MMA is methyl methacrylate, a chemical compound that was banned by the FDA in the 1970s for use in nail enhancements due to its potential health hazards,” Hanna says. Celebrity manicurist Julie Kandalec adds, “It’s an ingredient commonly found in acrylic liquids, called monomer.”

One of the easiest ways to check if there is MMA in your acrylic or nail supplies is to check the ingredient list of your products. It should not be listed as an ingredient in any reputable acrylic nail product. A few additional tips include: Smelling a very harsh odor when applying and filing your acrylic nails - some people say it smells like cat urine.

Editor’s note: A new report that microplastics pollution is hampering photosynthesis in plants, and that the result is the loss of some 10% of the world’s primary productivity, including food crops. We are now risking to blot out the planetary photosynthesis machine, just because we think that stopping the growth of the plastics industry is a subversive idea. But the report gets something in reverse: it is not that these effects “extend from food security into planetary health.” It is the opposite .But that changes little in a situation in which nothing changes, except for the desperate attempt of solving problems by killing the messenger, that is, " driving a dagger into the climate change religion"

Editor’s note: “A new study in Science indicates that reforestation projects, which restore degraded or destroyed forests, are the most effective land-based method for carbon removal and biodiversity protection. Meanwhile, the authors found that afforestation, in which trees are added where they didn’t exist before, and bioenergy cropping, in which carbon-removing crops are planted to make biofuels, can have negative effects on wildlife, outweighing the benefits of carbon removal. The research highlights the importance of identifying the best places for reforestation projects, but the authors emphasize that reforestation is not a replacement for fossil-fuel reduction.”

Editor’s note: “In recent years, the Southeast Asian country of Vietnam experienced a boom in renewable energy investments driven by generous feed-in tariffs, under which the state committed to buying electricity for 20 years at above-market prices. However, the high tariffs increased losses for Vietnam’s state-owned power utility EVN, the only buyer of the generated electricity, and led to an increase in power prices for households and factories. Authorities have repeatedly tried to reduce the high tariffs. Now they are considering a retroactive review of the criteria set for accessing the feed-in tariffs.”

Editor’s note: “I think hope is really harmful for several reasons. False hopes bind us to unlivable situations, and they blind us to real possibilities. Does anybody really think that Weyerhaeuser is going to stop deforesting because we ask nicely? Does anybody really think that if a democrat would have gotten into the White House that things would be ok? Does anybody think that vivisectors will stop torturing animals just because we stand outside with a sign?

Editor’s note: Water, as well as forests, do not need to be managed. They just need to be left alone.

https://youtu.be/d3Lt58tTYFk?feature=shared

By Petro Kotzé / Mangabay

Water seems deceptively simple and is easy to take for granted. It has no color, taste or smell and is one of the most plentiful chemical compounds on Earth. Recycled endlessly through the biosphere in its various forms, it is fundamental to keeping our planet’s operating system intact, and has done so for millions of years.

Editor’s note: A big backlash to new “renewables” is mounting across the country. With states, corporations, utilities and the federal government setting aggressive “renewable” energy goals, as well as big tax incentives such as the Inflation Reduction Act, wind and solar developers have been pushing projects that are igniting fierce battles over the environment, property rights, loss of farmland, climate change, aesthetics, the merits of renewable power and a host of other concerns.

Editor’s note: “Energy is, of course, fundamental to both human existence and the functioning of capitalism. It is central to production, as well as the heating and lighting systems that most people take for granted, and the energy sector is by far the single largest producer of greenhouse emissions.” A transition to 100% electrical energy will never happen. The percentage of electrical energy is 20%, of which 3% are “renewable”. Those figures have never been higher in well over 50 years. Also everywhere in the world, the development of “renewables” has and remains propped up by government support.

Editor’s note: “Birds and Offshore Wind: Developing the Offshore Wind that Birds Need”. - 2025 National Audubon Society

With up to a million birds currently being killed each year directly(which does not include indirect causes from mining and manufacturing) by wind turbines in the US, why would an organization dedicated to protecting birds say such a thing? Add on the fact that Wind facilities also require relatively large areas of land and sea. Facility development fragments and otherwise alters habitat in ways that make it unsuitable for species that have historically been present.

For Immediate Release February 14, 2025

Native American Wampanoag Tribal Members, Residents Challenge New Sand Mine Underway in Plymouth MA

Groups Demand Cease and Desist Order to Stop Destruction of Ancient Native American Sites

Indigenous People’s Graves, Sacred Sites at Risk

No Archeological or Environmental Study Conducted

Contacts: Meg Sheehan, Attorney

Community Land & Water Coalition

environmentwatchsoutheasternma@gmail.com

Tel. 508-259-9154

Melissa Ferretti, Chairwoman

Herring Pond Wampanoag Tribe

melissa@herringpondtribe.org

Plymouth, MA — Seven members of the Wampanoag Nation and six Plymouth residents appealed permits issued by the Town of Plymouth for a 33-acre sand mine and development on an ancient Native American site known as the “Great Lot” in south Plymouth.

By Mankh / Musings from Between the Lines Once upon a timeless . . . the non-human Light-Beings of the Sun cast their rays like life-giving nets upon the waters and the lands of the Earth . . . and all beings stirred awake to do the day’s work (and play) . . . until the nighttimeless when all beings rested and then the stars would guide their dreams . . .

Editor’s note: The team used an excavator to cut a trench through the center of the termite mounds, then carefully took soil samples every 10 cm down and 50 centimeters across. Another example of the hubris of human supremacy.

By Ruth Kamnitzer / Mongabay

Inhabited termite mounds along the Buffels River in Namaqualand, South Africa, are an astounding 34,000 years old, according to a new study.

Termites are a diverse group of insects that play a vital ecological role by breaking down organic matter. They live in complex social groups, and some species create large underground nests. These can include extensive tunnels and chambers where the termites live and store plant material. Some termite mounds can be very old; in 2018, researchers discovered termite mounds in Brazil that were 4,000 years old.

In response government officials labeled Earth Uprisings “eco-terrorists” — continuing a worldwide strategy of criminalizing protest.

In France, One Group Seeks to Do the Unthinkable: Unite the Climate Movement

by Anna Pujol-Mazzini, The Revelator September 3, 2024

This story is a joint production of The Revelator and Drilled . Read more from Drilled’s series on the criminalization of protests and activism . In France the unthinkable has happened: The working-class Yellow Vest movement, racial equity movements, and progressive climate activists have joined forces in a multiracial, cross-class coalition called Earth Uprisings. In uniting the climate movement with broader social justice causes, “Les Soulèvements de la Terre” is not just making history in France; it’s offering a blueprint for global environmental resistance. But the response has been shockingly violent and extreme.

A beginner’s guide to greenwashing and four ways to avoid falling for it

nito/Shutterstock, CC BY-NC-ND Lala Rukh, University of Galway

Growing up in a Pakistani village in the 2000s, sustainability was embedded throughout my daily life. My family has always been cautious of wasting energy, gas or water because these resources are expensive. We grew most of our own vegetables and reared poultry for eggs. By just buying a few essential groceries from the nearby market, we produced very little household waste. Food scraps were fed to our cattle, and we’d save any plastic bags to reuse.

Editor’s note: When a hurricane like Helene or Milton ravages coastal communities, already-strained first responders face a novel, and growing, threat: the lithium-ion batteries that power electric vehicles, store PV solar, e-bikes, and countless gadgets. When exposed to the salty water of a storm surge or extreme heat, they are at risk of bursting into flames — and taking an entire house with them.

“Anything that’s lithium-ion and exposed to salt water can have an issue,” said Bill Morelli, the fire chief in Seminole, Florida, and the bigger the battery, the greater the threat. That’s what makes EVs especially hazardous. “[The problem] has expanded as they continue to be more and more popular.”

On December 14th 1982, a blockade was launched to stop the construction of a hydroelectric dam that would have flooded Tasmania’s Franklin and Gordon rivers and surrounding old-growth forests. Over the next 3 months, over 1,340 people were arrested for trespassing, occupying roads and work sites, and chaining themselves to equipment. The protest gained widespread national and global support and played a major role in the cancellation of the project.

Tasmanian Wilderness Society blocks dam construction (Franklin River Campaign) 1981-83

By Asha Miriam Stobbe Reimer / THE COMMONS

Editor’s note: This article was written over a year and a half ago. Things are so much more worse now. Overshoot

Critics of ‘degrowth’ economics say it’s unworkable – but from an ecologist’s perspective, it’s inevitable

Shutterstock/Matt Sheumack Mike Joy, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

You may not have noticed, but earlier this month we passed Earth overshoot day, when humanity’s demands for ecological resources and services exceeded what our planet can regenerate annually.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Organization: Save Long Beach Island, Inc. (Save LBI)

Contact: Bob Stern, Ph.D., President Email: info@savelbi.org Phone: 917-952-5016

Contact: Attorney – Thomas Stavola, Jr., Esq.                                                       Email: tstavolajr@stavolalaw.com Phone: 732-539-7244

January 13, 2025

Save LBI Sues U.S. Agencies and Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind, Challenging Federal Approvals Greenlighting Marine Ecosystem Devastation, Including Risks to Critically Endangered Whales

LONG BEACH ISLAND (LBI), NEW JERSEY, January 13, 2025 – Save LBI, an organization that has been actively litigating issues surrounding marine mammal, human health, economic and other impacts connected to offshore wind industrialization off New Jersey since 2022, has filed suit against the U.S. Department of Commerce, National Marine Fisheries Service, Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, U.S. Department of Interior, and the Atlantic Shores Offshore Wind project for violations of a number of federal environmental statutes.

Editor’s note: “75 of the world’s largest 114 fossil fuel companies have now made net zero by 2050 commitments, yet not a single fossil fuel company has committed to phasing out oil and gas production by 2050 nor have any committed to ending exploration for new oil and gas fields or halting the extraction of existing reserves.”

" Real Zero, not greenwashed ‘net zero,’ is essential . As the Corporate Accountability report concludes, it’s time to reject the big polluters’ agenda and implement programs that rapidly phase out fossil fuels and truly eliminate greenhouse gas emissions."

By GERRY MCGOVERN, SUE BRANFORD / Mongabay

In 2022, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres declared that the “lifeline of renewable energy can steer [the] world out of climate crisis.” In saying so, he echoed a popular and tantalizing idea: that, if we hurry, we can erase the climate emergency with widespread adoption of renewables in the form of solar panels, wind farms, electric vehicles and more.

But things aren’t that simple, and analysts increasingly question the naïve assumption that renewables are a silver bullet.

Join Us During the New Moon For A DGR New Year’s Eve! 🌑

No matter how dark the night, the sun will return.

Join DGR on Facebook for some New Year’s Eve tidings of comfort and joy . . . and bears and lions, cave paintings and bison, hope and resistance.

We have a live hour-long program, featuring Derrick Jensen, Lierre Keith, and Deanna Meyer–and you! There’s time at the end for your questions.

By Olivia Rosane is a staff writer for Common Dreams from Dec 02, 2024

Environmental organizations cheered as Norway’s controversial plans to move forward with deep-sea mining in the vulnerable Arctic Ocean were iced on Sunday.

The pause was won in Norway’s parliament by the small Socialist Left (SV) Party in exchange for its support in passing the government’s 2025 budget.

“Today marks a monumental victory for the ocean, as the SV Party in Norway has successfully blocked the controversial plan to issue deep-sea mining licenses for the country’s extended continental shelf in the Arctic,” Steve Trent, CEO and founder of the Environmental Justice Foundation, said in a statement. “This decision is a testament to the power of principled, courageous political action, and it is a moment to celebrate for environmental advocates, ocean ecosystems, and future generations alike.”

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

Editor’s note: You have nothing to fear from Artificial Intelligence (AI), at least that is what IT will tell you. It is called " alignment faking", someone or thing purports to believe something they don’t because it could raise them in the esteem of potential “evaluators.” AI could save the world, but first, it will ruin the environment. AI has become an energy vampire. But communities are beginning to organize, pushing back against the unchecked expansion of data centres and the drain they incur on local resources. The longer the AI bubble continues the more it results in direct investment in physical infrastructure, and the more disastrous it will be for communities and the planet. AI is a product that people actively don’t want: including AI in marketing materials reduces the desire to purchase the product. AI is a proven loser.

Editor’s note: This year’s biannual Biodiversity COP was in Cali, Colombia, a country with the dubious distinction of topping the list of the number of environmental activists killed by a country in both 2022 (60) and 2023 (79) and will probably have that dubious honor this year with a continuingly rising number of (115) as of November 7th.

By TONY KIRBY | ANNA ABRAHAM | CESAR QUIROZ / Mongabay

BOGOTÁ, Colombia — While music played in Bogotá’s streets and a sense of victory filled the air after a long protest, Ana Graciela received a new appointment on her calendar: the funeral of Carlos Andrés Ascué Tumbo.

Editor’s note: Major plastic polluters win as the UN Treaty talks conclude without an agreement. Modern lifestyles and practices are intimately entwined with the use of plastics. Our phones, computers, food packaging, clothes, and even renewable energy technologies, such as wind turbine blades and the cables that connect them to the power grid, are all largely made from plastics. Plastics production requires fossil hydrocarbons and this connection continues to grow stronger daily. Powerful oil producers, both private companies and governments of oil-producing nations, were seen as the key impediment to a consensus deal. What will happen next? “Agree to a treaty among the willing even if that means leaving some countries that don’t want a strong treaty or concede to countries that will likely never join the treaty anyway, failing the planet in the process.”

Editor’s note: “Our heating of the Earth through carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas pollution, is closely connected to our excessive energy consumption. And with many of the ways we use that energy, we’re also producing another less widely discussed pollutant: industrial noise. Like greenhouse-gas pollution, noise pollution is degrading our world—and it’s not just affecting our bodily and mental health but also the health of ecosystems on which we depend utterly.”

by National Alliance of People’s Movements

13th Nov, 2024: More than 250 activists from different parts of India and diverse organizations signed on to a statement initiated by the National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM), strongly condemning the arbitrary detention of 6 social and environmental activists in Jammu & Kashmir, under the Public Safety Act (PSA). The signatories called for their immediate release and withdrawal of cases filed against them, for exercising their legitimate right to raise ecological concerns. All those detained Mohammad Abdullah Gujjar (resident of Sigdi Bhata), Noor Din (resident of Kakerwagan), Ghulam Nabi Choppan (resident of Trungi – Dachhan), Mohammad Jaffer Sheikh (resident of Nattas, Dool), Mohammad Ramzan (resident of Dangduroo – Dachhan), trade union leaders from Kishtwar district and Rehamatullah from Doda District (J&K) were only raising pertinent issues regarding socio-environmental impacts of large projects as well as solid waste management.

By Hans Nicholas Jong / Mongabay

JAKARTA — German chemical giant BASF and French miner Eramet have pulled out of a multibillion-dollar “green energy” project in Indonesia because of its impact on one of the last Indigenous tribes on Earth living in voluntary isolation.

In an announcement on June 24, both companies said they had scrapped plans to invest up to $2.6 billion in the project on the island of Halmahera in Indonesia’s eastern province of North Maluku. The Sonic Bay project would have seen the construction of a refinery producing about 67,000 metric tons of nickel and 7,500 metric tons of cobalt a year. These metals, crucial ingredients in electric vehicle batteries, would have come from the nearby Weda Bay Nickel mine, the world’s largest nickel mine, in which Eramet holds a minority stake.

Editor’s note: “Renewable” energy power plants continue the exploitation of the natural world and call their ecosystems “resources.”

Robbing Africa’s Riches to Save the Climate (and Power AI)

By Tommaso Marconi / FREEDOM

While renewable energy is seen as part of the solution to many environmental issues we are facing, it is also used as a pretext by capitalist lobbies and colonialism to overcome territorial sovereignty and implement privatisation. The case of Western Sahara is clear: two-thirds of the territory has been occupied by the Moroccan army since 1975, and now Morocco’s main tool to continue the occupation has become the green transition.

U.S. Supreme Court to Review Apache Stronghold’s Case on Nov. 22, 2024

For Immediate Release: November 7, 2024 Media Contact: Ryan Colby | media@becketlaw.org | 202-349-7219

WASHINGTON – A coalition of Western Apaches, other Native peoples, and non-Native allies yesterday asked the Supreme Court to reject plans by the federal government and a multinational mining giant to destroy a sacred site where Apaches have held religious ceremonies for centuries. In Apache Stronghold v. United States, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals refused to stop the federal government from transferring Oak Flat to Resolution Copper, a foreign-owned mining company that plans to turn the site into a massive mining crater, ending Apache religious practices forever ( Watch this short video to learn more). The latest Supreme Court filing rebuts the government’s argument that religious freedom protections in the U.S. Constitution and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) do not apply on federally controlled land.

By Nick King and Aled Jones / THE CONVERSATION

The extent of humanity’s influence on the planet has become increasingly clear in recent years. From the alarming accumulation of plastic waste in our oceans to the sprawling growth of urban areas, the size of our impact is undeniable.

The concept of the “ technosphere” aims to reveal the immense scale of our collective impact. The concept was first introduced by US geologist Peter Haff in 2013, but paleobiologist Jan Zalasiewicz has since popularised the term through his work. The technosphere encompasses the vast global output of materials generated by human activities, as well as the associated energy consumption.

Mateo Sgambati  Aug 9th / World, FREEDOM News

Indigenous group opposing destructive mining in Maipo river sends greetings to anti-capitalist sabotage campaign

The group “Insurrectional Cell for the Maipo: New Subversion” (Célula insurreccional por el Mapio. Nueva Subversión) has claimed last Saturday’s arson attack in the region of Valparaíso, Chile. Seven trucks were set ablaze at the El Melón concrete plant during the night of arson, and the company offices were also targeted. No injuries were reported.

By Liz Kimbrough / Mongabay

Dozens of once-pristine rivers and streams in Alaska’s Brooks Range are turning an alarming shade of orange. The discoloration, according to a new study published in the journal Communications Earth and Environment, is likely caused by the thawing of permafrost, which is exposing previously frozen minerals that are now leaching into the waterways.

The research team, led by ecologist Jon O’Donnell from the U.S. National Park Service, documented 75 locations across a vast area of northern Alaska where the crystal-clear waters now appear heavily stained. Using satellite imagery and field observations, the scientists determined that the onset of this discoloration coincided with a period of warming and increased snowfall in the region over the past decade.

Editor’s notes: Methane(CH4) is the main component of natural gas. The word comes from the Greek methy “wine” + hylē “wood.” However, marketers came up with the term natural gas rather than methane gas to give it a clean, green image. Methane is produced by decaying organic material. Natural sources, such as wetlands, account for roughly 40% of today’s global methane emissions. But the majority comes from human activities, such as farms, landfills, dams and wastewater treatment plants – and fuel production. Oil, gas, and coal together make up about a third of global methane emissions. It can leak anywhere along the supply chain, from the wellhead and processing plant, through pipelines and distribution lines, all the way to the burner of your home’s stove or furnace. Once it reaches the atmosphere, methane’s super heat-trapping properties render it a major agent of warming. Over the last 20 years, methane has caused 85 times more warming than the same amount of carbon dioxide. But methane doesn’t stay in the atmosphere for long. Unlike carbon dioxide, which lingers in the atmosphere for a century or more, methane only sticks around for about a dozen years.

By Liz Kimbrough / Mongabay

KLAMATH, CALIFORNIA—Brook M. Thompson was just 7 years old when she witnessed an apocalypse.

“A day after our world renewal ceremony, we saw all these fish lined up on the shores, just rotting in piles,” says Thompson, a Yurok tribal member who is also Karuk and living in present-day Northern California. “This is something that’s never happened in our oral history, since time immemorial.”

During the 2002 fish kill in the Klamath River, an estimated 30,000 to 70,000 salmon died when the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation diverted water to farms instead of letting it flow downstream. This catastrophic event catalyzed a movement to remove four dams that had choked the river for nearly a century.

By Elizabeth Robson / RadFemBiophilia’s Newsletter

In general, the United Nations (UN) Biodiversity Conference gets far less press than the UN climate change conferences, but I’ve seen more news items for this year’s Biodiversity Conference of the Parties (COP 16) than I have for previous biodiversity COPs. Still, I didn’t initially pay it much attention, because I’ve become so leery of these annual (for climate change COPs) and biannual (for biodiversity COPs) UN affairs. Why? Because, so far at least, these meetings have amounted to mostly good vibes, with little to no action that has any meaningful consequence in protecting the natural world.

Editor’s note: Climate change can not be addressed without stopping the extinction and plastics crisis. Every day, an estimated 137 species of plants, animals and insects go extinct due to deforestation alone. Microplastics have been detected in more than 1,300 animal species, including fish, mammals, birds, and insects. A global plastic treaty will only work if it caps production. Bangladesh is about to implement its existing law regarding plastic usage by strictly banning single-use plastic and, gradually, all possible plastic uses.

Editor’s note: For capitalism, “renewable” energy is a transition to green(greed) colonialism. Splinter colonization is still the policy of the day, divide and conquer the masses and corrupting local elites with bribery.

Capitalists benefit from business-friendly legal doctrines and a uniform regulatory system. They do not have to contend with patchwork prohibitions and restrictions enforced by sovereign communities that require FPIC and put their sovereignty into practice by persuasion or physical force, refusing obedience and cooperation. No justice, no peace, so the guerrillas will keep investors away.

Ecology & Environmental Sciences

Abstract

Previously, anthropogenic ecological overshoot has been identified as a fundamental cause of the myriad symptoms we see around the globe today from biodiversity loss and ocean acidification to the disturbing rise in novel entities and climate change. In the present paper, we have examined this more deeply, and explore the behavioural drivers of overshoot, providing evidence that overshoot is itself a symptom of a deeper, more subversive modern crisis of human behaviour. We work to name and frame this crisis as ‘the Human Behavioural Crisis’ and propose the crisis be recognised globally as a critical intervention point for tackling ecological overshoot. We demonstrate how current interventions are largely physical, resource intensive, slow-moving and focused on addressing the symptoms of ecological overshoot (such as climate change) rather than the distal cause (maladaptive behaviours). We argue that even in the best-case scenarios, symptom-level interventions are unlikely to avoid catastrophe or achieve more than ephemeral progress. We explore three drivers of the behavioural crisis in depth: economic growth; marketing; and pronatalism. These three drivers directly impact the three ‘levers’ of overshoot: consumption, waste and population. We demonstrate how the maladaptive behaviours of overshoot stemming from these three drivers have been catalysed and perpetuated by the intentional exploitation of previously adaptive human impulses. In the final sections of this paper, we propose an interdisciplinary emergency response to the behavioural crisis by, amongst other things, the shifting of social norms relating to reproduction, consumption and waste. We seek to highlight a critical disconnect that is an ongoing societal gulf in communication between those that know such as scientists working within limits to growth, and those members of the citizenry, largely influenced by social scientists and industry, that must act.

By Christopher Ketcham / COUNTERPUNCH

A crowd of 3,000 anti-tourism protesters descended on posh downtown Barcelona last July, their demeanor one of delighted malice.  They cordoned off hotels and eateries with hazard tape, as if demarcating a crime scene. They sprayed with water guns the blithe holidaymakers seated in restaurants.  Video footage showed unhappy couples and glowering young men chased from their seats by the mob, stunned at the indignity.

The protesters shouted, “Tourists go home.” They held signs that said, “Barcelona is not for sale.” They spoke of “mass touristification” and inveighed against the greed of restaurateurs and hoteliers and Airbnb landlords profiting from the madding crowd while the average Catalan struggled to meet the skyrocketing costs of daily life. One of the protesters told an interviewer, “The city has turned completely for tourists. What we want is a city for citizens.”

Editor’s note: DGR does not support the renewable energy transition aspect of such a treaty.

By Alexandria ShanerSeptember 11, 2024 / Waging Nonviolence

An unprecedented alliance of climate groups is targeting airports on three continents to demand a binding treaty to end fossil fuels by 2030.

A new international coalition is disrupting airports to make one demand: the adoption of a treaty to end fossil fuels by 2030.

Under the banner Oil Kills, small groups of activists have occupied airport departure lounges, plane cabins, terminals, tarmacs and roads across three continents — and they aren’t done yet. Here are the numbers so far: 500 people, 31 airports, 22 groups, 166 arrests, 42 people on remand in prison — all in support of their one demand.

By Prof Jem Bendell / thoughts on collapse readiness and recovery

Self-deception is rife within the environmental profession and movement. Some denial or disavowal is not surprising, due to how upsetting it is to focus on an unfolding tragedy. But our vulnerability to self-deception has been hijacked by the self interests of the rich and powerful, to spin a ‘fake green fairytale’. Their story distracts us from the truth of the damage done, that to come, and what our options might be. Indeed, their fairytale prevents us from rebelling to try to make this a fairer disaster, or a more gentle and just collapse of the societies we live in. Averting wider rebellion might be why the fairytale receives loads of funding for books, awards, feature articles and documentaries, as well as videos for popular YouTube channels. That’s why, like me, you might not have realised for years that it is a fairytale. In this essay I will explain the nine lies that comprise this ‘fake green fairytale’ before explaining how much damage is being done to both people and planet from the dominance of this story within contemporary environmentalism.

Editor’s note: This article is an update from a year ago. Trying to fix the climate change planetary boundary at the expense of biodiversity or any of the other planetary boundaries is a fool’s errand. This article does not state the fact that it only takes one planetary boundary to collapse to cause a massive die-off of life on the planet. Plus no mention of the poly-crisis of nuclear war, increasing inequality, AI and global economic crash.

Editor’s note: Climate change is a symptom predicament of overshoot and is exploited by power elites to deflect from what is necessary, ending modern civilization. The slow death of nature started with civilization, it has exponentially sped up since the 1700s. The reason there are no more natural disasters is because they are all now man-made.

Rich countries have exported climate breakdown through extractive industries, creating a “carbon colonialism.”

By Laurie Parsons / Earth Food Life Introduction

Editor’s note: This article does not mention the subsidies going to " renewable" energy, which is in the trillions, and its environmentally harmful implementation. Also not mentioned are the costs associated with the loss of livelihood for those humans affected by these unsustainable “developments”, not to mention the harm done to more than human species.

By Edward Carver staff writer for Common Dreams.

Governments across the world now spend a total of $2.6 trillion per year on subsidies that harm the environment, jeopardizing global climate and biodiversity targets, according to an analysis released Tuesday.

By Olivia Rosane, staff writer for Common Dreams.

Almost 200 people were killed in 2023 for attempting to protect their lands and communities from ecological devastation, Global Witness revealed Tuesday.

This raises the total number of environmental defenders killed between 2012—when Global Witness began publishing its annual reports—and 2023 to 2,106.

“As the climate crisis accelerates, those who use their voice to courageously defend our planet are met with violence, intimidation, and murder,” Laura Furones, the report’s lead author and senior adviser to the Land and Environmental Defenders Campaign at Global Witness, said in a statement. “Our data shows that the number of killings remains alarmingly high, a situation that is simply unacceptable.”

By Max Radwin 29 JUL 2024 / Mongabay

Indigenous communities on Nicaragua’s northern Caribbean coast continue to suffer threats, kidnappings, torture and unlawful arrests while defending communal territory from illegal settlements and mining. Residents say they’re worried about losing ancestral land as well as traditional farming, hunting and fishing practices as the forest is cleared and mines pollute local streams and rivers. This year, there have been 643 cases of violence against Indigenous peoples, including death threats, the burning of homes, unlawful arrests, kidnappings, torture and displacement, according to Indigenous rights groups that spoke at an Inter-American Commission on Human Rights panel this month.

By Katie Singer https://katiesinger.substack.com/p/bess-fire-hazards

On Friday, August 30, Applied Energy Services Corporation (AES), a global utility and power generation company, submitted a proposal to Santa Fe, New Mexico county commissioners to build a 700-acre solar facility with a battery energy storage system (BESS).

On September 5th, a thermal runaway fire started at the AES-built SDG&E (San Diego Gas and Electric) Battery Storage Facility in Escondido, California. (With a thermal runaway fire, excessive heat causes a chemical reaction that spreads to other batteries.) Authorities issued a mandatory evacuation order for the immediate area, and a “shelter in place” order for areas as far as over a mile away from the fire. (To shelter in place, people must go indoors, shut doors and windows, and “self-sustain” until emergency personnel provide additional direction.) Schools up to three miles away from the fire were evacuated Thursday and canceled for Friday. 500 businesses closed.

Editor’s note: Protecting the ocean means life protection, our ecosystems depend on intact and clean oceans. Even though the aim is to protect 30% of the planet, it’s not clear what conservation actually means worldwide. That leads to ineffective conservation measures and demands more knowledge about oceanic ecosystems and also implementing it. For the most part protected areas don’t need to be managed, they just need to have humans leave them alone.

Editor’s note: We know what needs to be done but will it be done? No, the system will not allow it so the system must go. The sooner the better. Join a social movement advocating for a real energy transition, one that strives to guarantee that civilization will not emerge from this century.

By Richard Heinberg Aug 25 for Common Dreams

Humanity’s transition from relying overwhelmingly on fossil fuels to instead using alternative low-carbon energy sources is sometimes said to be unstoppable and exponential. A boosterish attitude on the part of many renewable energy advocates is understandable: overcoming people’s climate despair and sowing confidence could help muster the needed groundswell of motivation to end our collective fossil fuel dependency. But occasionally a reality check is in order.

Editor’s note: Although Greenpeace has done many good things in the past, particularly their work that led to an international ban on whale hunting, it is astounding that they currently support offshore wind.

Nick Young _26 July 2024 / Greenpeace_Scientists have found a source of ‘dark oxygen’ 4,000 meters below the surface of the Pacific in the target zone for deep sea mining. The discovery could have far-reaching implications for science and the wannabe deep sea mining industry. It’s often said that we know more about the surface of the moon than we do about the deep ocean. This new discovery of dark oxygen shows how true that is, and underlines the need to stop a new deep sea mining industry from targeting its source.

Editor’s note: Environmental activism will only play a role in the lives of young people if adults are great role models and walk the talk. As custodians, we need to take the young out into nature to help them gain an appreciation for wilderness. So that they will want to protect the earth in the future. At the same time, many teenagers lose their connection to the natural world, because the lifestyle of our sedentary, technology-focused culture doesn’t give them any incentive to connect. Instead of investing in research for techno-fixes, we should find out how people will care more deeply about the planet’s ecosystems.

Hello! Brandi from Deep Green Resistance here.

We here at DGR would love to invite you to our upcoming online conference opportunities. They’re all about our annual conference which is fast approaching. The dates of the conference are Friday, August 23rd (afternoon) until Monday, August 26th (morning).

We’ll be doing three livestreams. They are all taking place on Saturday, August 24th and all times listed are in the Pacific Daylight Time zone. Our first live stream starts at 9 am on the 24th and will be presented by Lierre Keith. Those of you who have seen Lierre in action know what a powerful speaker she is. Her talk is entitled From Living Planet to Necrosphere: In the Time of Patriarchy’s Endgame and you definitely don’t want to miss it!

Editor’s note: Mass media news about war raises concerns about death, injury, and refuge of humans, the war on nature is rarely highlighted. But warfare always means ecocide on a large scale and wildlife and nature often take more time to recover than it is capable of. In Ukraine, 80% of wildlife is already on the brink of extinction, with the Russian aggression even more species and individual animals are getting lost. Therefore it’s a relief to have organisations like UAnimals who rescue pets and wildlife in emergency situations and raise international awareness about the destruction in nature and national parks.

Editor’s note: Just substitute the word civilization for the word modernity.

By Tom Murphy - using physics and estimation to assess energy, growth, options / Do the Math

Having developed a perspective that modernity is fated to fail, and that many of our culture’s current pursuits and institutions are misguided efforts to prop up temporary structures, I often encounter the reaction that I am being defeatist. If what I am saying is true, then what’s the point? Yeah: what is this point that others believe justifies all the craziness? Whatever they think “the point” is could well be based on unexamined and incorrect beliefs.

By Gabriel Fonten / Freedom July 23

Struggle against hoarding of reservoir water by agro-industry sees five days of action, culminating in a 10,000-strong march on the commercial port of La Rochelle

The French environmentalist movement Soulevements de la Terre (Uprisings of the Land) is carrying on its campaign against mishandling of water resources. This phase of action began on July 16 with the “ Village for Water and Land Defense“, a meeting bringing activists from around the world to discuss strategy. This assembly of culminated in two demonstrations of around 10,000 people on the July 19 and 20, despite severe repression by police including teargas, blockades, and police charges at protesters.

Editor’s note: Changing the face of a globalist, imperialist organization whose mandate is the equitable exploitation of “the common heritage of mankind” will not stop deep sea mining. We will need to stop the first attempt at enclosure and destruction of the sea floor, by any means necessary. Delegitimize, discredit and scuttle this operation. If you would like to help contact Deep Sea Defenders.

By ELIZABETH CLAIRE ALBERTS / Mongabay

3 AUG 2024 JAMAICA

ELISABETH ROBSON JUL 03, 2024

How a lack of imagination perpetuates this ecocidal way of life

I’ve recently read three books, all of which I’m glad I read, and all of which have the same fatal flaw: they are all constructed around a faulty premise.

A Poison Like No Other: How Microplastics Corrupted Our Planet and Our Bodies by Matt Simon is a book about the absolutely catastrophic impacts of plastic. The book describes how micro- and nanoplastics are everywhere: they are in the air we breathe, in the water we drink, the food we eat, the soil, our bodies (brains, blood, lungs, placentas, fetuses, testicles; everywhere we’ve researchers have looked, they’ve found plastic), and the bodies of every living being on the planet including plants. These microplastics are leaking CO2, contributing to climate change; leaking toxics, poisoning us and all living beings who ingest these plastics; clogging our veins, our lungs, our brains.

Editor’s note: We can no longer continue to deny the evidence. We are living through the end stage of the Pyrocene. We have hit rock bottom and are seeking solutions from anywhere else but to slow down. Unfortunately, the necessary change will not come from us, rather something external will bring us down. But we should give it a push whenever possible. Dying and being reborn is a natural process, we must contract when faced with hard times.

Editor’s note: Humans have lived in balance with nature for millions of years. It was only in the last ten thousand years, with the advent of civilization, that humans have become unbalanced. If we continue on this course, we will reach our destination in less than a hundred years.

By Jan Ritch-Frel / CounterPunch

Discoveries in the fields of human origins, paleoanthropology, cognitive science, and behavioral biology have accelerated in the past few decades. We occasionally bump into news reports that new findings have revolutionary implications for how humanity lives today—but the information for the most part is still packed obscurely in the worlds of science and academia.

Editor’s note: It’s a coast - not a beach, we forget that when our society talks about going to the beach. A beach is for basking in the sun, getting a drink, and dabbling in the water. But a coast is far more than an entertainment place for humans, it’s a habitat for a variety of animals and plants. Sand mining is a threat to these ecosystems and criminals operate it illegally. Construction companies need sand for their concrete as the demand for buildings soars. They seal the planet by destroying coastlines - and beaches.

By Julia Conley Jun 26, 2024, for Common Dreams. “The geoengineering approach puts Earth’s systems at risk in a faulty and false bid toward solving the climate crisis. It is what we call a false solution,” said one campaigner. Biodiversity advocates on Wednesday called on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to reject a new geoengineering project spearheaded by researchers in Massachusetts that one critic said would do “nothing to solve the root causes of the climate crisis and instead puts at risk the oceans’ natural capacity to absorb carbon and their role in sustaining life on Earth.”

Editor’s note: Sharks are beautiful, intelligent creatures, but they have been overexploited for decades. Because of their “high market value” industrial fisheries hunt sharks for their fins and other body parts. But it’s difficult to control the protection of the sea predators when they move to unprotected zones or international and local fleets fish in other countries’ fishery zones. The brutal killings of adults, babies, and even pregnant sharks happen while our culture is focused on buying more stuff and attending distracting events.

Editor’s note: The author asks if that is a good thing. The short answer is no. For the same reason, agriculture is bad for the land, aquaculture is bad for the ocean. It is because humans have overcaught wild fish and depleted their numbers that people have more and more gone to aquaculture. There are now just too many human mouths to feed and not enough fish in the oceans.

Editor’s note: When we engage in any form of activism, building leadership capacity helps people become more confident and proactive. It means the leader of the group doesn’t have to be responsible for every task and can delegate other important tasks to members. In this case, the author talks about climate change, we at DGR think that climate change is one of many problems and stems from our destructive industrial culture. But you can exchange the word for any other that would describe a dire situation today - the strategy of leadership capacity still applies. DGR disagrees with 350.org’s belief that electrifying everything will “solve” climate change. It is, in fact, impossible, and attempts to do so will only make matters worse.

by Mike DiGirolamo, Rachel Donald on Mongabay 11 June 2024

Burning wood to generate electricity — “biomass energy” — is increasingly being pursued as a renewable replacement for burning coal in nations like the U.K., Japan, and South Korea — even though its emissions aren’t carbon neutral in practice.

On this episode of the Mongabay Newscast, reporter Justin Catanoso speaks with Rachel Donald about the single largest emitter of CO2 in the U.K., biomass firm Drax, which is trying to open two wood pellet plants in the state of California.

Editor’s note: While renewable energies won’t save the climate and need to be fought against, it’s as neccessary to keep on fighting against fossil fuels. Because the oil and gas industries will continue with their business as usual - even if they promote an energy transistion from fossil to renewables. This is a lie, all technology inventions for new energy extraction are added up. That’s why it’s effective when people organize in order to continue the abolition of burning fossil fuels, be it in court or outdoors.

by Basten Gokkon on Mongabay 14 May 2024

A new study concludes that chimpanzees displaying a range of ailments seek out plants with known medicinal properties to treat those ailments.

The finding is important because it’s a rare instance where a species is shown to consume a plant as medicine rather than as part of its general diet.

The study identified 13 plant species that the chimpanzees in Uganda’s Budongo Forest relied on, which can help inform conservation efforts for the great apes.

Editor’s note: A pandemic in our backyards - The squirrel walked a bit wobbly, it wasn’t as agile and funny as these small creatures often move. It had its eyes rather closed which gave it a tired look. I was concerned and called a squirrel rescue station, luckily there was one closer to me. The poor squirrel got worse meanwhile and couldn’t jump anymore. Lastly, it just sat in the corner of the roof with its head down.

by Riza Salman on Mongabay 11 June 2024

• During the COVID-19 pandemic, a young documentary filmmaker began quietly joining a growing number of Facebook community groups run by traders of rare Indonesian birds.
• Over the following two years, a reporting team from several news organizations uncovered a wide network of actors offering species for sale for as little as 250,000 rupiah ($15). These individuals included a serving naval officer.
• One shop owner selling birds in Morowali, the epicenter of Indonesia’s nickel mining and smelting boom, said they began trading in birds in 2018, after ships began docking in the local port bringing oil and cement.

KENDARI, Indonesia — In 2021, as the world grappled with the COVID-19 pandemic, Irwan watched online as a flurry of new social media groups dedicated to parrots sprang up across Indonesia.

Editor’s note: Most Indigenous economics or land-based communities appreciate nature in its complex lifegiving and intelligent values it provides - for free - to all forms of creatures on earth. Yet we live in a century where shareholders and voracious businessmen and women on Wall Street want to put not only a monetary value but tradable assets on nature.

In this podcast episode by Mongabay Newscast, you’ll learn why this fails to recognize the intrinsic value of biodiversity and how the principles of Indigenous economics would lead to balance and harmony towards biological and physical reality.

Anita HofschneiderSenior Staff Writer Grist

Goldman Prize Winner Murrawah Maroochy Johnson talks climate justice and inheriting a legacy of Indigenous resistance.

In 2019, Australia was on the cusp of approving a new coal mine on traditional Wirdi land in Queensland that would have extracted approximately 40 million tons of coal each year for 35 years. The Waratah coal mine would have destroyed a nature refuge and emitted 1.58 billion tons of carbon dioxide.

Editor’s note: Our current society is based on standards that lobbyists, financial markets, and industries target. That way the powerful can lead secret wars against human and non-human animals without the majority questioning their strategy. Any political or economic decision is based on these standards, not on the values of functioning ecosystems or healthy families. If our society wants to maintain and build a brighter future for young people, it needs to put the wild world as its basis to flourish. It also needs to prevent domestic violence from happening in the first place and make sure that babies have the birthright to a thriving ecocentric society in which informed people have the actual freedom to consent. Power to the people not to a few mighty people at the top requires civil disobedience, something that only empowered people can implement. But without civil disobedience, we won’t end the secret wars against our living planet.

by Liz Kimbrough on Mongabay 30 May 2024

• The critically endangered Devils Hole pupfish population has reached a 25-year high of 191 fish, offering hope for the species that lives in the smallest known habitat of any vertebrate.
• Above water and SCUBA surveys conducted by scientists twice a year carefully monitor the pupfish population in Death Valley, Nevada, which has fluctuated dangerously in the past, dropping as low as 35 individuals in 2013.
• A landmark 1976 Supreme Court decision, informed by environmental science, protected the pupfish by limiting groundwater pumping that threatened its habitat, setting a precedent for science-based conservation policy.
• Despite recent success, the pupfish remains threatened by climate change impacts on the delicate desert ecosystem, as well as growing human demand for water resources in the region.

In a glimmer of hope for one of the world’s rarest fish, scientists have counted 191 Devils Hole pupfish this spring in their tiny desert habitat. This number marks the highest spring count for the critically endangered species in more than two decades.

by Mike DiGirolamo, Rachel Donald on Mongabay 21 May 2024

• The “right to roam” movement in England seeks to reclaim common rights to access, use and enjoy both private and public land, since citizens only have access to 8% of their nation’s land currently.
• Campaigner and activist Jon Moses joins the Mongabay podcast to discuss the history of land ownership change in England with co-host Rachel Donald, and why reestablishing a common “freedom to roam” — a right observed in places like the Czech Republic and Norway — is necessary to reestablishing human connection with nature and repairing damaged landscapes.
• At least 2,500 landscapes are cut off from public access in England, requiring one to trespass to reach them.
• “There needs to be a kind of rethinking really of [what] people’s place is in the landscape and how that intersects with a kind of [new] relationship between people and nature as well,” Moses says on this episode.

Like most nations, England doesn’t have legally recognized rights for citizens to cross non-public lands. This means that the nearly 56 million people who live there are only legally allowed to access 8% of the country. One particularly picturesque example of this problem was recently noted by the BBC, which discussed a large piece of public land that’s actually inaccessible due to being surrounded by private land, forcing people to trespass in order to reach it.

Editor’s note: Civilization is in free fall, and most people do not accept that. Humans will have to use a lot less energy. That future is hard for people to grasp. They will need to adjust their expectations of how reality is going to look. This will require going through the stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining(excuses), depression, and acceptance. We can still create social relations that can improve the world through policy and interactions. Rememberthe win is always in the movements struggling together with others toward those victories, the fighting against the fascism of industrial civilization.

Editor’s note: Campaigning for protecting wildlife and ecosystems is rarely successful if only fought in court. But in this case, a Peruvian court decided to give the river Maranon rights that would ensure its conservation and protection from oil spills. For this decision, the indigenous groups led by Kukama women have been fighting for their river for over three years. As with many people living on the land they depend on clean water and fertile land to feed their families. Now the court victory gives them the necessary legal foundation to keep on fighting for a life free from ecological disasters.

by Michael Beltran / Mongabay

SITIO DALICNO, Philippines — Domeng Laita, 64, stands on a mountain ledge outside his home, looking down with worry on his face. Below him stands the embankment of the San Roque dam, stretching more than a kilometer (0.6 miles) along the Agno River. In 2012, a spill from a gold mine upstream sent millions of tons of waste into the river system. With a looming increase in mining activity, Laita says he dreads a repeat of the incident.

Editor’s note: Any compensation from chemical companies cannot make up for the repercussions of mining, in this case, salt mining. The petrochemical company Braskem, the largest plastic producer in the Americas, is responsible for the displacement of people and was well aware of the risk that the city of Maceió could sink. Yet it kept on operating the mine. As long as companies like Braskem put profit above all other needs - social, environmental, health of communities and thriving wild habitats - this ecocrisis in which we live will only get worse. It can’t go on like this anymore.

By Katie Singer

A tech lover recently told me that he and several colleagues have realized:

1.     The Earth does not have enough energy, minerals or water to support AI, e-vehicles, solar PVs, industrial wind facilities and batteries. Not at the scale we dream to fulfill. Not with eight billion humans.

2.     Expanding the Internet and AI ravages the Earth and wastes young brains.

I consider this man’s honesty excellent news. If more people acknowledge that our electronic tools take from the Earth faster than it can replenish and waste faster than the Earth can absorb, maybe we could take a collective pause. We could question which manufactured goods are necessary and which ones are not. We could stop ravaging ecosystems, reduce production and consumption. We could have truth and reconciliation parties about our relationship with nature and ask each other for help in living within our bioregion’s ecological limits. We could cultivate humility.

Editor’s note: This review from the book “Capitalism Won’t Save the Planet” talks about why the energy transition from fossil fuels to so-called renewable energy is slow and not that profitable. We at DGR believe it is not a transition - worldwide we see an increase in fossil fuel consumption. But the use of electricity from wind and solar power increases are just as strong, especially by digital companies like Amazon whose carbon emissions go up while powering with electricity. The public should get much more skeptical towards the “energy transition” and question the profit-making energy corporations.

BYKATIE FITE / COUNTERPUNCH

A recent financial Webinar features Jindalee mining company executive Lindsay Dudfield selling the company’s plan for an immense lithium mining project that would tear apart the heart of irreplaceable Sage-grouse habitat at McDermitt Creek in southeast Oregon. Australian miner Jindalee has spun itself off as a US company, just as Lithium Americas did when it formed Lithium Nevada Corporation (LNC) to mine Thacker Pass further south in the McDermitt caldera. This positions the miners for federal loan largesse as they pursue mining destruction of the sagebrush sea. I wrote about the extraordinary McDermitt Creek values at stake, and the damage and habitat fragmentation already inflicted by 70 or so previous Jindalee exploration drilling sites here.

Editor’s note: Mining poisons the earth, not only right now, but for future generations: even if the mine is closed and all workers have left, the chemicals and metals that they have used and mined will stay hidden in the soil. But it can’t be hidden forever. When the earth moves due to flooding so do the chemicals. They then poison the land and water and damage the ecosystems.

Uganda’s Nyamwamba river, in the Rwenzori Mountains, has begun to flood catastrophically in recent years, partly due to climate change. Along the river are copper tailings pools from an old Canadian mining operation, which are becoming increasingly eroded by the flooding. According to a series of studies, these tailings have been washing into the water supply and soil of the Nyamwamba River Basin, contaminating human tissue, food and water with deadly heavy metals. Cancer rates are higher than normal near the tailings pools, and scientists fear that as the flooding continues to worsen, so will the health crisis.

“The climate crisis for example, has been framed as an environment issue and a technology issue, when it is actually a crisis of the human consciousness and psyche. This criminally negligent misdiagnosis, reframing and distortion of major existential crises into simple practical problems to be solved by technology, demonstrates how superficial and corrupted our very approach to problem-solving is. We are trying to solve the disasters of capitalism with more capitalism. This has never worked, and it never will. The very desire to profit out of these solutions, to “create jobs” and prosperity through Green New Deals, only demonstrates the level of delusion and persistent lack of any seriousness in dealing with a problem which is of apocalyptic proportions…..There are thousands of “environmental” organisations who are nothing but shopfronts for extractive capitalism in the form of renewable technology.  Their very organisation and operating principles emulate capitalist ventures.” - George Tsakraklides

Editor’s Note: Now as the evil empire is falling apart, it is trying to do as much damage as it can while it still can. As Dylan Thomas said: “Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.” There is currently an onslaugth of “green” energy projects on the land and sea in a desperate attempt to transition to the Fourth Industrial Revolution, the age of the intelligent machine. The sooner this culture dies the more of the living world will be left. But as we see with the violent reaction to the current protests, to their last gasps in Gaza, it will be brutal. We truly are on the eve of destruction.

Editor’s Note: Brave activist throughout the world risk their lives to protect the environment. We honor and respect their courage and realize that they are truly heroes. May they remain safe and in our thoughts to give them strength to carry on. Are you working with an organization that protects the environment?

by Liz Kimbrough on 4 April 2024 / Mongabay

Over nearly 30 years, Carlos Zorrilla and the organizations he co-founded helped stop six companies from developing open-pit copper mining operations in the Intag Valley in Ecuador. As a leader and public figure, Zorrilla is often for advice from communities facing similar struggles, so in 2009 he published a guide on how to protect one’s community from mining and other extractive operations. The 60-page guide shares wisdom and resources, including mines’ environmental and health risks, key early warning signs a company is moving in, and advice on mitigating damage if a mine does go ahead. The most important point, Zorrilla says in an interview with Mongabay, is to stop mining before it starts. Carlos Zorrilla is a leader in what locals say is the longest continuous resistance movement against mining in Latin America.

Editor’s note: We arrive in a time where technocrats are taking the reigns over the conditions of life, in the age of the machine. Or at least they aim to, but Mother Earth won’t accept a submission under dead things invented by coldhearted people. With her wild and fierce force she will collapse human techno-phantasies like a house of cards.

We as beings connected to ecosystems can stop partaking as well and not let ourselves put microchips under the skin or use a digital passport. The more we refuse technology the more independent we stay in our minds. And the saner our minds the better we’re able to struggle side by side with Mother Earth.

Editor’s Note: Civilization is killing the planet. DGR believes that nature must be protected from civilization. Nature can come back from the damage that people have done but first the destruction must stop. While people can not survive without nature, nature does not need people to survive, but it could use some help to repair the damage done. That requires activism from ordinary people to counter the extractive greed of the profit motive. This is why we must organize and survive to fight another day.

Ecosophia by Peter Charles Downey - Film Review

By Elisabeth Robson

The film Ecosophia is a tour through many of the issues facing humanity: our addiction to growth, energy, and materials, and our devastating use of “surplus energy” to extract and consume—and thus destroy—the very system that sustains us. The narrative of the film is told through a series of short interviews, interspersed with reflections by the filmmaker, Peter Charles Downey.

Editor’s note: Wind farms are not a solution to ecological destruction, especially not when built in protected reserves. Singapore-based company Rizal Wind Energy Corp. (RWEC) is drilling illegally in wildlife sanctuary and ecotourism area Masungi Georeserve.

For this massive construction it is bulldozing forest to make roads. It needs diesel for the trucks and lube oil to run the wind turbines. Local environmentalists have protected the Masungi Georeserve over generations through educating local people and engaging in struggles against land grabbing.

Editor’s note: As humanity, we’ve come so far as to consider - after having wreaked havoc on a perfectly functioning ecosystems on a flourishing planet - that producing clouds from seawater is a good idea. It sounds too bizarre to be true and even hilarious - but it’s deeply sad.

There are indeed scientists who get paid for researching not in a laboratory but in real life situations, how millions of aircrafts and ships can bring tons of aerosols into the sky to prevent the sun from doing what she does: shining to provide sunlight.

Editor’s Note: The Kurdish people of Rojava have been building a grassroots democracy based around self-organizing communes, valuing relationships with nature and women’s liberation. To a large extent, these communes aim for what we believe the world should be: localized food systems, ecological living, and non-hierarchical societal structures. However, they face many challenges from neighboring states. We have covered this previously in many of our posts and podcasts. The following is a part of the report by Make Rojava Green Again. You can find the full report here.

Editor’s Note: Since main stream media gives so much attention to COP28 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), a lot of people are familiar with it. Climate change is posed as the main environmental issue that we are facing right now. While DGR believes that climate change is a threat, it is by far not the worst. Other pressing issues, like biodiversity loss, are often sidelined by mainstream media. As a result, many people do know what COP14 UN Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS) is. Biodiversity preservation requires habitat restoration, hardly something that anyone could gain profit from. Climate change, on the other hand, has provided many opportunities for corporations, in the name of “green” energy transition. We believe that climate change is a symptom of industrial civilization. Continuation of the process via “renewable” energy will only worsen all the ecological crisis that we are facing now, including climate change. Ending industrial civilization, protecting species and restoring habitats is the only way to actually address these issues.

Editor’s note: When debating with people about how to create a society without war, the argument always comes up that “back in the stone age humans were also violent” or “back to nature doesn’t work”. Yet historical research shows that even if we shouldn’t romanticise being a cave man or woman, in prehistory humans probably lived the most peaceful life they ever have on earth.

As this article by Deborah Barsky describes, how early Homo species hunted in vast lush territories and formed clan-like groups. They had to stick together against storms and times of hunger, because they knew they were interdependent on each other and on wild nature.

Editor’s note: Fishermen are engaging resistance against the natural gas industry and its expansion of Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) terminals. They aim to defend their traditional work that goes back hundreds of years, their fishing habitats, and the health of their community. Europe, especially Germany, has increased its demand for LNG since refusing to buy gas from Russia when the attack on the Ukraine started. Texan gas company Cheniere delivered 70 percent of its natural gas supply to Europe last year.

Editor’s Note: After exploiting almost every land on Earth, the industrial economy has now moved on to exploit the sea. Exploiters do not view the sea as many of us do: a deep body of water that is home to unimaginably large number of creatures. They see the sea as they view any other place on Earth: a huge reservoir of resources that might profit them. These profits come in many forms: greater wealth, which in turn is control over even more resources, and an ability to surround oneself with and have power over more people to do their bidding. It is for this that they are destroying life on Earth.

Sabotage on Tesla - Editorial

It’s a chilly spring night in early March in Gruenheide, which is around 40 km (25 miles) away from Berlin. A few determined people walk across a flat meadow surrounded by pine forests at a wintry zero degrees. They stop at a high-voltage pylon, ignite the cables, then trigger a short circuit with water. Flames shoot up with the help of car tires, the high-voltage pylon spits fire into the darkness of the night.

Editor’s note: This is not a DGR sponsored event. While we may not agree with all of the analysis, this event may offer some useful points into understanding the disease of wetiko. DGR knows that the only way to secure the future of life on the planet is to dismantle civilization, which is the source of the dominant culture’s behaviours. This can not be accomplished through individual lifestyle and behaviour change. But it can be accomplished by joining together with like minded people that hold the commitment to fight against the destruction of the planet that is done in the name of “progress”.

WHO Abstains From “Transgender” Guidelines For Minors

This is a quick update about WHO’s plan for creating a “transgender” health guidelines. It was announced in late December and the consultations were supposed to begin on February. We outlined some major problems about the plan in an editorial early January. We thank all of our readers who took action either by signing petitions or by sending emails to WHO highlighting those problems.

Editor’s note: DGR believes that it is necessary for organizers to be strategic and efficient in organizing against ecocide. This also includes using technology as a tool for organizing. Therefore, we do not engage in “virtue signalling” and individual lifestyle choices by avoiding the use of technology. However, we are also aware of the harmful effects of these technologies. The following piece is a delving into the impacts of all actions we take and asks “what will be left to carry forward?”

Editor’s Note: On Tuesday I logged into Chat GPT for the first time, a chatbot driven by artificial intelligence technology. With search engines like Google showing mostly affiliate marketing links, it seems as there’s less and less non-commercial information to utilize for researching. I asked Chat GPT and voilá; got a valuable answer, which of course I still had to verify as any editor needs to with information found on the internet. And it - the AI machine - was even friendly to me. It is spooky how delighted I was as if I’d been chatting to a real person.

Editor’s Note: Deep Green Resistance promotes a biocentric worldview. We believe in the dignity of the lives of every creature of the world, and nature herself. Human and nonhuman alike are a part of nature, and should live in harmony with her, not against her.

That’s why we invite you to come to the We Are All In This Together Symposium, a series of live-events where friends of nature can learn more about how to get active in resistance and bring the natural world to the center of their lives in a practical and intertwined way.

Editor’s note: We all know the word mammal, but not many people may have heard about tetrapod species. This group of wild animals includes amphibians, birds and reptiles in addition to mammals. Most people love jaguars and monkeys, but an ecosystem is thriving with all kinds of particular species, also with the ones that are green and greasy or look like little dinosaurs.

Because of their importance researchers want to find out how many tetrapod species have gone extinct in comparison to how many can be rediscovered; just because nobody saw them in between a few years, doesn’t mean that they’re gone. With this “lost and found” method scientists can prove how bad the extinction rate really is, and, in a case of rediscovery, get funding for protection measures.

Editor’s note: While this article could have been written about any extractive industry, it has focused on offshore wind turbine farms. These destructive projects should require at least as much scrutiny as an offshore oil rig, but they are not. Because in the name of climate mitigation, they are rushed through without consideration for the damage they will cause, or even their effectiveness in serving this purpose and need for existence. Which is usually just based only on government mandates. And this is all done in the name of Big Environmentalism. DGR does not believe the Bright Green Lies of mainstream environmental NGOs.

Editor’s Note: Last November, an Ecuadorean appeals court ruled to return the land back to the ownership of Siekopai People. Since the early 20th century, the Siekopai have suffered due to rubber plantation, drawing of an international border through their land, oil exploration, deforestation for pastures and monocultures, Christian missionaries, among many others. A return of their land is a landmark judgment, and came after years of organizing. The following is a brief story that came out soon after the return of their land.

Editor’s Note: The following is a response we got on our recent article Ways to Fight Reliance on the Violent War Economy. We believe that discourses and discussions are important to further our analysis. In order to encourage that, we encourage our readers to participate in comments at the end of the article. You could also send us written responses to us. If you want to submit responses to any of our published pieces, please mail it to newsservice@deepgreenresistance.org putting “Letter to Editor” as a subject.

Editor’s note: Grizzly bears weigh around 700, the female up to 800 pounds according to the National Wildlife Federation. In contrast to what one might think they are omnivores and eat insects, grass, berries, roots and other plants in addition to animals like salmon, moose or deer.

“Grizzly bears are large and range in color from very light tan (almost white) to dark brown. They have a dished face, short, rounded ears, and a large shoulder hump.” The hump “gives the bear additional strength for digging” after food or their dens.

Editor’s note: As a director of conservation organisation African Parks, Prince Harry is an elite philantropist whose “good” intentions turn evil. The charity is complicit in beating to death, raping and torturing indigenous people who went into their forests to gather medicine and hunt for food.

An armed militia abused the Baka people, formerly known as the Pygmies, over years and chased them out of their ancestral home, the Congolese rainforest in Makouagonda.

Editor’s Note: This is an update to a story that we published about the proposed copper mining in Porcupine Mountains. Michigan Strategic Fund is considering a grant for the Copperwood project - a project that will destroy the natural habitat in the Porcupine Mountains. This is an urgent call for action, you can find the original piece here.

URGENT: Michigan considering $50M grant for Copperwood

We are writing today with an urgent action request that needs to be completed as soon as possible. If you care about the health of Lake Superior and about the wilderness quality of the North Country Trail and Porcupine Mountains State Park, now is the time to fight for it. An article released on January 30th reports that the Michigan Strategic Fund is currently considering a $50 million grant for the Copperwood project. This money would more than double Highland Copper’s bank account, but more importantly, a State endorsement would provide a massive boost in momentum and be used as leverage for future funds from grants, investors, and loans. To quote Highland Copper’s CEO Barry O’Shea: " I can tell you with certainty that an award of this nature will move the needle significantly in terms of how our debt providers and our equity investors look at our company. It’s not only a large financial boost for the project, but it is a true endorsement."

Editor’s Note: Building up local structures is an essential part of fighting the militarized global culture. The following piece explains how that is being done in many places across the world. That said, it is important to understand that such structures are only effective if they are a part of a wider culture of resistance.

All cities are unsustainable, they are built on the surplus that is created through agriculture. They require the importation of resources. Then the land-base and functioning ecosystems are destroyed as they grow. Civilization is a war on nature. This article is anthropocentric but it does point out how the self-organizing super organism that is the globalized capitalist economy operates and controls people. DGR’s battle is not one of a person’s identity, we fight to protect nature.

Editor’s note: We wrote this article to give you a historical and current background of how people of the Philippines work relentlessly against dam constructions. It is a summary of the book Mapping Anti-Dam Movements: The Politics of Water Reservoir Construction and Hydropower Development Projects in the Philippines by Fernan Talamayan of the National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University.

The Filipinos, of which some of them are DGR allies, bravely try to protect water and land, even though the military persecutes and sometimes kills them for doing this.

Editor’s Note: One of the problems of the civilized world is our obsession with “knowing,” to the point that we cannot stand not knowing. Yet, we know so little about the mysterious ways in which nature works. Ironically, the only way that we can understand the mystery is first by accepting that we do not know. In this post, Rebecca Wildbear invites you to take the step and let nature and your imagination guide you.

Editor’s note: There is no way mining can be done in a “sustainable way and with acceptable consequences,” whether it is on land or in the sea. It is not a question of if we don’t, we will have to continue to use open pit mines and mountaintop removal. These forms of mining will continue regardless. Deep sea mining will only add to it. Norway likes to be perceived as a net-zero hero but the reality is that behind all of those electric cars and heat pumps, Norway is a major exporter of fossil fuels, and uses the income to pay for the new technologies. And now Norway wants to be a leader in deep-sea mining, too. This demonstrates that Norway is a country that cares little for the natural world if it means giving up its extractive economy for the conviences of a modern lifestyle. If mining is involved, there will be no green transition.

Editor’s Note: A polycrisis is a situation where multiple interrelated crises hit at the same time, similar to the geopolitical, ecological and social crisis that we are witnessing now. In this piece, Micheal Lerner explains the concept of polycrisis while introducing some of the systems to understand the polycrisis and a possible way to deal with it. This piece was written in July, 2023. Recent changes, namely the Israel-Palestine war, are not mentioned here.

Editor’s note: Iran is mostly in the news for its nationwide protests against the Islamic Republic, and for its brutal treatment of women who refuse to cover their hair with a hijab. But there’s another crisis unfolding, not so much covered on the news - the ecological crisis.

In Iran we witness overshoot that leads to the land being uninhabitable in the future: water scarcity, loss of fertile land, overpopulation, government mismanagment, pollution, and poverty.

Editor’s Note: We all know that globalization can never be sustainable. Localization is imperative for a just and sustainable world. Yet, proponents of globalization have created an emissions accounting system that argues that importing goods is better than sourcing locally. Sector-based accounting calculates the carbon emissions caused by a product in the given area. So, for example, if you are consuming a product that was produced across the world, sector-based accounting would only calculate the carbon emissions in your area, so excludes the production process and transportation. Here is a video about how our “stuff” is produced in a globalized world. It gives a fair idea of what a sector-based accounting system fails to account for.

Editor’s note: The mining industry is one of the most significant human rights violators in the world. Mines are one of the most dangerous and hazardous places to work. People do not willingly let go of their subsistence economies to work in mines and quarries. They have to be forced to do so. One of the ways mining companies do that is by taking away the means of a subsistence economy. This is the story of many mines across the world. In this piece, we bring to you a story from Tuscany, Italy. It traces out the history of marble quarrying in the Mountains of the Moon (Apuan Alps), and the struggle by local communities against the quarries.

Editor’s Note: The Earth wants to live. And she wants us to stop destroying her. It is a simple answer, but one with many complex processes. How do we get there? Shall I leave my attachments with the industrial world and being off-the-grid living, like we were supposed to? Will that help Earth?

Yes, we need to leave this way of life and live more sustainably. But what the Earth needs is more than that. It is not one person who should give up on this industrial way of life, rather it is the entire industrial civilization that should stop existing. This requires a massive cultural shift from this globalized culture to a more localized one. In this article, Katie Singer explores the harms of this globalized system and a need to shift to a more local one. You can find her at katiesinger@substack.com

Editorial - Urgent Call for Comments on WHO Announcement of Guideline on Transgender Health

The World Health Organization (WHO) announced on December 18, 2023 that it is going to develop a guideline on the health of “trans and gender diverse” [sic] people.

The WHO announcement states:

“The guideline is supposed to focus on 5 areas: provision of gender-affirming care, including hormones; health workers education and training for the provision of gender-inclusive care; provision of health care for trans and gender diverse people who suffered i nterpersonal violence based in their needs; health policies that support gender-inclusive care, and legal recognition of self-determined gender identity.”

Editor’s Note: In our fight for the defense of the natural world, it is important that we feel connected to nature. Given that there is so little left in the world that could be called “natural,” it may be hard to do for many of us. It is in this spirit that we bring to you a story of a walk into the wilderness of Nuyts in the south west of Western Australia. At the beginning of the year, we hope you feel closer to your roots: the mother Earth.

Editor’s Note: There are fewer than 300 wolverines in the contiguous United States. Wolverines were listed as a threatened species in the lower 48 states  under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) in November 2023. But there are still exceptions to the protection for the wolverines. The following is a piece written by Mike Garrity, the executive director of the Alliance for the Wild Rockies. He describes the legal situation regarding the protection of the wolverines. Finally the piece ends with a call for action to remove these exceptions.

Editor’s Note: The scientific method is considered the best at explaining natural phenomenon - for good reason. However, science also has limitations. First, science has a limited scope. It requires evidence beyond reasonable doubt for any explanations to be considered reliable. It can only make predictions based on those explanations. What if there are some real phenomena that cannot be “proven” yet? In that case, what alternative assumptions do we use to make predictions?

Editor’s Note: The successful Irish struggle against fracking by multi-national gas company Tamboran offers key insights on community power building for anti-extraction movements across the world.The Australian corporation paints its international natural gas projects as ‘green’ with words like “Net Zero CO2 Energy Transition”. But people in the Beetaloo Basin in Australia and Leitrim in Ireland don’t fall for their lies.

Read about how local people, farmers, fishers and artists - deeply intertwined with their land - unite to fight for what they hold dear: rivers and streams, peat lands and hills, villages and work on the land.

Editor’s Note: We cannot have infinite growth on a finite planet. Something that should be a part of common sense is somehow lost in meaning among policymakers. In this piece, Elisabeth Robson explains the concept of overshoot to explain just that. She also delves into how the major policy makers have ignored it in favor of focusing on climate change and proposing solutions of “renewable” energy. Finally, she ends with three presentations on the same topic.

Editor’s note: Environmental nonprofit groups — which include land conservation, land trusts, and wildlife protection organizations — receive just 2% of all charitable donations, research suggests.Though small conservation groups are typically efficient about converting funds into effective, on-the-ground projects, most conservation funding goes to the largest, multi-national organizations.

“The simplest and most immediate way concerned parties with some resources, whether an individual or institution, can help is to donate more to small wildlife conservation organizations and volunteer when and where it is logistically possible,” a new op-ed argues. This post is a commentary by Gail Koelln.

Editor’s Note: The following is an update from Roam Free Nation on the bison “hunt” in Yellowstone National Park. You can find our original story here.

THE “HUNT”

The Montana state bison “hunt” began on November 15. Eight bulls, from the imperiled Central herd, have already been killed by state hunters near West Yellowstone, in the Hebgen Basin. Yellowstone National Park has been warning against killing any buffalo in the Hebgen Basin for many years now, because the Central herd – the truly last wild, migratory buffalo - continues to decline.

Editor’s Note: Ecopsychology emerged in early 1990’s as a beacon of hope for biocentrism. Unlike environmental psychology that looks at human psychology in the context of environment, ecopsychology looks at human psychology as part of and intricately connected to the Earth. It is based on the assumption that human mental wellbeing is related to planetary wellbeing. It highlights our interconnection with, not just other humans, but with the Earth and all other nonhumans.

Editor’s note: Exxon Mobil recently discovered more oil and gas fields in the disputed territory of Esequibo in South America. Guyana has already awarded drilling bids to the corporation. But Venezuela claims the region its own. News about the developments changes rapidly: On December 3rd the Venezuelan people voted 96% in favor of the non-binding referendum María Páez Victor writes about. Nobody informed Indigenous leaders in Esequibo about the situation, according to Deutsche Welle.

November 29 For Immediate Release

On Tuesday, December 5th, from 1 pm to 2:30 pm, following a federal judge’s dismissal of their latest lawsuit, the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony (RSIC) will hold a press conference on their court cases against the Thacker Pass lithium mine.

Members of the media are invited to attend the press conference, which will be held at RSIC’s Multipurpose Room, 34 Reservation Road, Building A, Reno, NV. The press conference will also be available by zoom and will be live streaming on the RSIC Facebook page.

Editor’s Note: Technology has created a virtual lifespace for all: a lifespace that gives us calculated doses of dopamine and gets us addicted to it. The following piece urges us to remove ourselves from the technological world that we have unwittingly been entangled into and to place ourselves within the natural, real world.

Praise the Technology!

By Mankh

• 89% of Americans say they check their phones within the first 10 minutes of waking up.
• 75% of Americans feel uneasy leaving their phone at home.
• 75% use their phone on the toilet.
• 69% have texted someone in the same room as them before.
• 60% sleep with their phone at night
• 57% consider themselves “addicted” to their phones
• 55% say that they have never gone longer than 24 hours without their cell phone.
• 47% of people say they feel a sense of panic or anxiety when their cell phone battery goes below 20%.
• 46% use or look at their phone while on a date.
• 27% use or look at their phone while driving. [" 2023 Cell Phone Usage Statistics: Mornings Are for Notifications"]

After a Hewlett-Packard BIOS update fried my computer’s motherboard I had four-and-a-half days without a computer while the part was in transit to the neighborhood repair guy I found because of guidance in a dream from a Carolina Wren reminding me to look local; then Internet via cell phone helped find the repair guy.

Editor’s Note: Last winter, we published a news report about the winter hunt for buffalo in Yellowstone National Park. Today we are bringing you a short update from Stephany Seay, co-founder of Roam Free Nation, about an appeal for a ceasefire for the last wild buffalo at the Yellowstone National Park for this upcoming winter.

By Stephany Seay/ Roam Free Nation

It is time for a cease-fire in the so-called buffalo hunts that take place on the western and northern edges of Yellowstone National Park.

Editor’s Note: The Halmahera Island in Indonesia is the only known home to the Hongana Manyana tribe. Unfortunately, it is also the home to vast reserves of nickel. Mining companies are now evading the indigenous rights and ecological rights of the inhabitants of the island, as well as of the island herself, to steal the nickel. The nickel is going to be used for manufacturing electric cars. The following piece is taken from Survival International.

Editor’s note: If you search the keywords renewable energy problems you’ll be snowed under with deceptive synonyms like challenges, opportunities or even solutions. Most articles don’t go into the depth of why “renewable” energy is continuing the ongoing environmental atrocities.

In Germany the buzz word is energy shift (Energiewende), which means we allegedly shift from a “bad energy” to a “good one”. But in reality it’s just a shift of our addiction from one “drug” to another, that is similarly contaminating. As Boris highlights in his article, only through a transition to a de-industrialized society will we live in a truly sustainable relationship with Mother Earth.

Editor’s Note: This is a short report-back from the Interagency Bison Management Plan meeting by Stephany Seay. Stephany Seay is a founder of Roam Free Nation.

By Stephany Seay/Roam Free Nation

Jaedin Medicine Elk and I traveled to Chico Hot Springs, MT, for the fall Interagency Bison Management Plan meeting, which took place on Halloween. Not exactly how we wanted to spend this holiday, but the buffalo come first. This is our report back to you.

Editor’s Note: The following piece is an argument for deep green environmentalism and attempts to answer the questions: What is deep green environmentalism? How have other forms of environmentalism (particularly bright green and technological) failed to save nature? Why do we need deep green environmentalism?

We Are Deep Green Environmentalists

By Elisabeth Robson/ Medium

In recent years the media has noticed that the incessant calls of “ climate emergency” followed by no action that is making any material difference to the climate change crisis has lead to people feeling depressed about the future. Of course, being the media, they report on this as if it’s a simple story of a world split into three categories of people: climate activists, climate deniers, and climate doomers. But this is too simple a story, as we will see.

Editor’s note: The US military is the largest emitter of greenhouse gas pollution in the world. It is through the allocation of over half the federal government budget that this is made possible. So when companies say that the destruction of the environment must be done to save the planet, this fact is never mentioned. We are in fact in an existential situation and yet ending the war machine is never on the table. The evil empire will do what it has always done, which is to extract the wealth of the land to the determinant of those that live there. And this will not end until it collapses. If we are to have anything left before this happens we must fight to save it.

Editor’s note: As we see in this article, published on 10/24/2023 by Investigate Europe you can find on their website www.investigate-europe.eu, the European Union abandons it’s own environmental standards when it comes to pursuing geopolitical interests in remote places.

In July of 2023 the European Parliament voted for the EU restoration law so that a part of the 80 percent of natural habitats already damaged can be rewilded. But the implementation of this law can only make an impact if Europe decreases it’s use of metals and minerals from mining, outside and inside of it’s borders.

Editor’s Note: With the increase in offshore wind energy surveys, the number of stranded North Atlantic Right Whales on East Coast beaches has also increased. Right Whales were declared as a critically endangered species by the US National Oceanographic and Administrative Administration (NOAA) in 2020. Survey and construction for offshore wind requires sonar to inform about the condition of the seabed where the wind turbines are supposed to be embedded. Right whales depend of whale calls to maintain contact with each other, gather to feed and to find mates. The oceanic noise pollution caused by the sonar disrupts all of this.

Editor’s Note: This piece was offered by Austin Persons. He wrote this in the last fall, with a sense of grief over what has been lost in the natural world.

November Falling

By Austin Persons

In this time of transitions deciduous forests glow, rustling softly on the breeze. Leaves, having fed their trees since spring, drift poetically to Earth. They wish to protect the ground which sustains their community, to merge with the infinite in the second half of their lives as leaves.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Editor’s Note: In 2015, a study developed nine indicators for planetary health, and corresponding nine threshold or boundaries. According to a recent study based on the same framework, six of the nine boundaries have already been crossed, while the other three are in the process of being crossed. This should come as a surprise to very few. The interesting fact about this new framework is that climate change is only one of the nine indicators in the new model, which is unlike in the mainstream environmental movement belief. This framework gives a much more holistic picture of the current ecological crisis than is common among the wider culture.

The following is a press release by Alyansa Tigil Mina (ATM) about a protest action against seabed quarrying in Manila Bay. DGR Asia Pacific is also a collaborator of the protest.

Press release

Alyansa Tigil Mina together with Deep Green Resistance and Local Autonomous Network trooped to the Senate during the joint hearing on seabed quarrying today for a peaceful protest action dubbed “Food Not Quarry” as they asked the Senate to urge President Bongbong Marcos, Jr. to issue an Executive Order suspending all Manila Bay reclamation projects.

Ogden: A Tale for the End of Time by Ben G. Price [Editor’s Pick]

It is rare to read something written from a nonhuman perspective without forcing humanlike qualities on them. Ben Price does exactly that in “Ogden: A Tale for the End of Time.” The shift from human’s to troll’s to bear’s to deer’s perspectives seems authentic and genuine. This reflects the author’s own values: of the author being able to view the nonhumans with respect and see the nuances and complexities of their lives, without attributing humanlike qualities to them. It quite fits the author’s profile as well. Ben Price is a pioneer of the Rights of Nature movement - a movement for legal recognition of the rights of natural entities to survive and thrive, a movement that is not possible with a human supremacist attitude.

Editor’s Note: With the ineffectiveness of the current environmental movement becoming more and more apparent, people are turning to other means to save the natural world. DGR believes in the use of any technique to save the natural world. However, we also believe that caution should be expanded towards the so called “renewable” energy as well. Also care should be taken in what actions would happen in declaring a climate emergency.

Editor’s Note; The fossil fuel industry is largely responsible for the climate crisis we are in today. The following article highlights the current state of the climate crisis. While we believe that the fossil fuel industry needs to be stopped, DGR does not believe that “green” energy is going to save the planet. We believe that the green energy industry is just an extension of the ’traditional" energy industry, running with the same disregard for the natural world. This article was produced by Earth | Food | Life, a project of the Independent Media Institute.

Editor’s Note; It is important to understand the difference between a reform and a revolution in any political movement. A reform aims to tweak some aspects of the system to make it more equitable, fair and just. A revolution, on the other hand, changes the overall structure of the system. DGR, as a radical environmental and a radical feminist organization, believes that reforms are not enough in a system that is inherently rooted in oppression and injustice. We believe that a revolution is necessary to remove that deep rooted structural violence. However, we also understand that a revolution requires political organizing at a much larger scale. While we are working on building that political movement, the natural world is being destroyed. Till then, something needs to be done to protect the pieces of natural world that we have left, no matter how small. That is where reforms contribute. We understand the perseverance and diligence it takes to bring about any reform and appreciate those who are working on it. Below is the story of such a movement. Though originally designed to be much more protective of nature and indigenous people, the mining laws in Mexico were modified to be much less than that by the time they were passed. The US is still ruled by the Mining Law of 1872.

Wednesday, September 6, 2023

“Violence on the Land is Violence on our Bodies”: Appalachian Frontline Women’s Divestment Delegation Highlights Dangers of Mountain Valley Pipeline in Meeting with UBS Bank

Joint press release with Divest Invest Protect and The Women’s Earth and Climate Action Network (WECAN) International SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA, California— On September 6, a delegation of frontline women leaders from Appalachia and advocates met with UBS Bank to highlight concerns of human rights violations along the Mountain Valley Pipeline, as well as environmental harms in the Appalachian region as a result of the pipeline.

On the Philippines, two young women - Jonila Castro (21) and Jhed Tamano (22) - were abducted on Saturday night (September 2). Both are organizing against the Manila Bay Reclamation Project. Jonila Castro is a dedicated volunteer with AKAP Ka Manila Bay, Jhed Tamano is a committed program coordinator for the Community and Church Program for Manila Bay under the Ecumenical Bishops Forum. They were on their way to conduct important consultations with coastal communities when they were snatched by armed individuals in Barangay Lati, Orion, Bataan.

Editor’s Note: Language is one of the most significant elements of any culture. If a language goes extinct, the culture will go extinct within a few generations. Languages are not just a way of communicating, they represent a worldview. Relation to the natural world is a clear example. In the English language, natural elements are referred by a neutral gender pronoun, “it.” It is not a coincidence that the same pronoun is used to refer to inanimate or nonliving beings. On the other hand, many cultures (both indigenous and nonindigenous) refer to natural elements with a gendered pronoun, similar to the ones used to refer to a person. For anyone who is a part of the culture, the language that they learn shapes how they view natural elements. An English speaking child is more likely to view nature as inanimate, compared to a child whose language ascribes personhood to nature. In the following essay, Mankh explores the origin of the language and its relation to our worldview.

Editor’s Note: In this essay, Carl (one of our editors) describes the process of ocean acidification, and how it relates with other ecological crises.

By Carl van Warmerdam First we need to know what an acid is. An acid is any substance (species) who’s molecules or ions are capable of donating a hydrogen ion proton (H+) to another substance in aqueous solution. The opposite of an acid is a base. Which is a substance who’s molecules or ions are able to accept a hydrogen ion from an acid. Acidic substances are usually identified by their sour taste while bases are bitter. The quantitative means to measure the degree to which a substance is acidic or basic is the detection of “potential of hydrogen” (pH) or “power of hydrogen”. This is expressed with a logarithmic scale 0 -14 that inversely indicates the activity of hydrogen ions in solution. The greater the amount of hydrogen ions which are measured below 7 the more acidic a substance is, going to 0. The less hydrogen ions are present which are measured above 7 the more basic a substance is, going to 14. So the pH values are inverse to number of hydrogen ions present. As the concentration of hydrogen ions increases the pH decreases (acidic). As the concentration of hydrogen ions decreases the pH increases (basic). With the value of 7 being neutral which is where pure distilled water falls on the scale. So acidification would be increasing hydrogen ions.Basic (or alkaline) properties can be associated with the presence of hydroxide ions (OH−) in aqueous solution, and the neutralization of acids (H+) by bases can be explained in terms of the reaction of these two ions to give the neutral molecule water (H+ + OH− → H2O).

Editor’s Note: One of the indicators of the success of any movement is the level of oppression by the powerful. The protests against logging at Fairy Creek on Vancouver Island, Canada, are an illustration of this. Fairy Creek is home to old-growth forests and has been targeted by forest product industries. Two years ago, activists joined hands with indigenous people to protest the logging. Now renewed efforts to protect the old-growth forests have been met with force by the RCMP. We thank Brenda Norrell for permission to repost this piece.

Editor’s Note: Scientists have been known to make modest predictions when it comes to ecological crises. This is a reason many predictions come about long before the expected timeline. The following article looks at some recent events to argue that climate collapse has already begun.

By José Seoane/ Globetrotter

In 2023, different climatic anomalies have been recorded that set new historical records in the tragic progression of climate change at the global level.

Editor’s note: The FPIC (Free, prior and informed consent) and UNDRIP (UN Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples) are international standards, that some companies have adopted into their policies. The FPIC is an international human rights principle that protect peoples’ rights to self-determination. UNDRIP delineates and defines the individual and collective rights of indigenous peoples. Both of these are important principles that improve the sovereignty of indigenous peoples. However, neither of these are legally binding, which has disastrous outcomes.

Editor’s Note: We all know that industrial technology is not good for the natural world. This is what makes any form of industrial technology practically unsustainable in the long run, and ecocidal by nature. The following article describes the impact of wireless technology on various aspects of wildlife. This article was produced by Earth | Food | Life, a project of the Independent Media Institute.

By Reynald Loki/ Earth | Food | Life

Editor’s Note: In the Fight for Who We Love series, we introduce you to a species. These nonhuman species are what inspires most of us to join environmental movements and to continue to fight for the natural world. We hope you find this series inspiring, informative, and a break from news on industrial civilization. Let us know what you think in the comments! Also, if there is a species that you want us to cover in the upcoming months, please make suggestions. Today they are polar bears.

Editor’s note: In order to create a culture where the greed of humans reigned supreme to the needs of life on the planet, the human civilization had to create myths. Categorically claiming that the past was worse, in terms of human rights and equality, stopped any discussion over the detrimental state of both in present society. All of these myths directly or indirectly form the basis of human supremacy, male supremacy and the Eurocentric perspective. Challenging these assumptions are just one of the ways to bring cultural changes. The following article talks about three of such myths about our past that have been dismissed by recent evidence. This article was produced by Human Bridges, a project of the Independent Media Institute.

Editor’s Note: This essay was originally published in 2021, but is timely today as the new Christopher Nolan film “Oppenheimer” has just been released. As people are coming to realize the Bright Green Lies of “renewable” energy, they are looking for other ways to continue their unsustainable lifestyles. Many people are seriously considering risking more nuclear reactor accidents, waste and nuclear winter as the war in Ukraine continues to escalate.

By Max Wilbert/ Substack

Editor’s Note: Protests and demands by the mainstream environmental movement has yet failed to make any substantial changes in the ecological health of the natural world. Day by day, the situation is getting worse. Ecosabotage, on the other hand, deals directly with the problem and stops the powerful’s ability to control nature. The following is a communique submitted anonymously to, and originally published by, Unsalted Counter Info.

Reportback from some valve turners

It is with a heavy heart and hazy skies we announce that 2 different pipeline valves were turned off along the Line 5 route on Anishinaabae land in the great lakes region.This was done on the 13th anniversary of the Kalamazoo River oil spill.This was the 2nd largest inland oil spill in amerikkkan history, dumping 1,000,000 gallons of tar sands crude oil into the river and causing untold damage to the water, land and those who live on it.

Editor’s Note: The Manila Bay Reclamation Project is a series of projects around the bay in the cities of Manila, Pasay, Parañaque, Navotas, and Cavite. The projects- that should more accurately be called land grabs- ironically assert to “reclaim” the bay area for commercial, residential and tourism development. Offshore mining has started in the Manila Bay area. Fisherfolks in the area have not been informed about the seabed quarry before it began. Now there are no fish for them to catch. Their entire livelihood has been destroyed. Many have relocated to other areas. The following is a statement by a coalition of organizations fighting for community rights and against the seabed quarry.

Editor’s Note: In today’s piece, we bring to you two issues from New Delhi, India. First, the Dwarka forest is being threatened with deforestation for redevelopment projects. Second, the spotted deer in Deer Park are being relocated to a different state because the authorities now believe that the deer have become “unmanageable.” The eco-suicidal drive of our collective culture is what makes decisions. The needs of nature and life come secondary. Both of these issues are a reflection of the same trend. The two issues are followed by a video from one of our readers. We thank Tannuja for providing us with the stories and David for offering the video.

Editor’s Note: Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant (PORTS), a facility in Pike County, Ohio, produced enriched uranium for the US Atomic Energy Commission (USAEC). It operated from 1954 to 2001. Since 2019, PORTS has been under scrutiny for expelling radioactive material to the land, air and soil. The local community had been unaware till mid-2019 when enriched uranium was detected in Zahn’s Corner Middle School, culminating in the school having to be suddenly closed after the revelation. The school later filed a lawsuit against PORTS. On June 10, Dr. Michael Ketterer gave a presentation on the ongoing effects of the contamination by PORTS. The following piece presents a brief summary and reflection, followed by a video of the presentation.

Editor’s note: In the short span of time that plastic was invented, plastic has become ubiquitous. Not just in its widespread use in our daily lives but also in the pervasive form that it has entered our ecosystem and our bodies. In its nanoparticle (any particle of diameter ranging from 1 to 100 nanometer) form, plastics are capable of entering our bodies more so than a coarse particle of plastic is. The following article explains the direness of the situation. This adapted excerpt is from Thicker Than Water: The Quest for Solutions to the Plastic Crisis, by Erica Cirino (Island Press, 2021). Reproduced with permission from Island Press. This adaptation was produced for the web by Earth | Food | Life, a project of the Independent Media Institute.

Editor’s Note: Roam Free Nation’s cofounders traveled to Gardiner, MT recently to attend the Interagency Bison Management Plan meeting and speak on behalf of the buffalo. The meeting gave an overview of the recent “hunt” that killed over 1,200 wild buffaloes. The meeting was also attended by a few representatives of tribal people who participated in the “hunt”. Many of the represented tribal people there were satisfied at how “smooth” the “hunt” turned out to be for them. Read the Roam Free Nation’s full report on the meeting here. Yet not everyone believes that the “hunt” was what could be the best for the wild buffaloes. The following piece is an opinion piece by Jaedin Medicine Elk, a co-founder of Roam Free Nation and a member of the Cheyenne tribe.

Editor’s Note: A successful environmental movement will result from a coordination between aboveground political action and underground action against critical infrastructures. For security of the overall movement, DGR remains an aboveground organization. We do not have any links with any sort of underground groups. The following is a piece that is republished from Act for Freedom about three attacks against critical infrastructure in Chile.

Via Sans Nom (trans. by Act for Freedom)

Los Álamos (Chile), June 9, 2023. The pylon of the high-voltage power line failed to withstand the shock of the attack.

Editor’s Note: As a continent with abundant “resources”, Africa has been a target of colonial powers, who have plundered her land for centuries. This is not merely ecocide, but a violation of indigenous and human rights as well. Colonizers have destroyed Africa and continue to do so under newer guises, all in the name of, they say, advancing the lives of African people. People whose advanced cultures were destroyed along with their land. While DGR believes in community control over decisions related to energy, we not believe that renewable energy is the key to the ecological problems we are facing. This article was produced by Earth | Food | Life, a project of the Independent Media Institute. This article is an edited version of a speech the author delivered at Health of Mother Earth Foundation’s 10th Anniversary Conference with the theme ‘Advancing Environmental Justice in Africa’ held in June 2023 in Abuja, Nigeria.

Editor’s Note: In the following piece, Mankh talks about the detachment of technology from the natural world and urges people on the need to be in touch with nature. The promise of these gadgets is freedom but the reality is they’re tyranny. It is good to know that everything that corporations tell you is a lie. Believe the results of their actions and not what they say. Their only goal is to make a profit. We thank the author for offering this piece to us.

Editor’s Note: With the inevitability of peak oil, many have welcomed nuclear as an alternate source of energy. Countless " accidents" over the past few decades (Chernobyl and Fukushima being the most prominent) have warned us of the risks associated with nuclear. Not only that, business as usual (without “accidents”) for nuclear does not bode well for public health either. The following is a press release by Radiation and Public Health Project. It highlights the key points of recent health research near NFS nuclear plant in Unicoi County, Tennessee. The press release is followed by a Deep Green Book Club discussion on a film about nuclear waste.

Editor’s Note: The following is an excerpt from the book Wild Yoga by Rebecca Wildbear. In this excerpt, Rebecca talks about connecting with spirituality, and demonstrates how caring for the nature and other nonhumans is an integral part of it. Learn more about her work at the end of this post.

I walk through the cave’s rocky, wet terrain, placing my hand on a wall to steady myself as my eyes adjust to the dark. Pausing, I hear the soft, dripping echo of dew sliding off rock. It sounds like a heartbeat from within this cool earthen interior. As water trickles over my feet, I remember watching springs emerge from darkness, rising from under the ground to feed streams, lakes, and rivers. I thank these waters for nourishing all life on our planet.

Editor’s Note: This press release from CELDF (Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund) describes a gag order put against an activist, Tish O’Dell, for talking about her concerns on the use of an industrial byproduct in her community. The gag order was placed in 2012. Since then, tests have affirmed that not only was the product toxic, it is also high in radioactive elements. Lawsuits by big corporations against activists are one of the tools used to shut down any form of resistance. We have talked about it also in the context of the lawsuit against activists and tribal members involved in protecting Thacker Pass. After a decade during which new research has been conducted, Tish O’Dell has appealed for a termination on the gag order.

Editor’s Note: In order to deter the tribal members and activists from fighting for Thacker Pass, Lithium Nevada has sued them. Unsurprisingly, as a corporation, they have greater funds to sustain their legal action. We appeal for all who can to support in whatever way you can. The details for financial donations are at the end of the post.

Lithium Nevada Corporation has filed a lawsuit against Protect Thacker Pass and seven people for opposing the Thacker Pass lithium mine.

Editor’s Note: For the past few decades, the environmental movement has tried lobbying, educating, and holding rallies with the notion of protecting the natural world. This approach has not led to success. Instead of the destruction of the planet being slowed down, it has been progressing (in some cases, accelerating). This inefficacy has forced us to consider other means that might have better results. The deep green environmental movement has always called for use of any means necessary to protect the natural world. The following analysis highlights how more are opening up to the idea. This story was originally published by Grist. Sign up for Grist’s weekly newsletter here

Editor’s Note: The following are two press releases by Ox Sam Camp. As communities get more radical against corporations, corporations use their power against them. This is not the first time that this has happened and it will not be the last. As activists, it is necessary for us to understand the risk associated with any action against the system. The earlier we understand this, the better we can strategize. The article is followed by a short reflection piece by Elisabeth Robson on the need for the environmental movement to put our allegiance with the natural world, as is demonstrated in this fight to protect Thacker Pass.

Editor’s Note: The following events are not organized by DGR. We stand in solidarity with both of these and encourage our readers to get involved in these if possible.

Radical Resilience and Restoration for Wetland Rights

On June 28 th CELDF’s Kai Huschke will be presenting at the Society for Wetland Scientists annual conference. Joining Kai on the panel Socio-Ecological Resilience and Adaptation: Implementing Rights of Wetlands will be S enior Ecologist/Natural Climate Solutions Specialist Gillian Davis from BSC Group, Inc. and Tufts University Global Development & Environment Institute, Matthew Simpon, Director from the UK based organization 35percent, and Bill Moomaw, Tufts University Professor Emeritus. The four have been active as part of a global collective working on the community and national levels for the legal rights of wetlands.

Editor’s Note: Ever since the beginning of scientific progress, it has been based on control (or domination) of the natural world. It has been based on a nature-hating patriarchal way of viewing the world. That does not mean that there is no other way to fulfill our curiosity. Numerous indigenous peoples and nonhumans have found ways to fulfill their curiosity within a harmonious relationship (as opposed to a dominating relationship) with the natural world. This article highlights how scientific progress could destroy the world to the point of causing human extinction.

Editor’s Note: Any alternative to fossil fuel is embraced as “green.” These include the so-called alternatives that require the destruction of the natural world on par with the destruction by fossil fuel. DGR has always stood against these false solutions. Instead, we stand with the real solutions, i.e. a complete halting of the industrial civilization and a return to a regenerative system. The following article is written by Arno, and was originally published on the DGR France website. It is translated by Benja. It discusses the damage done by lithium mining, a core element of batteries for electronics, including electric cars.

Editor’s Note: Civilization is destructive. It endangers everyone in its quest for development, including vulnerable human communities. We stand in solidarity with all efforts by communities to protect themselves and the natural communities they live in. The following is a press release by Women’s Earth and Climate Action Network International (WECAN). You can find the original statement here.

USA, May 25, 2023— Today, Indigenous women leaders from the Indigenous Women’s Treaty Alliance, joined by over 150 organizations, representing millions nationwide, submitted a letter to the Biden Administration with an emergency request to decommission Enbridge Line 5 pipeline due to imminent threats of oil spills impacting the Bad River Watershed and the Great Lakes.

Editor’s Note: The following events are not being organized by DGR. We may not agree with all of the content on the events. Yet, we encourage you to attend these events to learn more about the amazing kangaroo.

Kangaroo Walks and Talks Program

We are excited to launch the Kangaroo Walks and Talks Program with a webinar 7pm-8pm (AEST) Tuesday 30th May.

Back to Country, Save Kangaroos on Mornington Peninsula and Kangaroos Alive have developed a special program to introduce communities to their local kangaroo mob.

Editor’s Note: Many environmentalists state their reason for wanting to stop the destruction on nature is because, according to them, there is no humanity without nature. As a biophilic organization, DGR believes that we should save nature because nature has an inherent worth (irrespective of the value for humans). The following article is written with the same sentiment.

By Simon P. James / The Conversation

Environmentalists rightly urge us to consider the long-term effects of our actions. Plastic bags, they point out, can take hundreds of years to decompose, while radioactive waste can remain dangerous for hundreds of thousands of years. It could take the Earth’s biosphere several million years to recover from human-caused mass extinctions.

Editor’s Note: The mainstream environmental movement has failed to save the natural world. A baby step in the right direction has been counterbalanced by a giant leap against Earth. DGR has been speaking up for sabotage of key infrastructures for the past decade. Now, more and more individuals and groups are waking up to the asymmetrical nature of our struggles and to the necessity to use any means that we can. The following piece from Truthout argues that ecosabotage of gas and oil pipelines has become a heroic action to save the planet.

Editor’s Note: The Indigenous Women of Peehee Mu’huh have set up an Indigenous Women’s Camp (Ox Sam Newe Momokonee Nokutun) blocking the construction of a water pipeline for Lithium Nevada’s open-pit lithium mine. The land is a historic site, and has witnessed two massacres of indigenous people. The following text was written by Paul Cienfuegos, Founding Director, Community Rights US. We share it here to update you on the latest happenings at Thacker Pass. This piece is also a call for action for all to share the word and help the movement in any way that they can. More information can be found at the Indigenous Women’s Camp website oxsam.org. Thank you for reading.

Editor’s Note: Title IX of the Educational Amendments of 1972 prohibits sex-based discrimination in US educational institutions receiving federal aid. The US Department of Education has proposed to amend the Title IX in relation to sex-related eligibility criteria for male and female athletic teams. If passed, this would mean that athletes would be allowed to compete based on their gender identity, rather than their sex. Sports has long been categorized on the basis of sex for a reason. There are some fundamental differences in the ways that male and female bodies develop, specifically in adolescence. Male sex hormones, especially testosterone, are responsible for increased muscle mass and bone density. Sex hormones account for the sudden height and weight increases in boys after puberty. These effects are long lasting, and cannot be curbed by taking cross-sex hormones. Recently, the debate has been ignited by the win of the trans-identifying swimmer Lia Thomas in the women’s category. This is a press release from GASBR, Green Alliance for Sex-Based Rights. It is also a call for action. Today is the last day for commenting on the issue.

Editor’s Note: We are witnessing the results of a culture in overshoot. Having extracted everything that is easily accessible on land, corporations are turning to the remote depths of the ocean in search of profitable metals. The fact that deep sea mining is being considered is proof that this way of life can’t last. Industrial mining will, of course, come to an end. And the world will be far better off if the mining is stopped before it destroys the ocean rather than after. While the fight against deep sea mining has largely focused on areas beyond national jurisdiction, there are many national projects, like the one in Norway, that require opposition. A living ocean is far more valuable than the metals that can be extracted from it.

Editor’s Note: It is not enough to consider short-term productivity when we talk about restoration of the natural world. It is imperative that we talk about how the landscape will be in the future, hundreds, maybe thousands, of years from today. Only then will we be talking about true sustainability, or about true restoration.

By Austin Pearsons

Our actions today determine our options tomorrow. This is as good a time as any to ask ourselves hard questions. To look around, to look inward. How are our choices impacting future generations? What will be our legacy? Will the children of tomorrow benefit from our actions today? Will our grandchildren thank us for our dedication and foresight? Our grandchildren’s grandchildren? Will there be abundance or will there be scarcity? The answer hinges on us in the present.

By Max Wilbert/ Protect Thacker Pass

A criminal slips a police officer a handful of bills and walks free. A businessman buys a politician with a briefcase full of cash. We often think of bribery and corruption in these blatant terms, and as something that happens in poor countries, elsewhere.

But corruption often looks different.

In the United States, where I live, corruption is common. It’s also mostly legal.

In fact, dirty money has become part of the political fabric of our nation. It has become normalized, institutionalized, and even regulated. And yet, the effects of this corruption are just as insidious and destructive as blatant payoffs. Corruption is a rot in our political system, and it is spreading.

Editor’s Note: For a long time, natural landscapes have been destroyed in the name of development. “Development” - a vague concept in itself - is the primary driver of destruction and ecocide across the world. Same thing is happening in the beautiful Gozo island of Malta. But it’s not happening without resistance. Some local groups are fighting for their land. This piece is written by a member of resistance against the development. In addition to the brief overview of the “developmental” project, this piece is also a fundraising appeal from the group.

Editor’s Note: In the Fight for Who We Love series, we introduce you to one species every month. These nonhuman species are what inspires most of us to join the environmental movement and to continue to fight for the natural world. We hope you find this series inspiring, informative, and a break from news on industrial civilization. Let us know what you think in comments! Also, if there is a species that you want us to cover in the upcoming months, please make suggestions in the comments. Today it is Adélie penguins.

Editor’s Note: Earlier this year, UN delegates reached an agreement on conservation of marine life on international waters. The agreement, reached after two decades of negotiations, claims it will protect 30 percent of the world’s oceans from biodiversity loss by 2030. It has been hailed as a " breakthrough" by Secretary-General António Guterres. Mainstream environmental organizations have followed suit. These two articles by DGR members question these claims. They explore what the treaty actually says. The article is followed by the invitation to a demonstration against Deep Sea Mining in London on May 3 and 4.

Editor’s Note: Mainstream environmental organizations propose electric vehicles (EVs) as a solution to every environmental crisis. It is not only untrue, but a delusion. It does not matter to the hundreds of lives lost whether they were killed for extraction of fossil fuel for traditional internal combustion (IC) cars, or for extraction of materials necessary for manufacturing EVs. What matters is that they are dead, never to come back, and that they died so a portion of humans could have convenient mobility. DGR is organizing to oppose car culture: both IC and EVs.

Editor’s Note: The Earth is dying. The facts are there. Yet, not a lot of people take it seriously. Otherwise, we would have seen a much greater action around it. The following post tries to explain this phenomenon by the concepts of enlightenment, wétiko, denial of reality and maximum power principle, and by challenging the preconceived notions in our civilization.

By Erik Michaels/ Problems, Predicaments and Technology My last post about enlightenment was to describe the simple fact that enlightenment does not bring happiness or fulfillment but is a stripping away of innocence and naïvety. Enlightenment is what experience and reality replaces idealism with. My own experience informs me that I must choose to look for positives rather than the negatives which initially overwhelm me. I must turn away from the anthropocentric perspective which I am naturally biased with. In this manner, I can then begin to look at the collective set of predicaments our species has brought forth and see it for the unvarnished truth that it really is. My writings aren’t unique, as many others write about the same topics as I do. However, very few actually point to the actual roots of these predicaments the way I do, and perhaps denial of reality (see link below) is one reason why. Doing so requires much grief work along the way, realizing the true nature of how we got to this point.

Editor’s Note: The civilization has destroyed many places in the name of progress, which they call ‘sacrifice zones.’ The following piece discusses different instances of destruction from recent history, and how the current economy has actively profited from those destructions. The views expressed in the article are of the author. DGR does not necessarily agree with all of the opinions expressed.

By Mankh

Considering the destruction caused by extractive mining and wars, the global corporate empire society sure seems like one huge controlled demolition. Before getting to the topic of Electric Vehicles (EVs) and specifically Thacker Pass aka Peehee Mu’huh, some examples and explanation of the context of controlled demolition.

Editor’s Note: Celebrate this Earth’s Day with Eden’s Last Chance. We congratulate Joshua on the completion of his film, and hope that it will encourage more people to get involved in the environmental movement. View more of our coverage on Fairy Creek here.

TEENAGER’S RELEASE OF 2023 EARTH DAY FILM CHALLENGES OUR FUTURE

Amazon will be releasing Eden’s Last Chance – One Teenager’s Journey into the Environmental Movement, before Earth Day 2023 on April 18th. Winner of an Impact Docs award, the full length documentary is 19-year-old Joshua Wright’s first film. Known as a champion of British Columbia’s defense of Fairy Creek’s old growth forests, his aim is to mobilize citizens to take immediate action on the ecological crisis.

Editor’s Note: We thank the author for offering this piece to us at the beginning of a new season. The opinions expressed in this article are of the author and may not correspond to DGR. DGR is a biophilic and feminist organization. Our stance puts us in conflict with religion many times, but we are not an anti-religious organization. The following article is published as a critical analysis of religion and capitalism, not to oppose any religion. For further insight into DGR’s views on spirituality, read this portion from the Deep Green Resistance book.

Editor’s Note: In the following piece, Sue Coulstock invites you in Nuyts Wilderness Walk. Along the journey, she shares her reflections on Australia’s colonial past, and the many nonhumans who call the wilderness their homes.

By Sue Coulstock

Recently we did an impromptu reconnaissance hike in a pocket of remnant old-growth Karri/Tingle forest, in preparation for doing the Nuyts Wilderness Walk for the first time later this Southern autumn. I’ve blogged our hikes for years to share with overseas friends and thought I’d share this one with fellow DGR people from all over the world. Many of you will be consciously limiting overseas travel, so I wanted to give you a vicarious walking experience in Australia with us.

Editor’s note: Neither of the events are being organized by DGR. We stand in solidarity with both of these and encourage our readers to get involved in these if possible.

Community Rights US to reorganize as Association

The following is a message from Paul Cienfuegos, the Founding Director of Community Rights US, regarding some news about his movement and virtual book talks on April 1 and April 17. You can join the event here.

Editor’s Note: Over the past two years, we have brought you news about the fight for Thacker Pass, and how destruction will affect the indigenous people and the natural community. The destruction of Thacker Pass has already begun. Despite that, those who were fighting against the ecocide have not stopped. This is a call for action to support them in any way that you can.

On March 23, U.S. District Court Judge Miranda M. Du ruled against the tribes — the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony, Summit Lake Paiute Tribe, and the Burns Paiute Tribe — who argued that the Bureau of Land Management violated several laws when it permitted Lithium Americas on Jan. 15, 2021 to mine Thacker Pass. The tribes also alleged that the permission violates their access to historically and culturally significant sites.

Editor’s Note: This is an op-ed written by Jaedin Medicine Elk, who is the co-founder and vice-president of Roam Free Nation. She writes about the continued slaughter of migratory buffalo.

By Jaedin Medicine Elk/ Roam Free Nation

Thirty percent of America’s last wild migratory buffalo have been removed from the population.

On Saturday, March 18th, Yellowstone National Park released the latest report of bison slaughter and removal operations on the Interagency Bison Management Plan website. The report shows that the slaughter of Yellowstone’s bison continues, including the killing of pregnant females who are just weeks away from giving birth.

Editor’s note: Lierre Keith, co founder of DGR, is going to be in London for two events. On April 1, she’s going to be a part of a Women’s Rights Conference along with a number of other feminists. On April 2, she is going to give a talk on Bright Green Lies, followed by a screening of the documentary and Q&A.

What is to be Done? Women’s Rights Conference

A hybrid conference (up to 150 of us in real life and lots more online) in London on Saturday 1st April 2023, 9am-5pm near Old St tube or Barbican tube. Women’s Declaration International invites you to a day of speeches, workshops, networking, internet livestream link to global sisters and hopefully fun. If you would like to attend, help plan, organize, volunteer on the day, run sessions, etc, please email info@womensdeclaration.com or fill in this form https://forms.gle/bFLntzbBzrm4zd6M8

Editor’s Note: Today we’re sharing the following brief essays written by members of Deep Green Resistance :

• Why I Joined Deep Green Resistance
• A Culture of Resistance
• Why Should We Care About the Planet?
• How Do We Prepare For What’s Ahead?
• My Favorite Natural Place

My Favorite Natural Place

When I was about 8 I lived in the mountains and our home was surrounded by tall needly trees.

Not too far from one corner of the home, just slightly down the hill, was a small cluster of boulders. The rocks were situated in such a way that I could just manage to nestle myself 8-year-old self between them.

Editor’s Note: Taking the context of Maryland’s forests, the following piece analyses how the mainstream environmental movement and pro-industry management actors have used deliberately misinterpreting to outright creation of information to justify commercial activities at the expense of forests. Industrial deforestation is harmful for the forests and the planet. The fact that this obvious piece of information should even be stated to educated adults affirms the successful (and deceitful) framing of biomass as an environmentally friendly way out of climate crisis. The same goes for deep sea mining.

Editor’s Note: The Earth is dying and the industrial civilization is killing it. Decades of the environmental movement has not only failed to stop the ecocide, let alone even to slow it down. By the time you finish reading this article, a species will have gone extinct. We’ve tried peaceful negotiations. We’ve lobbied. We’ve protested. We’ve organized non violent direct action. Yet, what seems to be the most effective action is sabotage of infrastructures, be it the attack on Saudi oil wells or on the Niger Delta. DGR is an aboveground organization, yet believes that it is necessary to use any means necessary to bring down the industrial civilization. You can know the difference between an underground and an aboveground organization here. The following is a communique from an underground group. It is posted from BC Counter Info.

Editor’s note: In Atlanta City, local people are protesting a proposed police training facility. The project includes a mock metropolis, and is proposed to be built on the lands of Weelaunee Forest. Protestors have camped in the Forest. Clashes with the police led to one being killed over a month ago. This article discusses different aspects of the Cop City.

By Ray Acheson / Counterpunch

In September 2021, the Atlanta City Council passed legislation to build a $90 million police training facility, despite overwhelming opposition from the Atlanta community. The compound would include a mock city complete with houses, a school, a gas station, a bank, and a community centre; it would also feature a Black Hawk landing pad, shooting ranges, and a bomb testing site.

Editor’s note: None of the events are being organized by DGR. We stand in solidarity and encourage our readers to get involved in these if possible.

Kangaroo: A love-hate story (Film Screening)

Kangaroo reveals Australia’s relationship with its beloved icon, uncovering disturbing scenes behind the largest mass destruction of wildlife in the world. Using investigative techniques such as interviews, citizen footage, and research, Kangaroo: A Love-Hate Story shows how the kangaroo meat industry and the Australian government put profits ahead of animal welfare, native species protection and the environment. In addition, farmers who are guided by misinformation and profit take whatever steps they deem necessary to eradicate the species.

Editor’s Note: The brief piece reflects on the consumer-, expansion- and tech-centered world and calls for shifting our allegiance to the natural world. We thank the author for both the article and the poem.

By Mankh (Walter E. Harris III)

“Each and every new product is supposed to offer a dramatic shortcut to the long-awaited promised land of total consumption.” & “… consumer can only get his hands on a succession of fragments of this commodity heaven.” - Guy Debord, from his book The Society of the Spectacle

Editor’s note: Climate change predictions have repeatedly demonstrated to be estimating disasters much later than they arrive. In spite of that, climate scientists still continue to make similar predictions. In this piece, the author - a psychologist - explores the technical and psychological reasons behind this.

By Jackson Damian / Medium

One of the clichés of climate change reporting is climate scientists claiming to be ‘surprised’, ‘shocked’ or ‘baffled’ by extreme events happening so much faster than predicted by their models and research studies.

Editor’s note: The Thacker Pass lithium mine project reflects more than one injustices in the world: greenwashing mines, denying U.S. atrocities against indigenous tribes, grabbing indigenous land against their will, ecocide. This article highlights some of these injustices.

By Brett Wilkins / Common Dreams

A coalition of conservation groups on Tuesday joined Native American tribes in launching legal challenges to a proposed lithium mine in northern Nevada that critics say was “illegally approved” and will “irreparably damage” the delicate desert ecosystem and land where Indigenous peoples are seeking federal historical recognition of a genocidal massacre perpetrated by U.S. colonizers.

February 17, 2023

Late yesterday, three Native American Tribes — the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony, Burns Paiute Tribe, and Summit Lake Paiute Tribe — launched a major new lawsuit against the Thacker Pass lithium mine.

Will Falk is representing RSIC and SLPT in this lawsuit, and Protect Thacker Pass is providing media support. Please donate to support the case and fund legal costs!

DONATE: https://www.protectthackerpass.org/donations-and-funding/

This new case contains major allegations that were not heard in the prior court case, and may be a significant road block for the mine.

Editor’s note: In order to fill the void of fossil fuel supplies caused by the Russia-Ukraine War, countries are opening their land for coal extraction. We recently covered the resistance in Lützerath, Germany. A similar story seems to be unraveling in Australia. The following piece, originally published in Public Eye, follows the tragic Aboriginal land grabbing by corporations spanning two continents. Despite local resistance and vigil for over 400 days, the mines have not yet been stopped.

Editor’s Note: The following is a press release by Roam Free Nation. It describes how the population of wild bison is being targeted and reduced in favor for the livestock industry. Once again, the needs of the natural world is being held secondary to the profit motive of businesses.

GARDINER, MT: On Friday, Yellowstone National Park submitted a report to IBMP.info (the website of the Interagency Bison Management Plan) revealing shocking numbers of Yellowstone’s bison – the country’s last wild migratory buffalo — who have been killed during the so-called hunt, slaughter, and removal for quarantine (domestication). At the time the report was issued, the number of buffalo eliminated from Yellowstone’s population stood at 1,024. That number increases daily, and it’s only early February. This is already the most deadly year for wild buffalo since 2017, and if the killing and capturing continues at this rate, these mis-management actions could remove a third to half of the population.

Editor’s note: Science, touted to be objective, is far from so. As Lewis Mumford explains and Derrick writes extensively in Myth of Human Supremacy, any tool cannot be separated from the overall social structure under which it was created and operates. Likewise, science, as a way of thought, was created under a paradigm of dominance of nature. Much of the scientific discoveries have been pursued for the same purpose. Neither climate science, not climate solution is an exception. The following article is a part of a blog by Indrajit Samarajiva. DGR does not espouse the views express in this article in its entirety.

Editor’s Note: Due to their early adoption of renewables, Germany has been hailed as an example by mainstream environmentalists. The myth that Germany is cutting back on fossil fuel has already been debunked in Bright Green Lies. With their main supplier of fossil fuel going to war with Ukraine, Germany is facing a crisis. They are vying for alternate sources, which they have found under their own soil in Lützerath. They are trying to evacuate a hundred villages to get coal under their ground. In a brave attempt to defend their land, the people are putting up a fight against the German state. Today’s post consists of three separate pieces. The first is a Common Dreams piece covering police brutality against the local communities. The second is a firsthand account of one of those many protestors who joined the local villagers in fighting the German state. This account explores the need for training and militant resistance to industrial civilization. The post finally culminates in an excerpt from Derrick Jensen’s Endgame. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Deep Green Resistance, the News Service or its staff.

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.

Tribal Chairman: “It’s Our Responsibility to Protect Sacred Sites”

RENO, NV — The Thacker Pass Lithium Mine in northern Nevada is headed back to Federal Court on January 5th as the lawsuits against the project near completion, but project opponents are raising the alarm that Lithium Nevada Corporation has already begun work on the proposed mine.

Lithium Nevada’s workers at Thacker Pass have begun digging test pits, bore holes, dumping gravel, building fencing, and installing security cameras where Native Americans often conduct ceremonies. Lithium Nevada also conducted “bulk sampling” earlier this year, and may be planning to dig dozens of new test pits across Thacker Pass. They’re claiming this work is legal under previous permits issued over a decade ago. But Tribes and mine opponents, including the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony and Summit Lake Paiute Tribe, disagree.

Editor’s note: It is true that wind and heat from the sun are renewable but the devices used to capture that energy are not. Creating such devices only adds on to a non-existing carbon budget. Richard Heinberg, the author of the following article, is an advocate for “renewable” energy as a part of the “transition” to a post carbon civilization. However, the following article demonstrates that the so-called transition is not happening in real life. In reality, civilization and a “post-carbon” future is an oxymoron. Civilization cannot survive in a post-carbon future. It is highly unlikely that humanity will willingly transition out of civilization, so it must be brought down “by any means possible”. The best way to accomplish that is through organizing. The sooner it is brought down, the better for the planet. For more on the impracticality of renewables, read Bright Green Lies.

Editor’s Note: The mainstream environmental movement has been co-opted not only into believing that renewables can save the planet, but also in the tactics used to accomplish that. A lot of the movement uses advocacy as the one and only strategy against systems of power. The main problem with the advocacy is that it places power in the hands of the state and diminishes the power that we have as individuals and as communities. On the contrary, the organizing model recognizes the power that we hold and focuses on increasing that power through collective, coordinated actions. (For more on this, read Jane McAlevey’s book “ No Shortcuts: Organizing for Power in a New Gilded Age.” ) This is an editorial piece by Hugo Blanco, a Peruvian peasant and political figure. It is a call to action for all to recognize the power we have as individuals and as communities to organize into a powerful social movement.

Editor’s note: The Ambler road is being planned in Alaska to connect the Dalton Highway with the Ambler Mining District. It will cross the Arctic National Park, state lands and native lands. The road in itself poses many threats to the wildlife which is described in the following piece. Many stakeholders are involved in this project, some of them support it and some of them oppose it. Proponents include the Congressional delegates from Alaska and native tribes who hope to benefit from the added jobs in their economy. Those who oppose it are the native groups whose subsistence hunting and gathering is threatened by the road and conservationists. As George Wuerthner mentions in this piece, for a long time, the mining project was not feasible economically, and thus the area was protected from extraction. As we are extracting the last remaining fossil fuels, mining sites like these, which were too expensive in the past, become more necessary for the so called energy transition. We can expect this trend to grow in the future. As fossil fuels peak, there will be more and more extraction of these last remaining pockets of minerals. This mining prospect in Alaska is just another example of this.

The salmons are dying, all for the greed of humans. Salmons are only one of the numerous species at risk due to industrial civilization. We lose 200 species a day. This is an ecological crisis that we are facing. This is a call for action. Join a resistance. For all the species that we are losing every day. For the salmon. Align yourself with the natural world.

By Max Wilbert

Earlier this month I spent a week in the coastal mountains of Oregon, where industrial logging has replaced old-growth forests with monocrop plantations, released vast quantities of greenhouse gases, eviscerated biodiversity, and harmed rivers and streams via siltation and other forms of habitat destruction, water temperature increases, and chemical pollution.

Editor’s note: Mainstream environmentalists have been demanding that countries across the world declare a “climate emergency.” But what does a climate emergency mean? What will the consequences be? Is there a possibility that it will be more detrimental to the environment? In this piece, Elisabeth Robson argues how declaring a climate emergency can be worse for the environment.

By Elisabeth Robson/ Protect Thacker Pass

“Climate emergency”. We hear these words regularly these days, whenever there is a wild fire, a flood, or an extreme weather event of any kind. We hear these words at the annual Conference of Parties (COPs) on climate change held by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), including at the COP27 meeting happening right now in Egypt. And we hear these words regularly from organizations petitioning the U.S. government to “declare a climate emergency”, and from Senators requesting the same.

Editor’s note: Less than five years ago in Ireland, a woman getting an abortion could get a longer sentence than her rapist. That changed with a referendum in 2018, where the people of Ireland voted for abortion rights. The following article is written by one of the organizers of the Yes campaign: a campaign that reached out to people leading up to the referendum to get them to vote Yes for abortion rights. IN this piece, Clodagh Schofield describes her experiences with using powerful conversations as a tactic in the campaign. As social beings, we tend to be reluctant to voice our opinions if we believe that those around us would get uncomfortable because of it. It might be because we think others don’t agree with us, or simply because the topic is an awkward one (like abortion). Voicing our opinions in such situations can be a small, yet powerful, way to start a discussion on a topic. It can lead to an exchange of ideas and people beginning to understand each other’s perspectives. Sometimes, it can also be part of a wider strategy to influence public opinion. While DGR does not believe that changing public opinion in itself can lead to a cultural shift required to save the world, we do believe it is an important part of our movement. It is also a tactic that you can use with the people around you which requires relatively less time and energy and a higher amount of courage. Let us know if you have started uncomfortable conversations around you, and the effects you observed.

“All ethics so far evolved rest upon a single premise: that the individual is a member of a community of interdependent parts. The land ethic simply enlarges the boundaries of the community to include soils, waters, plants and animals, or collectively the land.” - Aldo Leopold, The Land Ethic, A Sand County Almanac.

By Rob Lewis, originally published by Resilience.org

Land change is a scientific term you’re not likely to hear in mainstream climate conversation, which is a shame, because what it refers to, the climatic effects of human damage to living landscapes, is a big part of the climate crisis. I talk in greater detail about land change and how it got left out of the climate narrative in an earlier Resilience piece, called Putting the Land Back in Climate. Here, I want to consider the effects of this omission, not only in the practical terms of climate policy, but in terms less definitive. What does it mean to our treatment of the land that it’s gotten to be left out of our picture of climate? Or another way of putting it: how does not knowing that our local landscapes hydrate, cool and stabilize our climates, affect our relationship with those landscapes or lack thereof?

Editor’s note: The Rojava conflict, also known as the Rojava Revolution, is a political upheaval and military conflict taking place in northern Syria and Iraq known among Kurds as Western Kurdistan or Rojava. In this social revolution a prominent role is played by women both on the battlefield and within the newly formed political system, as well as the implementation of democratic confederalism, a form of libertarian socialism that emphasizes decentralization, gender equality and the need for local governance through direct democracy. As an eco-feminist organization, DGR agrees with Women Defend Rojava that all women should aspire to the principles of self-defense. That this consciousness must be established in society as a culture of resistance. The power of the State will always attack those who resist and rise up against patriarchal violence and fight for a free life. As part of the women’s revolution, the Rojava takes an important role in building alternatives to the current patriarchal-capitalist world system and defending them.

This is a press release by Process of Liberation of Mother Earth, originally published in Liberacion de la Madre Tierra. The Nasa people of Cauca had been pushed to the mountains by the invaders in the 16th century. For the past 17 years, they have shifted to direct action to get back their land. Although their pursuit had been disrupted in the past, they have now stayed in their original land despite state attempts to remove them. Both right leaning and left leaning governments have attempted to remove them from their rights to their land. DGR extends our solidarity to the Nasa people of Cauca valley in their struggle for land reclamation.

By Carl van Warmerdam

The North Atlantic Right Whale (NARW) are among the rarest of all marine mammal species in the Atlantic Ocean. They average approximately 15 m (50 ft) in length. They have stocky, black bodies with no dorsal fin, and bumpy, coarse patches of skin on their heads called callosities. The NARW is one of the world’s most endangered whales. Once common along the eastern U.S. seaboard, the whale was hunted to near-extinction by the 1750s. The species gets its names from early whalers, who considered them to be the “right” whales to hunt. By the early 1900s the population off Europe had been virtually extirpated while a small population of perhaps a hundred or fewer survived in the western North Atlantic off the United States and Canada. After 1935, when an international agreement went into effect banning the hunting of all right whales, their numbers began to increase slowly. In recent decades, this slow recovery has been impeded by mortality and serious injury from ship strikes, entanglement in fishing gear, underwater noise and separation from calving areas because of shipping traffic. NARW now occur almost exclusively along the east coasts of the United States and Canada, where they rely on a calanoid copepod, Calanus finmarchicus, as their primary food source. Beyond eating a lot, whales also produce lots of plumes (a gassy form of underwater poop). These plumes fertilize the ocean and help feed small organisms called phytoplankton. These organisms, in turn, produce 50% of the world’s oxygen – every other breath humans take. Over their lifetimes, NARW also accumulate tons of carbon in their bodies – helping to mitigate climate change. The importance of whales for the ecosystem cannot be overstated.

This episode tries to answer the challenging question: What comes after Industrial Civilization? In this part, Max Wilbert talks with Lierre Keith. Lierre Keith is the author of ‘The Vegetarian Myth’ and someone who has studied food systems, sustainability, agriculture and soils for many years. This is part 2 of an episode of the Green Flame. Part 1 where Max interviews Michel Jacobi was release a while ago. You can find it here.

On November 19th, Deep Green Resistance hosted a special 3-hour live streaming event, “Collapse: Climate, Ecology, and Civilization” featuring Derrick Jensen, Saba Malik, Max Wilbert, Robert Jensen, Lierre Keith, and a variety of other grassroots activists from four continents. The recording of the event has been released. The fundraiser and auction still continues. Auction will end on Wednesday.

Our way of life doesn’t need to be saved. The planet needs to be saved from our way of life. Right now civilization is causing the extinction of 200 species a day. It is drawing down the Earth’s capacity to support life. Ultimately, we are talking about the future of all generations being sacrificed.

Today, November 19th, Deep Green Resistance is hosting a live online event on the topic of collapse. The event will start at 3 PM Pacific Time (11pm / 23:00 UTC) and will be hosted on Givebutter and Facebook.

This live event will explore issues of collapse (ecological, climatic, and civilizational) with a focus on organized, political resistance to slow and mitigate the worst aspects of collapse and accelerate the positive impacts. There will be opportunities to ask questions and participate in dialogue.

By Frank Kaminski, originally published by Mud City Press An Inconvenient Apocalypse: Environmental Collapse, Climate Crisis, and the Fate of Humanity By Wes Jackson and Robert Jensen 184 pp. University of Notre Dame Press, Sept. 2022. $24.00.

The goal of An Inconvenient Apocalypse isn’t to try to convince people of the reality of humankind’s environmental and societal crises. The book’s authors know that’s a fool’s errand, given the powerlessness of facts alone to change minds. “A parade of statistics and studies,” they write, “rarely persuades those who have decided to ignore the threats to human communities and ecosystems.” Instead the book takes these threats as a starting point and spends the majority of its lean page count exploring their implications and how we might best respond to them. It succeeds commendably in this regard.

Editor’s note: Any movement, if effective in challenging the status quo, is bound to face persecution from the state. The persecution may come in many forms, from defamation, to legal action, to outright murder. The twenty year long COINTELPRO program was run by the FBI to destabilize many movements including African-American, Native Americans and communist movements across the United States. A variety of methods was used to achieve the goal. The Green Scare is the set of tactics used by FBI in the early twenty-first century to discredit and persecute the radical environmental movement. The following article discusses the Green Scare, putting it in context of the recent demise of Dave Foreman, a found of Earth First! and an early target of Green Scare.

Editor’s Note: While climate change is taken as THE pressing ecological concern of current era, biodiversity loss is the often less known but probably more destructive ecological disaster. UNEP estimates we lose 200 species in a day. That is 200 species that are never going to walk the Earth again. With these, we lose 200 creatures that play a unique and significant part in the natural communities, and immeasurable contributions of each to the health of the nature. This study finds 69% average drop in animal populations since 1970. Over those five decades most of the decline can be traced to habitat destruction. The human desire for ever more growth played out over the years, city by city, road by road, acre by acre, across the globe. It is to want a new cell phone and never give a second thought as to where it comes from. Corporations want to make money so they hire the poor who want only to feed their families and they cut down another swath of rainforest to dig a mine and with it a dozen species we haven’t even named yet die. Think about what goes into a house to live in and the wood that must come from somewhere, and the coal and the oil to power it, and to power the cars that take people from there to the store to buy more things. And on and on, that is the American Dream.

This is part 1 of an episode of the Green Flame. This episode tries to answer the challenging question: What comes after Industrial Civilization? In this part, Max Wilbert talks with Michel Jacobi. Michel Jacobi is a German, but he’s living in the Western part of Ukraine trying to reverse breed some of the extinct large animals of the European countryside back into existence and work with these creatures as assistants and as allies, in the process of restoring the land. Part 2 of the episode is with Lierre Keith, author of ‘The Vegetarian Myth’ and someone who has studied food systems, sustainability, agriculture and soils for many years, will be featured shortly.

Editor’s note: On September 16, a 22 year-old woman (Mahsa Amini) was brutally tortured and killed by the Iranian state for improper wearing of hijab. The Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Khamenei, has made a public statement that the protests happening in the country are being backed by the Western countries, and that Mahsa Amini was not tortured in their prison. Given the history of US-backed regime changes across the world from Central and South Americas to the Middle East, including Iran itself, concerns among anti-imperialists about the recent protests are not an indication of paranoia. Whether or not the protests are backed by imperialist tendencies of the West, the plight of the women of Iran should not be discarded either. For the past forty decades of theocratic rule in Iran, women’s human rights have been violated in more than one occasion. They have faced many injustices, the death of Mahsa Amini and of the hundreds of people (especially young women) who protested her death is just the latest of which. Regardless of the West’s imperialist tendencies, these injustices should be addressed first and foremost. The following statement was released by Democratic Organisation of Iranian Women (DOIW) on September 23. Since then, many protestors have been killed, arrested and persecuted.

Editor’s note: Roads in the middle of wildlife, both illegal and legal, cause habitat fragmentation. This, in turn, impacts wildlife. They disturb migration routes of many animals. Many die in roadkill. Some are more likely to be killed than others, affecting the population balance between species. The light pollution alters the circadian rhythms. Other forms of pollution affects other aspects of their lives. Learn more about the impacts of roads on wildlife here. The following article demonstrates how, in addition to that, roads (mainly unofficial roads) are causing a widespread deforestation in the Amazon rainforest, one of the largest remaining rainforests. Amazon is home to not only some rare species of flora and fauna, but also to some of the last remaining uncontacted peoples in the world. Destruction of Amazon is an annihilation of these species and the lifestyles of these people.

Editor’s Note: Deep sea mining is being pursued on the pretext of a transition towards a “cleaner” source of energy. This transition is being hailed as “the solution” to all environmental problems by the majority of the environmental movement. The irony of “the solution” to environmental problems being destruction of natural communities seems to be lost on a lot of people. The International Seabed Authority has been criticized for a lack of transparency and corporate capture by the companies it is supposed to regulate. Given that the organization is expected to be f unded from mining royalties, it may not come as a surprise that it has prioritized the interests of corporations above the preservation of the deep sea. Despite numerous concerns raised about Nauru Ocean Resources Inc. (NORI)’s environmental impact statement, the ISA gave permission to NORI to begin exploratory mining. NORI’s vessel, The Hidden Gem, is currently extracting polymetallic nodules from the seafloor in the Clarion Clipperton Zone. This exploratory mining will cause tremendous harm itself, but it is also a big step towards opening the gates to large-scale commercial exploitation of the deep sea. To help stop this, get organized, become a Deep Sea Defender.

Editor’s Note: The natural world is dying and time is running out. DGR believes it is necessary to take any action possible to stop the destruction of the natural world. We believe sabotage of key infrastructures are more effective than social movements to bring the industrial civilization (and its death drive) down. In these dire times, we are glad to see increasing adoption of and advocacy for eco-sabotage. Fear that these actions will lead to further hostility from the powerful against the environmental movement are baseless. The powerful (including in UK) are already hostile to the environmental movement and the natural world. Any impact on hostility from the powerful is minimal. However, when it comes to tactics and strategy, context matters. No tactic can be judged as “effective” or “ineffective” in isolation. Goals, assumptions and political circumstances must be considered before selecting methods. As such, we think target selection is critical in evaluating an act of ecosabotage. Pipelines that transport oil are an example of strategic target selection. Windows of organizations linked to fossil fuels are not. Smashing windows or other similar small-scale acts of minor eco-sabotage may be useful for training and propaganda but it does little to challenge the power structure. Minor acts of eco-sabotage may be useful in drawing attention to the issue, by giving media attention to the issue (which is not guaranteed). DGR advocates to move beyond social-political goals and into physical material ones: challenging the power structure that enables destruction of nature through strategic dismantling of global industrial infrastructures. DGR also follows security culture. We maintain a strict firewall between underground action and aboveground organizing. That’s why, as an aboveground organization, we do not engage in any forms of underground action, nor do we know about any underground actions except through information published elsewhere. This article was originally published on opendemocracy.net

Editor’s Note: Development projects have always destroyed local ways of living and nonhuman communities. Numerous examples attest to that. The government of Cambodia need not look very far. The Lower Sesan 2 dam it built despite resistance has collectively been decried by national and international organizations for numerous human rights and indigenous rights violations. The government of Cambodia itself placed a ten-year ban on damming Mekong in 2020. Despite this, the government has permitted the group responsible for Lower Sesan 2 to conduct geological studies for building the Stung Treng dam along Mekong river. Previous studies have already outlined the devastating effects it can have on the fisher communities. It is no surprise that states prioritize profits over local communities in their decision making process. Organized political resistance is required for the local communities to stand a chance against such decisions that hughly impact their lives.

The Deep Green Resistance Fall Fundraiser Event

Our way of life — industrial civilization — is destroying the planet.

From coral reefs to the great forests, the last strongholds of the wild are falling. The climate is destabilizing. And we are entering the 6th mass extinction of life on Earth. Ecological collapse is here.

This unprecedented crisis demands extraordinary solutions. And yet, governments and mainstream environmental groups are failing to chart a path towards a livable future. What is to be done?

Editor’s note: Land defenders, especially indigenous land defenders, are at risk across the world, more so in some places than others. In their fight to protect their communities and their land, they directly confront structures of power, challenging the powerful’s sense of entitlement. In order to maintain the status quo, the powerful employ any means necessary to silence the resistors. In some places, this may take the form of political and legal attack, in others, this may lead to murder. Either way, the objective of such repression is not merely to silence one voice, but to set an example, to shut down those hundreds of voices which may have been raised in resistance. This strategy has been used through history. Even so, resistance lives on. Where the repression becomes strong, defenders find new ways to adapt to their political situation and to continue fighting the powerful. Statistics say that one land defender is killed every two days. While it is necessary to hold the states accountable for these unlawful killings, it is also important for defenders to take measures to protect themselves. This may include being familiar with the laws of one’s region, or to learn self-defense, or whatever is appropriate for one’s situation. Following rules of security culture may help in increasing security for defenders.

Editor’s note: Every time a corporation or state puts forward a development project to further reinforce existing structures of power, it is done under the guise of “economic prosperity.” Those most affected by the project are brought forward as one of the beneficiaries of the so-called economic progress. In reality, their ways of life and livelihood are destroyed, making them more and more dependent on the larger economy and, thus, on the state. The nonhumans are left unmentioned. The same claims are being made about the Uinta Basin Railway. As is mentioned in the article, there is little probability that the railways will be used for anything except transporting fossil fuels. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author. DGR does not endorse all of the ideas expressed here. We do not believe solar, wind or geothermal energy are a viable - or even an ethical - alternative to fossil fuel. Regardless of that, we do agree with the author’s analysis of the Uinta Basin Railway contributing to further climate change. This is a call to action. Stop this project before it starts. Get involved in an organization to Stop the Unita Basin Railway. Or get involved in fighting for what you love, start your own organization. Spread the word!

Editor’s note: Neither of the events are being organized by DGR. We stand in solidarity with both of these and encourage our readers to get involved in these if possible.

FiLiA 2022

FiLiA is a UK-based women-led volunteer women-only organization. It runs the largest annual grassroots conference in Europe, with the aims of a) building sisterhood and solidarity, b) amplifying the voices of women, particularly those less often heard or purposefully silenced, and c) defending women’s human rights. Every year since 2013, the FiLiA conference is organized in a different part of UK and brings women together in listening to and building relationship with other women. Women share their experiences with patriarchy and their efforts to tackle the challenges they have faced.

Editor’s note: Contrary to what mainstream environmental organizations assert, so-called “renewable” energy is NOT a solution to the ecological crisis we are facing. It would require a tremendous amount of energy to mine materials; transport and transform them through industrial processes like smelting; turn them into solar panels, wind turbines, batteries, vehicles, infrastructure, and industrial machinery plus installation and maintenance. This is all done using the same systems of power which is currently used for conventional fossil fuels. The resulting emissions from these process will only add to the business as usual emissions. While the wind and sun may be “renewable,” the turbines, solar panels, the raw materials that go into making them, and the lands and oceans they impact certainly are not. They require tons of carbon emissions to produce so they are not carbon free and not green. Calling them “green” is greenwashing. The proposed mass adoption of “renewable” energy on a hitherto undreamed of scale has made the issue of energy (power) density extremely important . In its simplest terms, power density can be understood as: ‘how big does my power station have to be, in order to generate the power I want?’ The most useful metric is the land (or sea) area that will be used up. Here, we encounter the most easily understood, and the most insoluble of “renewable” energy’s problems. Compared to fossil fuel, it’s power density is very very low. Thus, they require larger areas of land to produce. This land is someone’s home, someone’s sacred site, someone’s source of food, water and air. We just don’t hear about them, because they are the wild beings, the nonhumans treated as disposables by civilization. The humans that inhabit the land are indigenous peoples who are yet to be fully assimilated into the industrial culture. Here, we can see colonialism and extractive economics come together. The following article describes the plans for different “renewable” energy plants in California and Nevada. The article also demonstrates how the plans for big “renewables” actively reinforce the existing structures of power, with the energy companies lobbying to disincentivize decentralized and community-controlled rooftop solars in favor of big projects that are destroying the neighbors.

Editor’s note: Borders are created by nation-states. If the relationship between the surrounding countries are amiable, borders serve the purpose to stop individuals from crossing over to the other side without authority. Conversely, if the relationship is hostile, borders either are an active warzone (eg. Gaza strip between Israel and Palestine), or are at the risk of becoming one (eg. Kashmir between India and Pakistan). Either of these pose a threat to the wild nature. Many species rely on periodic migration through a specific route that goes beyond the boundaries of nation-states. At its best, borders serve to stop that migration, risking the survival of the species. At its worst, borders turned into active warzones and the militarized activities are constantly destroying an entire landscape. Civilisation inherently infringes on the freedom of all living beings through these borders. This article provides useful information from across the globe on how warzones are impacting wildlife. It also shows the threats of new projects such as the Belt and Road Initiative, purported to be based on “win-win cooperation” between countries, is still a warzone of competition with biodiversity. The peace parks proposed in this article can be used not only to rewild nature but also to deescalate conflict between neighboring nation states DGR supports and engages in rewilding the Earth. Meanwhile peace parks also pose some new questions: What happens if one, or both, states begin extracting resources beyond the regenerative capacity of the area? If one infringes the territory of the peace park, risking another conflict? What mechanisms can be put in place to deter such actions?

Editor’s note: After months of aboveground organizing against the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) Ruby Montoya and Jessica Reznicek conducted a campaign of underground sabotage to stop the pipeline in 2017. When their action received no media attention, they decided to go public to promote the seriousness of the cause. In a public statement, they claimed responsibility for their actions and consequently became subject to lawsuits, including criminal liability and terrorism charges. Jessica was sentenced to eight years in prison in 2021 and Ruby was recently sentenced to six years in prison. We understand and respect the risks that Jessica and Ruby took to protect what they love. We find it disturbing that Ruby Montoya collaborated with the law enforcement agencies to put the blame against her co-defendant and other people for a lighter sentence on her part. This type of behavior harms the entire movement. Therefore before engaging in any form of environmental action, aboveground or underground, it is necessary to study security culture. Understand the risks associated with one’s actions and make a conscious decision of whether to engage in the action or not. In order to follow the rules of security culture, as an aboveground organization, DGR does not engage in or have knowledge of any form of underground action. This increases the security and effectiveness of our movement as a whole. Though we do believe in using any means necessary to stop the ongoing ecocide. We also believe in a coordination between aboveground organizing and underground action. The Deep Green Resistance News Service exists to publicize and normalize the use of militant and underground tactics in the fight for justice and sustainability of the natural world.

Editor’s Note: DGR does not support solar and wind “alternatives”. They are not alternatives to the energy and ecological crisis, but rather a part of it.. They do not “replace” natural gas and fossil fuels, not only because the so called renewable energy are not as potent an energy source as fossil fuel, but also because they rely on fossil fuel for basic operation. They contribute to the abuse, exploitation and plunder of nature. There are mountains of resources to support this. More dangerously, they lead us to false solutions, putting our much needed revolutionary energies into projects which only contribute to the problem. We are firmly opposed to these technologies. The value of this article lies in exposing how these “green” technologies are being introduced in reality. Despite the bright green lies in this article, it is important to gain understanding on how these technologies are wrecking havoc across the globe. The beauty of nature is defended strongly in this article. The “violent mechanization of [the] daily view of the natural world” is acknowledged to be a deep concern, indeed it is “extremely disturbing”. In the spirit of solidarity and internationalism, we call for coalitions to ask important questions on these “green” and “alternative” technologies, and to continue the ecological resistance to protect the wild.

Editor’s note: Today we bring you a beautiful essay from Australia.

By Sue Coulstock For David Gulpilil, Sunsmart and the Earth, with love and thanks.

Written December 6 – 16, 2021

This is still being revised because it’s so difficult to find the words and tie everything together, but I thought I’d put this out in the open now.

A week ago a longtime friend died on the same day as a beloved representative of Australian Indigenous culture, and all week I have tried in vain to bring myself to write about it, in my desire to honour both of them. Each time before today, when I sat down at the keyboard, my mind became as blank as the virtual page.

Editor’s note: According to the scientists who wrote the following paper, “future environmental conditions will be far more dangerous than currently believed. The scale of the threats to the biosphere and all its lifeforms—including humanity—is in fact so great that it is difficult to grasp for even well-informed experts.” We agree, and have been working to both inform people about these issues and to resist the destruction of the planet since our organization formed over a decade ago. “Any else [other than telling the truth about our ecological crisis] is misleading at best,” the scientists write, “or negligent and potentially lethal for the human enterprise [and, we must add, much of life on this planet] at worst.” Modern civilization is a society of the spectacle in which media corporations focus more on who won the football game or how the queen is buried than about the breakdown of planetary ecology. This scientific report is essential reading and should be a headline news story worldwide. However, this information is inherently subversive, and therefore is either ignored or framed in such a way as to support the goals of the wealthy. For years, our co-founder Derrick Jensen has asked his audiences, “Do you think this culture will undergo a voluntary transformation to a sane and sustainable way of life?” No one ever says yes. This is why Deep Green Resistance exists. Deep Green Resistance starts where the environmental movement leaves off: industrial civilization is incompatible with life. Technology can’t fix it, and shopping—no matter how green—won’t stop it. To save this planet, we need a serious resistance movement that can bring down the industrial economy. Deep Green Resistance is a plan of action for anyone determined to fight for this planet—and win.

By Max Wilbert

David Roberts — a journalist who has written for Vox and Grist and now runs a popular green-tech newsletter — recently shared this on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/drvolts/status/1560121386013642752

https://twitter.com/drvolts/status/1560125556368162816

https://twitter.com/drvolts/status/1560126653245767680

This idea is not new to Mr. Roberts. It actually reflects a decades-long push to make environmentalism mainstream by sacrificing its foundational biocentric values in favor of anthropocentrism.

The organization 350, for example, has released a ‘style guide’ advising activists to “Focus on people. Whenever possible, use visuals to emphasize that climate is a real, tangible human problem—not an abstract [sic] ecological issue.” A later version of the same guide edited the statement to read: “People are the heart of the climate movement … avoid photos of polar bears, icebergs or other images that obscure the real people behind the climate crisis.”

Editor’s Note: When many people think of political engagement, they think of protests. However, protests are merely one tactic among thousands. Like all tactics, protests can be very effective in contributing to a broader strategy, or they can backfire. Context matters. Protest must play a role in a larger strategic plan if it is to help effect change. At Deep Green Resistance, we endorse raising political awareness of the destructive nature of civilization and organizing to stop the destruction of our planet. We also believe that aboveground activists need to push for acceptance and normalization of more militant and radical tactics, where appropriate. This article presents one view on protest, which is not necessarily ours. Nonetheless, this is useful material. For more information on strategy and tactics, we highly recommend reading Chapters 12, 13, and 14 in the book Deep Green Resistance: Strategy to Save the Planet ( buy the book or read a free online version here).

Editor’s Note: Global warming is a serious threat to our planet, and, along with mass extinction, wildlife population collapse, habitat destruction, desertification, aquifer drawdown, oceanic dead zones, pollution, and other ecological issues, is one of the primary symptoms of overshoot and industrial civilization. This paper, published last month in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, explores the prospect of catastrophic global warming, noting that “There is ample evidence that climate change could become catastrophic… at even modest levels of warming.” With outcomes such as runaway global warming, oceanic hypoxia, and mass mortality becoming more certain with each passing day, the justifications for Deep Green Resistance are only becoming stronger.

Editor’s note: By biomass, krill are the most abundant species in the world and the main food source for all baleen whales — including blue whales, the largest animals on the planet and the largest ever known to have existed. Regardless of how abundant it is — see Passenger Pigeons, Buffalo, or Great Auks — any species that becomes economically valuable in a growth economy will likely experience decline and collapse. That is the nature of endless growth. Krill are no different. Between overfishing that has more than quadrupled in 15 years and global climate destabilization that has already warmed the Antarctic by 2.5° C since the 1940s, Krill, like all life on Earth, are in trouble —  yet another sign that industrial civilization is driving an ongoing ecological collapse and accelerating us deeper into the 6th mass extinction (an extermination, in this case) of life on Earth.

Editor’s note: Most of the world’s science is conducted in service of profit and militarism which both depends upon for its creation and results in ruin for the natural world. In this article, Evan Richards draws links between the destruction of our planet, “anti-aging medicines,” patriarchy, and rejection of biological reality.

By Evan Richards

“The assumption that women and nature exist for the use and convenience of men has generated technologies undreamed of”

Editor’s note: Activists and environmentalists in the Philippines take extreme risks by speaking out to protect land and water. The Philippines has consistently been ranked as the most dangerous country in the world for environmental defenders. This story includes reference to 68-year-old environmental defender Daisy Macapanpan, who was arrested on what appear to be trumped-up charges for resisting the Ahunan pumped hydroelectric dam. This repression is merely the beginning. Deep Green Resistance has collaborated with grassroots activists in the Philippines for many years. Some of our allies are involved in this fight, and are raising funds to print educational materials, hold events, and support community activism against the Ahunan hydro project by providing expertise, assisting in connections with lawyers, help getting international media coverage, and more. You can donate to these community organizers via PayPal to this email address. This story has not previously been reported in the international press.

Editor’s note: Deep-sea mining is a sign of addiction. Only a culture driven by a death urge masquerading as a profit-production-motive could contemplate destroying some of the largest and most intact remaining habitats on Earth and call it “green.” One of the first companies that may begin deep sea mining is The Metals Company , headquartered in Vancouver, Canada. TMC plans to extract nickel, cobalt, copper, and manganese from “polymetallic nodules” dredged from the deep seafloor in an area of international waters called the Clarion Clipperton Zone southwest of San Diego. The company claims that mining the oceans is less harmful to the environment. Nothing could be further from the truth. As a biocentric organization, Deep Green Resistance is opposed to deep-sea mining — and indeed, all industrial mining. Mining is the one of the most destructive industries on the planet in terms of habitat destruction, pollution, and social injustice. Modern industrial civilization is fully dependent on mining, and as an organization dedicated to dismantling industrial civilization, we oppose and will fight all industrial mining activities. We put the planet first.

In the Pacific Northwest, fish cannot coexist with massive electricity demand.

by Max Wilbert

In 1980, the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) was given a mission to protect and restore salmon and steelhead fish populations in addition to running the dams in the Columbia River Basin (the most dammed watershed in the world) for electricity generation.

There is a fundamental contradiction between the survival of fish and the existence of dams. To believe otherwise is to deceive yourself. As this new investigation shows, BPA has always prioritized electricity over fish.

Editor’s note: This commentary from the eco-socialist philosopher, Monthly Review editor, and author John Bellamy Foster is noteworthy for its descriptions of the capture of the IPCC (The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), the United Nations body that facilitates the annual COP (Conference of Parties) climate meetings and produces the authoritative review of climate science in their “Assessment Reports.” While we are not Marxists, we share at least one significant understanding with Foster: the idea that revolutionary responses to the ecological crisis are morally justified. While Deep Green Resistance calls for strategic, coordinated eco-sabotage to initiate cascading systems failure in the infrastructure of global industrialism, Foster calls for class struggle and popular uprising. In this piece, Foster responds to an ongoing discussion and debate between Noam Chomsky, Max Wilbert of Deep Green Resistance, a Chilean proponent of what he calls “Collapsist Marxism,” and several other thinkers, previously published here. We share his commentary here in the spirit of dialogue.

We were warned for decades about the death march we are on because of global warming. And yet, the global ruling class continues to frog-march us towards extinction.

By Chris Hedges / ScheerPost

The past week has seen record-breaking heat waves across Europe. Wildfires have ripped through Spain, Portugal and France. London’s fire brigade experienced its busiest day since World War II. The U.K. saw its hottest day on record of 104.54 Fahrenheit. In China, more than a dozen cities issued the “highest possible heat warning” this weekend with over 900 million people in China enduring a scorching heat wave along with severe flooding and landslides across large swathes of southern China. Dozens of people have died. Millions of Chinese have been displaced. Economic losses run into the billions of yuan. Droughts, which have destroyed crops, killed livestock and forced many to flee their homes, are creating a potential famine in the Horn of Africa. More than 100 million people in the United States are under heat alerts in more than two dozen states from temperatures in the mid-to-upper 90s and low 100s. Wildfires have destroyed thousands of acres in California. More than 73 percent of New Mexico is suffering from an “extreme” or “severe” drought. Thousands of people had to flee from a fast-moving brush fire near Yosemite National Park on Saturday and 2,000 homes and businesses lost power.

Editor’s note: As an eco-feminist organization, Deep Green Resistance draws links between the exploitation and mistreatment of women, the destruction of compassion and solidarity, and the ongoing ecocide of the natural world. Rates of sexual abuse today are staggering. On average nearly 500,000 people over 12 years of age — the vast majority of them female — are sexually assaulted each year in the United States. Some 12.5% of children are sexually abused. In this piece, Jocelyn Crowley draws links between the mainstreaming of violent pornography and endemic sexual abuse — increasingly normalized as “rough sex” or kink, reminding us that we must not forget that sexual abuse of women is at the core of patriarchy. NB: This piece contains graphic descriptions of sexual abuse. Click here for information about stopping porn addiction.

Editor’s note: Today’s post is an interview with Will Falk discussing his work on the Protect Thacker Pass campaign with Tiokasin Ghosthorse (Lakota), host of First Voices Radio. Falk co-founded Protect Thacker Pass with Max Wilbert and is representing the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony in a Federal court case alleging violations of tribal consultation laws.

By First Voices Radio

Tiokasin’s guest is Will Falk, who gives an update on Thacker Pass in northern Nevada. In January 2021, Will and Max Wilbert launched an occupation of a proposed lithium mine at Thacker Pass. Will is a writer, lawyer, and environmental activist. He believes the ongoing destruction of the natural world is the most pressing issue confronting us today.

Editor’s note: Today we share an online fundraiser created by dissident author and journalist Christopher Ketcham. Ketchum is fundraising to meet with and complete his book about a Texas man who sabotaged electrical infrastructure across the American West “in defense of mother earth,” to use his own words. We support strategic and moral acts of sabotage against industrial infrastructure that is destroying our planet, and look forward to reading Ketchum’s book when it is released.

Editor’s note: From 2016-2017, Jessica Reznicek and Ruby Montoya conducted a campaign of sabotage against the Dakota Access Pipeline (known as DAPL). The saboteurs had previously participated in the aboveground movement at Standing Rock and Mississipi Stand, but when that proved largely ineffective, they turned to underground direct action. At the end of June, Reznicek was sentenced to eight years in federal prison after a controversial " terrorism enhancement" — which hasn’t been applied to January 6 defendants or to hate-crime terrorists — was added to her sentence. If you want to write to Jessica in prison, we’ve included her info at the end of this post. Now, Montoya’s case is moving towards sentencing. It appears she may be collaborating with authorities. If that is true, it’s disturbing. If you join a revolutionary movement, study security culture and gird yourself for what comes.

Editor’s note: Oil has been called the “master resource” of industrial civilization, because it facilitates almost every other economic activity and subsidizes almost every other form of extraction. Chainsaws, for example, run on gasoline; tractors run on diesel fuel; and 10 calories of fossil fuel energy (mostly oil) is used to produce 1 calorie of industrial food. From transportation to shipping, industrial production, plastics, construction, medicine, and beyond, industrial civilization is a culture of oil.

Editor’s note: As the climate crisis accelerates, extreme weather is causing crop failures and other disasters. Today’s article shares a grim projection: the world may see more than 1 billion climate refugees by 2050. This problem is not new. Throughout the last 10,000 years, many civilizations have grown powerful, destroyed their land and water, and collapsed. Our situation today is only different because of scale. Modern civilization is global, and so the problems are worse. Industrial civilization is a failed experiment. Wealthy consumer societies have been built by vast quantities of fossil energy and harvesting the natural world. Reversing this crisis will require a basic restructuring of our entire society. The economics of growth are obsolete. Destructive industries must be dismantled. Population must be stabilized and then reduced. Consumerism must be abandoned. Wild nature must be protected and allowed to expand and repair itself. And as centralized systems for food production and other necessities fail, new grassroots structures will need to be created.

By Max Wilbert

Yesterday I met this juvenile red-shafted Northern Flicker in the high desert of Oregon.

Flickers are common, but like all life on Earth, they are in danger. Bird populations around the world are collapsing. Even “common” species like the American Robin have seen massive population declines because of habitat destruction, insect population collapse, housecats, and other human impacts.

Flickers are not safe. They face all these impacts. This tree is a Western Juniper, one of several Juniper species who are being clearcut en masse across Oregon, Idaho, Nevada, California, Wyoming, and Montana. Ironically, this is not for lumber or even firewood, but because of a misguided attempt at “restoration” of water cycles which have been harmed by overgrazing, overpumping, and more and more human impacts. People are arguing that cutting down the forest will mean more water available for humans. It’s insane.

Editor’s note: The Extraction Economy and o_il pipelines are everywhere, and they affect everyone.  If you are white enough, rich enough, and/or lucky enough, the pipelines might not be built in your backyard, but no matter who you are, they contaminate the water, air, and land upon which you depend for your life.  The distance does not keep you safe, it only delays alarm.  There are no safe places to hide from a culture and economy based on extraction, drawdown, theft, genocide, and ecocide; this culture eats beautiful forested lands, rich seas, and clear skies and leaves behind wasteland, toxic dead zones, and, possibly in the near future, an inhabitable planet.  If it doesn’t seem like this culture and its economy steals wealth of all sorts for the benefit of a few, it’s very likely that you live in an exclusion zone rather than a sacrifice zone.  The exclusion zones are where resources are sent, where power is concentrated, where the in-group is nourished.  Sacrifice zones are where resources are extracted, where power is enforced to maintain subjugation, where the out-group is impoverished.  Even if you recognize the material problems this culture produces, its strong tradition of silencing dissent, erasing indigenous cultures and knowledge, and spreading self-serving disinformation obscure the root cause of these problems.  For thousands of years, the dynamic of the haves and the have-nots has been at the core of an evolving culture that dominates and erases other cultures.  It has taken many forms, including city-states, empires, kingdoms, feudalism, mercantilism, colonialism, white supremacy, patriarchy, capitalism, and fascism.  The common denominator is a selfish urge to profit at the expense of others, beginning about 10,000 years ago with the advent of_ agriculture and male subjugation of women.  This developed into various socioeconomic structures that depend on and thus facilitate the destruction of life.  The dominant culture abuses the earth just as it abuses women. “When it comes to protecting the planet, stopping pipelines needs to be one of our first priorities. And like other Earth-destroying machinery, pipelines are very vulnerable. They stretch on for miles with no guards, no fences, and no protection.” - Max Wilbert

By Will Falk

(I recognize that I am a man. I will never confront a decision about abortion. I am not trying to tell women what to do with the following. I am, however, humbly trying to offer an argument for enforcing women’s rights to full reproductive freedom that is rooted in neither political or religious ideology, but in ecological reality.)

“A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.” - Aldo Leopod, A Sand County Almanac

Editor’s note: This excerpt comes from the book Endgame by Derrick Jensen, a two-volume book consisting of Volume 1: The Problem of Civilization and Volume 2: Resistance . These premises serve as a starting point for Endgame and are explored in detail in the book, which may be Jensen’s magnum opus. If you are confused by these premises, we highly recommend reading the book. See here for a definition of civilization.

PREMISE ONE: Civilization is not and can never be sustainable. This is especially true for industrial civilization.

Editor’s note: The dominant global culture (“industrial civilization”) is built on resource extraction and forced conversion of habitat to exclusive human use, and this has serious consequences. Both global warming and the ongoing mass extermination of life on the planet (which has been deemed “the sixth mass extinction”), as well as other ecological crises (aquifer depletion, toxification of the total environment, ecosystem collapse, oceanic dead zones, etc.) are symptoms of humanity’s broken relationship to the planet. In plain terms: this way of life is killing the planet. Today’s article reminds us that these crises are deeply interlinked, and so are solutions. While we are a revolutionary organization, every small step in the right direction also matters. And as a biocentric organization, we are in favor of actions to protect the natural world rather than putting our faith in technological Bright Green Lies.

Editor’s note: Globalization is the process of increasing global integration between countries and regions. This increased connectivity is largely driven by trade. Enabled by the explosion of fossil fuel use over the past 150 years, global trade networks have opened up previously inaccessible natural communities (“ecosystems”) to market pressure, which has vastly accelerated the ecological crisis. Globalization i s an atrocity for the living planet. Today, forests in the southeastern United States are ground into pellets and sent to Europe to be burned in “green” power plants. Mineral ores are ripped from the ground in South America and shipped to processing plants and factories in Southeast Asia. Nigerian oil fills Delhi streets with smog. And factories around the world produce endless streams of consumer goods to fill homes that have tripled in size over the last 50 years. As the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) has stated, ““The neoliberal globalization of capitalism is based on exploitation, plunder, contempt and repression for those who resist it — in other words, the same as before, only now globalized.” And meanwhile, every indicator of ecological health—greenhouse gas emissions, oceanic dead zones, species extinctions, plastics in the ocean, overpopulation, urban sprawl, etc.—is heading in the wrong direction. The following article focuses mainly on the human impacts of globalization, which are brutal and feed inequality. As the then-Prime Minister of Jamaica said in 1977, “We are condemned to poverty by the nature of the exchange. There is nowhere else to go except down.”

Editor’s note: Deep sea mining could begin in about a year. But opponents of deep sea mining are taking their arguments onto the world stage at the U.N. Ocean Conference in Portugal and increasing numbers of Pacific leaders have added their voice to deep sea mining. Palau, Fiji, and Samoa are the latest to call for a moratorium on the emerging industry, in the first governmental alliance of its kind. Also French President Emmanuel Macron says we have to create the legal framework to stop mining in the high seas and not allow activities that put in danger the ecosystems that depend on them. France joins the global call for a ban on deep sea mining. The tide has turned.

Editor’s note: The shock doctrine is a concept proposed by Canadian journalist Naomi Klein and is outlined in her book, The Shock Doctrine. The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, published in 2007. Its central proposition is that the capitalist markets take advantage of moments of tragedy or disaster, such as the pandemic, to propose or impose policies that benefit them. People’s inability to react at these times favors this strategy. But the shock doctrine is part of a continuum. Civilization has been doing the same thing now that it has been doing for 10,000 years. Civilization traumatizes individuals, communities and cultures, then takes advantage of that trauma to grow and expand. Modern capitalism is civilization attempting to continue to function and sustain itself, while everything (eco-systems and social structures) collapse around it. People do not willingly hand over their personal power and autonomy and that of their community unless they have first been broken as a human being and built up again as a citizen. The shock will continue until we do something about the problem at the core, civilization itself. Or until civilization reaches its inevitable suicidal endgame.

Editor’s note: Beginning in April 2021, activists in Northern California have been engaged in a sustained campaign to protect the Jackson Demonstration State Forest from logging. Jackson is the largest State forest in California, stretching over nearly 50,000 acres, and is mostly made up of coast redwood, Douglas-fir, grand fir, hemlock, tanoak, madrone, and bay myrtle communities and is home to a wide variety of wildlife. Today, we celebrate a small but meaningful victory as Cal Fire, the state agency which manages the forest, has canceled three planned logging operations. But as David Brower, the first executive director of the Sierra Club who was later ousted for being too radical, used to say: “All our defeats are permanent, and all our victories temporary.” Logging continues to destroy other areas of the Jackson Forest, as well as forests across California, the country, and the world. The ecological crisis is deepening and it is the responsibility of each and every one of us to take focused, strategic action to prevent industrial civilization from destroying the planet.

Editor’s note: Marxism and Collapse is a new organization formed “for information and debate on the scientific sources surrounding the existential problems facing humanity in the short term (ecological crisis, energy collapse, overpopulation, resource depletion, pandemics, atomic war) and the need for a new strategic programmatic framework in the face of an inevitable nearby process of civilisational collapse and human extinction.” They reached out to Deep Green Resistance member Max Wilbert recently and invited him to participate in this written debate with Noam Chomsky and Miguel Fuentes. His comments are published here for the first time. A few notes. First, while it is impossible to work for social change without contending with Marx and his legacy, Deep Green Resistance is not a Marxist organization. Although several of our organizers do consider themselves Marxists, others reject Marxism. Nonetheless, we see great value in dialogue with Marxist organizations and communities, just as we value in dialogue with Conservative or Libertarian organizations. Open dialogue, debate, and discussion is essential, and we are glad to see some strains of Marxism beginning to seriously contend with the unfolding ecological crisis. Second, this debate includes comments from Guy McPherson, a man who Deep Green Resistance cut ties with after allegations surfaced of sexual misconduct. We would have preferred to remove McPherson’s comments, but left them here at the insistence of Marxism and Collapse. Be wary of this man. This is part 1 of a 2 part written debate.

Editor’s note: Lithium is among the hottest commodities today. As oil prices spike, electric vehicles (EVs) are sold out at dealerships and huge numbers of pre-orders serve as massive interest-free loans for EV corporations. But supply chains remain an obstacle to EV adoption. Producing electric cars is more complex and expensive than internal-combustion-engine vehicles, and the infrastructure to support EV manufacturing—from mines to factories—is still in its infancy. This imbalance between supply and demand is driving prices up, while uncertainties in the market are threatening investment. Those uncertainties include local communities around the world, from the United States to Chile, fighting to keep lithium mining from destroying their communities, as well as new threatening regulations in the European Union that classify lithium salts as serious reproductive toxins. The environmental impact of lithium mining and EV manufacturing is extremely serious, and community opposition is growing just as opposition to the oil and gas industry has grown. Today’s story comes from Serbia, where determined resistance from environmentalists, farmers, and community members has succeeded in blocking Rio Tinto, the second-largest mining corporation in the world, from mining the Jadar valley for lithium borates.

Editor’s note: As the climate catastrophe worsens, chaos and contradiction reigns. Grassroots people’s resistance to the fossil fuel industry is growing, but so is government repression, and investment in coal, oil, and gas continues to grow (last year, more than 83% of global energy was supplied by fossil fuels). Meanwhile, governments are censoring the true depths of the crisis and a rush of big-businesses are seeking to capitalize on global warming, seeing a massive “shock doctrine” opportunity for profiting off the crisis. Today we bring you an excerpt from the book Bright Green Lies: How the Environmental Movement Lost Its Way and What We Can Do About It by Derrick Jensen, Lierre Keith, and Max Wilbert, a book which Chris Hedges says “asks the questions most refuse to ask, and in that questioning, that seeking, uncovers profound truths we ignore at our peril.” This excerpt uses Naomi Klein’s concept of the “Shock Doctrine” to analyze how big business has co-opted the environmental movement into a de-facto lobbying arm for the so-called “green” technology industry, and in the process has turned away from the fundamental values of the environmentalism.

Editor’s note: In Nepal, as in many parts of the world, male violence against women is relatively common, yet often goes unreported and unpunished. Today we bring you an interview with Ruby Khan, a working-class Nepali woman who marched 520km (320 miles) and helped launch a grassroots uprising for concrete policy and cultural change in response to two incidents of violence against Nepali women. As an eco-feminist organization, Deep Green Resistance recognizes the links between the destruction of the planet and the oppression of women. Not least importantly, when women have greater autonomy and control over their lives, they chose to have fewer children, on average. Therefore, the liberation of women is not only the right path to justice, it is a necessity for reversing population growth and defending the living planet. More broadly, the same philosophical roots underpin both patriarchy and the destruction of the planet, which creates the potential for synergistic positive effects when addressing these issues. This interview, conducted by DGR organizer Salonika in Nepal, gives us a fascinating glimpse into the discipline, sacrifice, and hard work that goes into grassroots organizing.

Editor’s note: Too often, activists fail to understand tactics and strategy, especially when we are matched against business people, law enforcement, and even military professionals. This makes us easy to out-think, outmaneuver, and defeat. It is essential that we remedy this discrepancy. This article is excerpted from Chapter 12, Introduction to Strategy , in the book Deep Green Resistance: Strategy to Save the Planet , by Lierre Keith, Derrick Jensen, and Aric McBay. The book aims to introduce readers to basic and intermediate strategic principles and is an essential manual for activists in the age of eco-collapse.

How to Become and Activist and Organize Your Life for Resistance

By Max Wilbert

There is a spectrum of involvement in political organizing.

It begins with awareness of the issues. Then, a person may wish to volunteer and contribute to a cause. Eventually, if commitment and experience continues to grow, a person can begin to be a leader and true organizer, bringing other people together and coordinating work that falls into the three categories of resistance efforts [Ed. note: see our next article this Friday for more on these categories].

Editor’s note: This is the second article we’ve published recently on the phenomenon of “cancel culture,”  which increasingly characterizes liberal, progressive, and left movements in the United States and overseas. Leftists often see censorship and authoritarianism as hallmarks of conservative, right-wing, and fascist governments and organizations. But throughout history, there is an equally troubling trend of left-wing authoritarianism. Today, this strain of politics is ascendant, and the use of c ensorship and violence to curtail political speech has become increasingly accepted and mainstream both among Democratic-party ideologues, media and tech elites, and the professional managerial class, and among college-educated “radical” leftists. Deep Green Resistance has been targeted by these types of attacks, which, we theorize, are often either the work of agents provocateurs or are encouraged by corporate mercenaries and government agencies, which prefer movements to engage in endless internecine conflict rather than facing resistance movements based on principled alliances.

Our values, our structure, and our strategy

Deep Green Resistance is a radical environmental movement, dedicated to shifting activists towards strategies that have a real chance to stop the murder of the planet. Our allegiance is first and foremost to the land around us; we fight for the salmon, the pine trees, and the songbirds, not the solar panels and space shuttles so many ‘environmentalists’ have fallen in love with. We in DGR don’t want a more sustainable nightmare. We want a living world.

Editor’s note: In these dire times, we are glad to see increasing adoption of and advocacy for eco-sabotage. However, w hen it comes to tactics and strategy, context matters. No tactic can be judged as “effective” or “ineffective” in isolation. Goals, assumptions, and political circumstances must be considered before selecting methods. In the political context of 2022 Britain, the actions of the eco-sabotage group “Tyre Extinguishers” may be amplifying political pressure to reduce carbon pollution and curtail the hegemony of the automobile and building a cultural acceptance for more drastic illegal actions on behalf of the planet. This type of small-scale act of minor eco-sabotage may also be useful for training and propaganda. This is the best case outcome. A more pessimistic view is that these actions could lead to an upper-class backlash, further empower surveillance and repression against environmentalists, and put activists at risk within the legal system. However, we largely discount this interpretation, as the upper classes are already hostile to environmental action, this type of illegal action would likely lead to minimal punishments if prosecutions did take place, and police in Britain are already harassing, infiltrating, and disrupting environmental movements. A more valid critique—made in the spirit of solidarity—is that these actions are hitting the wrong targets and are inadequate to address the crisis we are facing. Halting global warming and reversing ecological decline will likely require massive, coordinated eco-sabotage against industrial infrastructure—not just individual cars. In that sense, these actions may represent a failure of target selection when compared to the Valve Turners or the DAPL eco-saboteurs. The Tyre Extinguishers chose their targets based on the idea that pressure on governments can halt the climate crisis and the destruction of the planet. We at Deep Green Resistance put no faith in this line of reasoning; the UK government has not defended the planet thus far, and there is no evidence that it will. Based on this divergent analysis, o ur goal is different. Rather than political-social, our goal is physical-material: we advocate for strategic dismantling of global industrial infrastructure. Please share your thoughts in the comments.

Editor’s note: Civilizations are defined by the growth of cities, vast acreages of agriculture, and hierarchical social systems—and after creating short term surpluses of energy and wealth at the expense of sustainability, they inevitably collapse. Today, we live in the first global civilization. The harnessing of fossil fuels has brought unimaginable power, but also terrible destructiveness. No technological innovation or social organization will be a simple silver bullet to solve these issues. Nevertheless, people around the world continue to experiment with alternative social arrangements. One is permaculture, which is often reduced to “gardening” but is actually a systems-thinking approach for deliberately designing human settlements, societies, and subsistence economies for sustainability and justice. In this era, systems-thinking around sustainability inevitably includes strategy and action to defend the planet, in addition to building alternative ways of living. In this piece, Jennifer Murnan argues that permaculture practitioners, who often becomes insular “lifeboaters” or “survivalists,” should link their work to political resistance movements working to dismantle industrial civilization before it’s too late.

Editor’s note: As global warming and ecological collapse accelerates, governments and corporations are unwilling to invest in real solutions. Instead, public fear is increasingly being weaponized to mobilize public subsidies for the so-called “green technology” industry, and a new sacrifice zone is emerging. For example, instead of moving to relocalize and reduce energy use, electric cars are being promoted as a “plug-and-play” substitute for gasoline cars. This approach will do nothing to halt the ecological crisis, will only negligibly reduce rising greenhouse gas emissions, and is accelerating new harms such as an explosion in mining for lithium, cobalt, copper, and other materials.

Editor’s note: Collapse is not just coming; it is already here. Wildlife populations are collapsing, from oceanic fish to birds to amphibians to plankton. The climate system is breaking down. Glaciers and ice sheets are collapsing. Dead zones are proliferating in the ocean. People in wealthy nations are only insulated from these realities because of massive energy inputs—mostly from fossil fuels. These are predictable results. An unsustainable culture will destroy the planet, and then it will collapse. Each day, more forest is logged, more pollution emitted, and more water poisoned. It is a tautology, therefore, that the sooner collapse happens, the more of the natural world will remain. Predictions of societal collapse have been made for decades, and while specifics often turn out to be wrong, the general trends are undeniable. Today’s article looks back at “Limits to Growth,” one of the first such studies.

Oral arguments for a federal appeal in the high profile case of environmental activist Jessica Reznicek will be heard by the 8th circuit court of appeal on May 13. In a defining moment for the climate justice movement and for all civil rights, the court will decide whether or not to uphold a “domestic terrorist enhancement” that an Iowa court applied to Reznicek’s prison sentence. Reznicek is expected to argue that the terrorism enhancement was both illegally and unjustly applied.

Editor’s note: The following conceptual tool is designed to help community organizers to categorize community groups, businesses, government bodies, and individuals along a “spectrum of allies.” This exercise teaches a fundamental tenet of community organizing: that our goal is not only to find people who agree with us fully, but to gradually shift those who disagree with us into greater political alignment. We use this tool regularly in Deep Green Resistance training programs and campaigns, and encourage you to do so as well.

Editor’s note: Writing from the mountains of Kerala, rewilder and restorationist Suprabha Seshan explores the pandemic and the war of patriarchy vs. the planet. “It is my sworn mission to salvage the ones burned, maimed, poisoned or reconstituted from the living earth by the fires of industrial civilisation,” she writes. This essay was first published in Turkish in Jineoloji magazine , a publication of the women’s movement of Kurdistan.

by Suprabha Seshan

Editor’s note: The ability to work with others who we may disagree is fundamental to organizing in a socially fractured, multi-polar world. But doing so is difficult, distasteful, and increasingly rare in our filter-bubble modern experience, where people we disagree with are purged in service of the creation of ideological echo chambers. Today’s essay speaks to the necessity and challenges of such coalition-building. Before we begin, we would like to share with you some actionable advice for coalitions. Building principled alliances depends on a series of steps that must be undertaken with intelligence and great care: 1. Movement Building. You cannot build an alliance as an individual. Alliances are built between organizations. We will assume here you have already done the work of identifying the core issues you are trying to address, articulating your core values, and bringing together a team/organization to take action. 2. Objectives. Alliances depend on you clearly understanding what you are trying to achieve. Determine your objectives. Ensure they are SMART and practical. You may also wish to sequence objectives along a timeline towards your broader strategic goals. 3. Understand the Political Context. Conduct a spectrum of allies exercise. Identify communities, individuals, and organizations who are involved in the situation or may be swayed to take part, and how sympathetic they are to your perspective. 4. Determine Potential Allies. Determine which organizations you will focus on for alliance building. Usually, this is not the “easy allies” who will work with you regardless of what you do. Instead, pivotal allies are often found among the ranks of those who are ambivalent or opposed to your organization in some way. Focus on key individuals, usually either formal or informal leaders. Research these people and identify areas of overlap, shared values, and how to effectively communicate with them. 5. Build Relationships and Negotiate. Talk with potential allies. Begin to build a relationship. Do not gloss over disagreements, but focus on areas of mutual benefit and overlapping values. Propose specific ways work together towards shared goals. Keep in mind that collaboration can fall along a spectrum from public to private, that political considerations may prevent certain approaches, and that building trust takes time.

Editor’s note: Leftists often see authoritarianism as a hallmark of conservative, right-wing, and fascist governments and organizations. But throughout history, there is an equally troubling trend of left-wing authoritarianism. Today, this strain of politics is ascendant in the United States, where the use of c ensorship and violence to curtail political speech has become increasingly accepted and mainstream both among Democratic-party ideologues, media and tech elites, and the professional managerial class, and among college-educated “radical” leftists. In today’s piece, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist Chris Hedges discusses the normalization of “cancel culture” as a sign of increasing corporate control and the fading of liberal values that protected basic political expression. For a decade, Deep Green Resistance has been targeted by what Hedges describes as the “boutique activism of a liberal class that lacks the courage and the organizational skills to challenge the actual centers of power.” The footsoldiers of cancel culture are, Hedges writes, “the useful idiots of corporate power and the emerging police state.” “Cancel culture is not the road to reform,” he concludes. “It is the road to tyranny.”

By Max Wilbert

We are living in an ecological catastrophe. Our world is being killed before our eyes. This hurts. And so for many people, their response is either apathy, complete emotional shutdown, or a nihilistic embrace of powerlessness.

There is another option. While our power to change the course of ecological collapse is indeed limited, limited is different from non-existent. The truth is, we do have power. And we can change the world. No, our power is not limitless. No, the world will not change easily. And no, we cannot fix everything. Some things are broken beyond fixing. But these difficulties do not absolve us of responsibility.

Editor’s note: Monday’s article covered the murder of environmentalists—at least 207 were killed last year. These killings are the extreme end of a spectrum of violence and repression used against environmentalists and land defenders. Another weapon on that spectrum is d raconian laws that prioritize business interests over communities and the natural world. These laws are common globally. Here in the United States, for example, corporations have more rights than human beings and protests are increasingly criminalized. Today’s story comes from Indonesia, where a new mining law is being used to punish activists. These measures are a predictable corporate/government response to grassroots resistance movements, and they must be fought. It’s also noteworthy that these laws may unintentionally lead to an increase in underground action and eco-sabotage, as clandestine action may be both a safer and a more effective option when civil dissent is outlawed.

Editor’s note: This article is a call for courage in the face of adversity, apathy, and violence. Two hundred and seven environmentalists were murdered last year—at least. Each fallen land defender is a hero. To save the planet, we must be willing to take risks and make sacrifices. States, corporations, and vigilantes use violence because it is brutally effective. Our best defense against murder and other intimidation techniques including detention, torture, surveillance, harassment, and infiltration is solidarity, organization, and strategy. Deep Green Resistance activists are active in many of the most dangerous parts of the world, where environmentalists are murdered regularly. This is why we advocate for security culture and teach techniques regarding privacy, anonymity, personal safety, and self-defense. As land defenders, we must be prepared. This work is dangerous, and by being prepared, we enable action.

Biocentrism (from Greek βίος bios, “life” and κέντρον kentron, “center”) is an ethical point of view that extends inherent value to all living things. It is an understanding of how the earth works, particularly as it relates to its biosphere or biodiversity, that stands in contrast to anthropocentrism, which centers on the value of humans.

The term biocentrism encompasses all environmental ethics that “extend the status of moral object from human beings to all living things in nature”. Biocentric ethics calls for a rethinking of the relationship between humans and nature. It states that nature does not exist simply to be used or consumed by humans, but that humans are simply one species amongst many, and that because we are part of an ecosystem, any actions which negatively affect the living systems of which we are a part adversely affect us as well, whether or not we maintain a biocentric worldview.

In the United States, the Supreme Court appears poised to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 50-year-old legal precedent that ruled state-level abortion bans are (in many situations) unconstitutional and violate the rights of pregnant women.

Since 1973, legal challenges to Roe v. Wade have weakened the case significantly, most recently allowing for a spate of state-level abortion bans in-all-but-name (notably in Texas, but other states are following suit). Overturning Roe v. Wade is likely to lead to a flood of these state-level abortion bans in roughly half of the United States.

Editor’s note: This excerpt comes from Volume 2 of Derrick Jensen’s 2005 book“Endgame,” a long-form exploration of the destruction of the natural world and the moral questions regarding eco-sabotage in defense of the planet. I n this segment of the book, Jensen responds to common pacifist talking points. His conclusion is not that violence is desirable, but rather that the complexity of a world filled with atrocities and competing narratives about them fills many people with a deep terror of the responsibility that accompanies facing these realities and choosing to take consequential action.

Editor’s note: Fossil fuels are highly polluting, their extraction is linked to human rights abuses, and their continued use is killing the planet. However, renewable energy technologies also have massive unrecognized costs. Our conclusion is that resistance to both of these industries is a moral imperative. I n this article we highlight two scientific studies examining these harms. It is critical that we act proactively to defend threatened land before development plans are cemented and it becomes too late.

Editor’s note: Luddism is often dismissed as “backwardness,” but it is actually a more advanced, considered, and wise position on technology. To be a Luddite is to stand with workers and the natural world against the death march of technology. This essay is a general introduction to the Luddites. However, we disagree with the author when he argues that modern technology is neutral and that “it’s how such technology is used” that determines its moral character. This view is fundamentally anthropocentric; it’s only possible when you discount the natural world and believe humans are more important than other species. For a more deeply developed critique of technological escalation (we do not refer to this phenomenon as “progress”), we recommend exploring the work of Lewis Mumford, Vine Deloria Jr., Derrick Jensen, Vandana Shiva, Chellis Glendinning, Ivan Illich, Jack D. Forbes, Langdon Winner, and other critics of technology and civilization. Here at Deep Green Resistance, we use the tools of industrial civilization (such as computers and the internet) to oppose it. Some accuse us of hypocrisy. But did Crazy Horse and Tecumseh not use firearms to fight European colonization? As Arundhati Roy has said, “Fighting people will choose their own weapons." We see a place in our movement for both principled rejection of technology and the establishment of counter-cultural spaces and organizations, and for the principled use of the products of empire to dismantle empire. These efforts may seem contradictory, but they are not — they are complementary, and in Deep Green Resistance, many of us practice both at the same time.

Quitting porn is about reclaiming your authentic sexuality, aligning your actions with your values, and decolonizing your mind. For organizers, activists, and revolutionaries, choosing to stop using porn will make you feel better, leave you with more energy and time, and is a stand in solidarity with women and girls—which is also a stand with the living planet.

This article will introduce the harms of pornography, share a radical feminist perspective on porn, a radical indigenous perspective on porn, a short interview with Noam Chomsky, and provide some tools to help you stop using porn.

Editor’s note: Feminism is often seen as a “woman issue” and thus as something secondary or unimportant compared to issues of class or ecology. But in this piece, Robert Jensen reminds us that “White supremacy, capitalism, and imperialism have never existed without patriarchy.” Some historians even see patriarchy as the “original oppression” — the template which has led to the world we now find ourselves in. From the psychology of domination to overpopulation, patriarchy is a powerful, subtle force in our world. If you are concerned about human rights or ecology, as we are, women’s oppression is essential to understand and undermine. Why are we a radical feminist organization? Because this is essential to justice and sustainability.

Editor’s note: This piece was written in 2018, and does not reflect DGR strategy. We are not a partisan organization along the U.S. Democrat-Republican divide. Rather, we view both of these political parties as tools of capitalist hegemony–two factions of the ruling class, battling for political and economic control. However, it is rare to find organizers writing about organizing. This piece is valuable for the same reason that autobiographies of organizers and revolutionary leaders are valuable—not for sweeping statements or ideological platitudes, but precisely because of the unpolished reality they, at times, show. Organizing for change in our society is not simple, and revolutionary change on the scale Deep Green Resistance advocates is titanic by any measure. A ny success we find will not play out smoothly like a Hollywood film. Essays like this remind us of the hard grunt work of grassroots organizing that is required for us to leave a better future for those who come after.

Editor’s Note: Industrial civilization is not a path to lasting peace and prosperity. By undermining the foundations of life on this planet, industrial society is creating unimaginable wealth for a small portion of people while creating a wasteland. This will not last. As Richard Heinberg has said,“The Party is Over.”

If this is indeed a party, it’s a ball on the deck of a slave ship—a hierarchical party in which amusement rides are built with planks from the hull. The party will only end when the whole ship sinks and everyone—slave and master alike—dies. Ecologically, industrial civilization amounts to this: a murder-suicide, bacchanalia purchased with the coin of atrocities. For this article, we bring you two voices—Lierre Keith and Will Falk—on the ecological costs of war, and the war on the natural world.

Dividing the world into worthy and unworthy victims is a tactic used to justify our crimes and demonize our enemies. Conflicts will not be solved until all nations abide by international law and all victims are deemed worthy.

By Chris Hedges / Original to ScheerPost

Rulers divide the world into worthy and unworthy victims, those we are allowed to pity, such as Ukrainians enduring the hell of modern warfare, and those whose suffering is minimized, dismissed, or ignored. The terror we and our allies carry out against Iraqi, Palestinian, Syrian, Libyan, Somali and Yemeni civilians is part of the regrettable cost of war. We, echoing the empty promises from Moscow, claim we do not target civilians. Rulers always paint their militaries as humane, there to serve and protect. Collateral damage happens, but it is regrettable.

Editor’s Note: Unquestioned beliefs are the real authorities of any culture, and one of the central authorities in the dominant, globalizing culture is that technological progress is an unmitigated good. We call this “the lie of the techno-fix.” The lie of the techno-fix is extremely convincing, with good reason. The propaganda promoting this idea is incessant and nearly subliminal, with billions of dollars pouring out of non-profit offices, New York PR firms, and Hollywood production companies annually to inculcate young people into the cult of technology. In policy, technology is rarely (if ever) subjected to any democratic controls; if it can be profitably made, it will be. And damn the consequences. There is money to be made. Critics of technology and the techno-elite, such as Lewis Mumford, Rachel Carson, Langdon Winner, Derrick Jensen, and many others, have spoken out for decades on these issues. Technological “development,” they warn us, is perhaps better understood as technological “escalation,” since modern industrial technologies typically represent a war on the planet and the poor. I n this article, Helena Norberg-Hodge asks us to consider what values are important to us: progress, or well-being? Breakneck speed, or balance? She articulates a vision of technology as subordinate to ecology and non-human and human communities alike based on her experiences in the remote Himalayan region of Ladakh.

Editor’s Note: Jane Anne Morris’ 2005 essay “Help! I’ve Been Colonized and I Can’t Get Up” is considered a classic text within the community rights movement. It criticizes the regulatory regime of environmental and public health protection, which has ultimately helped corporations standardize and de-risk investments, while failing to prevent ecological collapse. Instead of participating in this system, Morris proposes six legal changes which would substantially limit corporate power. The problems described in this essay have only become even worse since 2005. Barriers to challenging corporate-friendly legal structures are numerous, deeply embedded, and well-defended by teams of lawyers, lobbyists, and politicians who are entrenched in government and other institutions like military units employing defense-in-depth. Seventeen years of anti-corporate-power organizing, since this essay was written, has yet to breach these barricades. Morris’ essay today can be read in at least two ways: first, as calling for a populist effort to reign in corporate power, as she originally intended the piece; and second, as a historic account of advancing corporate power which calls for strategic and ethical escalation in defense of planet Earth.

Editor’s note: In the chess match that is imperial politics, entire nations and ecosystems are pawns that are bargained with and sacrificed. As war tears across Ukraine, we insist that neither the U.S. nor NATO or Russia is innocent. The dire truth is that empires produce wars, and thus the path towards peace ultimately means dismantling empires.

By Richard Rubenstein

Vladimir Putin’s attack on Ukraine is undoubtedly illegal and immoral.  From the point of view of Russian interests, it is also likely to prove a costly mistake.  The primary question now, however, is what to do about this, and the answers presented thus far by those outraged by the invasion are dangerously counterproductive.

Editor’s note: People who confront the destruction of the planet find a legal system that prioritizes corporations and not uncommonly become the targets of police surveillance. Unless we take precautions, police surveillance tools can uncover our plans and organizational structures—and can contribute to a culture of paranoia that discourages action. This training, from the Freedom of the Press Foundation, consists of interactive materials for learning what sort of tools law enforcement agencies use against journalists, but the material is practically applicable for organizers as well. We encourage our readers to study this material and consider appropriate countermeasures.

Editor’s note: It is far too easy for radicals with a systemic analysis to become paralyzed at the scope of necessary change. At its best, radical analysis informs strategic actions in the here-and-now that helps us create a better future. At worst, it enables a nihilistic resignation that prevents people from taking action. We advocate for the middle ground: using radical analysis to inform a practical radical politics in the here and now. But lest we become tempted to engage in tepid reformism, we must remember that practicality does not mean compromising on fundamental issues. When it comes to ecology, for example, any conflict between the ecologically necessary and politically feasible must be settled in favor of the ecologically necessary. However, the ecologically necessary will not spontaneously evolve; we must work for it, starting here and now. This piece from pro-feminist and environmental activist Robert Jensen dives into this thorny balance, and challenges each us: what can you begin doing now that is based in a radical understanding of the problems we face, and also is practical and effective in the context of a profoundly conservative society? We welcome discussion in the comments section.

Editor’s note: Proxy war and geopolitical jockeying are innate to superpower politics. The war in Ukraine is the direct result of NATO working to, in the words of Noam Chomsky, “control global energy systems, pipelines, and sea lanes,” and of Russia working to expand its imperial influence. The prize is Ukraine: a wealthy country with massive reserves of oil and gas, minerals, and the most valuable agricultural land in Europe. Ukraine has been a trophy of empires for centuries. To imperialists, land is to be seized and controlled, not revered and respected. For more on the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, which dates back decades, check out this Green Flame episode from 2020 with Ukrainian-American anti-war activist Sergio Kochergin:

Editor’s note: Animal abuse is a foundational pillar of the modern industrial food system. We stand against factory farming, vivisection, and other forms of animal testing and abuse. As an organization, however, we do not advocate veganism—and in fact, DGR co-founder Lierre Keith wrote a book called The Vegetarian Myth arguing that vegetarianism and veganism are not a political or ecological solution. However, there are vegans and vegetarians involved in Deep Green Resistance, and we overlap on many goals. This article is the story of the A nimal Liberation Front, a movement well worth learning from.

The following is an extract from Derrick Jensen’s 2016 book The Myth of Human Supremacy . From the book jacket: “In this impassioned polemic, radical environmental philosopher Derrick Jensen debunks the near-universal belief in a hierarchy of nature and the superiority of humans. Vast and underappreciated complexities of nonhuman life are explored in detail—from the cultures of pigs and prairie dogs, to the creative use of tools by elephants and fish, to the acumen of caterpillars and fungi. The paralysis of the scientific establishment on moral and ethical issues is confronted and a radical new framework for assessing the intelligence and sentience of nonhuman life is put forth.” Visit Derrick’s website to buy the book.

Editor’s note: The oceans have absorbed more than 90% of the excess heat trapped on planet earth due to global warming. Greenhouse gases are also absorbed into the ocean which has increased the acidity of ocean water significantly. Increased heat and acidity makes reproduction and survival more difficult for calcifying organisms such as corals and other marine life. It should be no surprise to anyone that we see coral reefs dying globally. So are plankton populations, fish populations, and countless other species. What is surprising is that efforts to halt and reverse greenhouse gas emissions have thus far been so tepid and ineffective. We must change that.

Editor’s note: Hydroelectric dams are not green energy, despite many claims that they are. Hydropower kills rivers, displaces millions of human beings, drives anadromous fish and other life dependent on free-flowing rivers extinct, and actually releases substantial greenhouse gasses. This post includes a short excerpt from Bright Green Lies as well as an article detailing a destructive dam proposal in Bolivia.

Dams are Not Green Energy

Excerpted from Chapter 11: The Hydropower Lie of Bright Green Lies: How the Environmental Movement Lost Its Way by Derrick Jensen, Lierre Keith, and Max Wilbert

We’ve covered Vince Emanuele’s work before, and this piece is a useful call to realistic organizing. Effective resistance will not emerge because we wish it to be so. It will only emerge as the result of hard, disciplined work and political organizing to take us from where we are now (A) to where we need to be (Z) via a series of intermediate steps. Emanuele calls for us to learn the difference between organizing vs. mobilizing, and apply those lessons. We must also note that this piece contains elements we disagree with. This includes a critique of anti-civilization politics. The point is well taken, but if the ecologically necessary is politically infeasible, we must change what is politically possible. The other way around is impossible. We also find Emanuele’s critique of Chris Hedges to be unnecessary; again, his point is well taken, but Hedges has done a great deal to raise awareness of and to support movements for change. This piece will be controversial in other ways as well, as it was meant to be, but it is worth reading. Diversity of thought will produce more effective outcomes than ideological conformity.

Editor’s note: This piece details the history of the enclosure movement, focusing on western civilization. Enclosure is an ongoing process by which land that was previously seen as collective, belonging to everyone or purely to nature, is privatized. Enclosure has long been a tenet of capitalism, and more broadly of civilization. Exploitation and destruction of land follows.

by Ian Angus

In 1542, Henry VIII gave his friend and privy councilor Sir William Herbert a gift: the buildings and lands of a dissolved monastery, Wilton Abbey near Salisbury. Herbert didn’t need farmland, so he had the buildings torn down, expelled the monastery’s tenants, and physically destroyed an entire village. In their place he built a large mansion, and fenced off the surrounding lands as a private park for hunting.

Editor’s note: This piece draws links between struggles against extraction projects and other land destruction related to fossil fuels, nuclear power, and renewable energy technologies alike. Around the world, people are struggling to protect the land and water in global resistance to extractive industries. We encourage our readers to join these struggles—or to begin a new campaign if one is not already happening.

BYDon Fitz and the Green Party of St. Louis

Politics isn’t a dirty word. It simply means “how we make decisions about the direction of our society.” This process has become mired in corruption. Making political change (and therefore economic and social change) requires that we get organized.

Countless activists through history remind us to " Organize, organize, organize," to " Join an organization." In response to the question “what can one person do?” they answer: “don’t just be one person.”

Editor’s note: Online privacy is an essential layer of self-defense and security in our modern internet-driven world. This issue can be confusing and overwhelming. This article is aimed at beginners, and will provide a starting point for you to consider these issues and improve your security.

Why should I care about online privacy?

“I have nothing to hide. Why should I care about my privacy?”

Much like the right to interracial marriage, woman’s suffrage, and freedom of speech, we didn’t always have the right to privacy. Generations before ours fought for our right to privacy. Privacy is a human right inherent to all of us, that we are entitled to without discrimination.

In this piece, Matej Kudláčik describes how a system that appears democratic, participatory, and free can actually conceal a profound totalitarianism. His argument has similarities to Sheldon Wolin’s conception of “inverted totalitarianism,” which Wolin described as being “all politics all of the time but politics largely untempered by the political. Party squabbles are occasionally on public display, and there is a frantic and continuous politics among factions of the party, interest groups, competing corporate powers, and rival media concerns. And there is, of course, the culminating moment of national elections when the attention of the nation is required to make a choice of personalities rather than a choice between alternatives. What is absent is the political, the commitment to finding where the common good lies amidst the welter of well-financed, highly organized, single-minded interests rabidly seeking governmental favors and overwhelming the practices of representative government and public administration by a sea of cash.” We’ve included a video in this post that discusses the concept of inverted totalitarianism in some detail. Part I of this essay can be found here.

Editor’s note: one of the worst environmental disasters that nearly no-one has heard of is " habitat fragmentation." Many ecologists believe that habitat fragmentation is the single most serious threat to biological diversity and is the primary cause of the present extinction crisis. Fences, roads, utility corridors, and other linear human disturbances increasingly shatter habitats into smaller and smaller pieces, with drastic consequences. This crisis is not being addressed, and it gets worse every day. This article explores one part of this problem: the effects of fencing on Pronghorn.

Editor’s note: Already threatened by overfishing, acidification, overheating, the collapse of coral reefs, declining plankton populations, plastic pollution, and deep sea oil drilling, the world’s oceans now face a new threat: mining, disguised as “green.” This piece, originally published in Counterpunch, describes the threat of deep sea mining. If you want to help protect the oceans from this threat, email deepseadefenders@protonmail.com or find Deep Sea Defenders on Facebook and Twitter @deepseadefender

By Joshua Clinton

“To build a green future, in the next couple of decades the world will need to mine more metal than we’ve mined in our entire history” says Gerard Barron, CEO of The Metals Company.

This talk was given in the Feminist Thinking Will Save the Planet session at #FiLiA2021. The article originally appeared on the FiLiA website.

By Susan Breen

Any of you who know me will be aware that I’m a recovering mainstream environmentalist and left wing political candidate, for any of you who are active in either sphere I’m sure you have shared many of the same frustrations and demoralisations as I have done. I became an activist in my teens but despite being involved in the movement since then I had been pretty much politically homeless for my entire life.

Florence Nightingale, the English pioneer of modern nursing is quoted as saying, “I attribute my success to this: I never gave or took an excuse.”

Editors note: Never give up your agency. If your goal is to save life on the planet, sometimes you have to sink your own boat.

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PW7J2Ii1uxU&t=8s[/embed]

Derrick Jensen This is Resistance Radio on the Progressive Radio Network. My guest today is Diane Wilson. She’s a mother of five, a fourth generation shrimp boat captain and an environmental activist. She’s been fighting to save the bays on the Texas gulf coast from chemical and oil development for the last 30 years. I also have to say that you have for at least 15-18 years been one of my heroes so thank you for that.

This story first appeared in Mongabay.

By Nick Rodway

• The Fitzroy River in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, one of the country’s most ecologically and culturally significant waterways, is facing proposals of further agriculture and mining development, including irrigation and fracking.
• In response, First Nations communities in the region have developed different methods to promote the conservation of the river, including curating cultural festivals, funding awareness campaigns, and working with digital technologies.
• First Nations land rights are held along the length of the Fitzroy River, the first time this has occurred across an entire catchment area in Australia.
• The catchment is the last stronghold of the world’s most “evolutionarily distinct and globally endangered” species, the freshwater sawfish (Pristis pristis) and is home to the threatened northern river shark (Glyphis garricki).

WEST KIMBERLEY, Australia — November marks the end of the dry season in the Kimberley, the northernmost region of Western Australia, the country’s largest state. As the monsoonal rains start to fall, the country comes alive with the cries of red winged parrots ( Aprosmictus erythropterus) and the Fitzroy River begins to run.

This story first appeared in Center for Biological Diversity.

SAN DIEGO, Calif.— After nearly 30 years of petitions and lawsuits by the Center for Biological Diversity, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today protected one of Southern California’s rarest butterflies, the Hermes copper butterfly, as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act.

The agency also designated 35,000 acres of protected critical habitat in San Diego County. The habitat consists of three units: Lopez Canyon, which includes acreage within Los Peñasquitos Canyon Preserve; Miramar/Santee; and Southern San Diego.

This article originally appeared in Mongabay.

Featured image: Barge transporting oil drums in the Niger Delta. Image by Stakeholder Democracy via Flickr ( CC BY-NC-ND 2.0).

• Oil has been spilling from a wellhead in Nigeria’s Bayelsa state for a month now, with the local company responsible unable to contain it.
• Experts say the scale and duration of the spill is so severe that it’s imperative that local communities be relocated for their safety.
• Oil spills and other forms of pollution caused by the industry are common in Bayelsa, the heart of the oil-rich Niger Delta.
• Companies, including foreign oil majors, are largely left to self-declare the spills that frequently occur, but face only token fines for failing to respond quickly.

Crude oil from a blowout has been pouring into creeks in the Niger Delta since Nov. 5, with the well’s owner, Nigerian energy firm Aiteo, unable to contain the spill and specialists called in to help.

This story was first published in Learning Earthways.

By George R Price.

[Part 1 of this essay can be found here.]

The points in time at which various ancient human societies began to go the wrong way (whether by force from outsiders, or by bad decisions made from within) are numerous and span thousands of years, but, thankfully for our future, some few remotely-situated Indigenous societies around the world never departed from those basic, ancient ways of seeing and living with the natural world and still have enough of their ancestral homelands not yet confiscated or destroyed by colonialist predators to make that continuance possible. The Kogi people of the northern Andes mountains in Colombia are a prime and now well-known example, [20] as are some of the more remote tribes to the south and east of them in the Amazon rainforest. Other relatively intact traditional indigenous societies exist in remote locations in central Africa, the Pacific islands, northern and southeastern Asia, and a few other remote locations in the Americas and elsewhere. [21] It is by learning from people such as these, and from all of our relations in the non-human world as well, that we might be able to find our way back to truly green, sustainable and regenerative ways of life. There are also many more Indigenous peoples throughout the world who have just a little or none of their ancestral homelands still accessible to them, retain only pieces of their traditional cultural values and practices, and have just a small number of tribal members who are still fluent in their ancestral languages. Colonialism, capitalism, cultural oppression, and intercultural relations have brought many changes to them, but, even so, for people whose encounter with wrong ways of living is more recent than most of the rest of humanity, the way back to truly green eco-harmony might be a little easier. [22] Unless a community consciously agrees to put the needs of their entire local ecosystem and all lives within it first, above what they conceive to be human needs, their community will someday fail and collapse.

This story was first published in Learning Earthways.

By George R. Price

The oral traditions and origin stories of many Indigenous peoples, worldwide, include some stories of the endings of previous worlds. In such stories, the end of one world usually coincides with the beginning of a new world. Typically, the end of one world is the end of a grave error, the end of a world gone wrong. The life-endangering wrong way had to end for life to continue anew. [1] To have a fresh start, venturing into many unknowns, might be somewhat scary, but it is really a wonderful gift.

This story first appeared in Mongabay.

Editor’s note: This is what environmental justice looks like. Not NGOs dictating what lands will be set aside for 30x30, which is just greenwashing colonialism. It is the people whose land it is making those decisions and the governments enforcing them.

By Maxwell Radwin

• An Indigenous community in southwest Colombia established a protected reserve in the face of illegal logging, mining and coca cultivation being carried out by criminal groups.
• The Eperãra Siapidaarã peoples are especially interested in protecting the extremely poisonous golden dart frog, which they historically used in their darts while hunting.
• Despite establishing the reserve, the community has more work to do to fend off violent non-state armed groups.

One of the most poisonous animals on earth, the golden dart frog carries enough toxins in its body to kill 10 people. If it enters the blood stream, the toxin paralyzes the nervous system and, in only a few minutes, stops the heart from beating.

This is a press release from the Center for Biological Diversity

Ecuador’s Highest Court Enforces Constitutional ‘Rights of Nature’ to Safeguard Los Cedros Protected Forest

QUITO, Ecuador— In an unprecedented case, the Constitutional Court of Ecuador has applied the constitutional provision on the “ Rights of Nature” to safeguard the Los Cedros cloud forest from mining concessions. The court voted seven in favor, with two abstentions.

In the wake of the ruling, which was published Dec. 1, the Constitutional Court will develop a binding area of law in which the Rights of Nature, the right to a healthy environment, the right to water and environmental consultation must be respected.

This story first appeared in Mongabay.

Editor’s note: THE FIRST LARGE SCALE NATURE CONSERVATION AGREEMENT (NCA) IN THE WORLD. You should be afraid, very afraid. (NCA) is a different acronym for (NGO). It is the new colonialism, green , clean and renewable. The market will not solve climate change or loss of biodiversity. The market can only cause those problems. Don’t let them tell you otherwise. Free and Informed Prior Consent and may I add control by keeping corporations out. Abolish all corporations and their money.

This story was originally published by the Indigenous Environmental Network.

The Indigenous Environmental Network condemns the actions of Canada as it inflicts settler violence against the Wet’suwet’en peoples, hypocritically breaking both Wet’suwet’en and Canadian law to push TC Energy’s illegal Coastal Gaslink pipeline through unceded territories.

By entering sovereign Wet’suwet’en territory with RCMP, dogs and assault rifles we are witnessing state-sanctioned violence on behalf of an Oil company, and such barbarous acts of violence inflicted upon Indigenous peoples cannot be defended. These attacks by RCMP are nothing less than Human Rights violations as defined by the United Nations, and acts of extreme detriment to the inherent sovereignty of the Wet’suwet’en. The Wet’suwet’en have asserted self-governance over their territories since time immemorial, and it is their inherent right to defend their lands, resources and bodies from foreign aggressors. They have signed no treaties nor have they relinquished title to their lands. They are not part of so-called Canada and have not consented to bearing the burden of the world’s dependence on an extractive industry such as oil.

Editor’s note: This article has been published in The International Journal of Human Rights. Unfortunaltly we don’t have the rights to publish the whole article which is behind a paywall, but we are publishing the extract and some quotes.

Featured image: The surface mine storage place, mining minerals and brown coal in different colours. View from above. Photo by Curioso Photography on Unsplash ABSTRACT This article describes the connections between resource extraction, prostitution, poverty, and climate change. Although resource extraction and prostitution have been viewed as separate phenomena, this article suggests that they are related harms that result in multiple violations of women’s human rights. The businesses of resource extraction and prostitution adversely impact women’s lives, especially those who are poor, ethnically or racially marginalised, and young. The article clarifies associations between prostitution and climate change on the one hand, and poverty, choicelessness, and the appearance of consent on the other. We discuss human rights conventions that are relevant to mitigation of the harms caused by extreme poverty, homelessness, resource extraction, climate change, and prostitution. These include anti-slavery conventions and women’s sex-based rights conventions.

Non-neutrality of technology & limits to conspiracy theory

By Nicolas Casaux

“For, prior to all such, we have the things themselves for our masters. Now they are many; and it is through these that the men who control the things inevitably become our masters too.” Epictetus, Discourses, Book IV, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Ed.

In an essay published in the fall of 1872, entitled “On Authority," Friedrich Engels, Marx’s alter ego, railed against the “anti-authoritarians" (the anarchists) who imagined they could organize the production of “modern industry" without recourse to any authority:

This story first appeared in ScheerPost.

By Chris Hedges

The trial of Ghislaine Maxwell which began last week in Manhattan will not hold to account the powerful and wealthy men who are also complicit in the sexual assaults of girls as young as twelve Maxwell allegedly procured for billionaire Jeffrey Epstein.

Donald Trump, Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, hedge-fund billionaire Glenn Dubin, former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, former Secretary of the Treasury and former president of Harvard Larry Summers, Stephen Pinker, Prince Andrew, Alan Dershowitz, billionaire Victoria’s Secret CEO Les Wexner, the, J.P Morgan banker Jes Staley, former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barack, real estate mogul Mort Zuckerman, former Maine senator George Mitchell, Harvey Weinstein and many others who were at least present and most likely participated in Epstein’s perpetual Bacchanalia, are not in court. The law firms and high-priced attorneys, federal and state prosecutors, private investigators, personal assistants, publicists, servants, drivers and numerous other procurers, sometimes women, who made Epstein’s crimes possible are not being investigated. Those in the media, the political arena and the entertainment industry who aggressively and often viciously shut down and discredited the few voices, including those of a handful of intrepid reporters, who sought to shine a light on the crimes committed by Epstein and his circle of accomplices are not on trial. The videos that Epstein apparently collected of his guests engaged in their sexual escapades with teenage and underage girls from the cameras he had installed in his opulent residences and on his private island have mysteriously disappeared, most probably into the black hole of the FBI, along with other crucial evidence. Epstein’s death in a New York jail cell, while officially ruled a suicide, is in the eyes of many credible investigators a murder. With Epstein dead, and Maxwell sacrificed, the ruling oligarchs will once again escape justice.

This article was produced by Local Peace Economy , a project of the Independent Media Institute.

By Koohan Paik-Mander

The U.S. military is famous for being the single largest consumer of petroleum products in the world and the largest emitter of greenhouse gases. Its carbon emissions exceed those released by “more than 100 countries combined.”

Now, with the Biden administration’s mandate to slash carbon emissions “at least in half by the end of the decade,” the Pentagon has committed to using all-electric vehicles and transitioning to biofuels for all its trucks, ships and aircraft. But is only addressing emissions enough to mitigate the current climate crisis?

This story first appeared in Climate & Capitalism Deprived of land and common rights, the English poor were forced into wage-labor

Articles in this series:

1. Commons and classes before capitalism
2. ‘Systematic theft of communal property’
3. Against Enclosure: The Commonwealth Men
4. Dispossessed: Origins of the Working Class

by Ian Angus Who built the seven gates of Thebes? The books are filled with names of kings. Was it the kings who hauled the craggy blocks of stone? —Bertolt Brecht, “A Worker Reads History”

“You Can Kill a Man, but You Can’t Kill an Idea” -  Medgar Evers

This article first appeared in Common Dreams.

“After a year of strikes—and having faced brutal repression that claimed some 700 lives—India’s farmers are victorious in their struggle.”

By KENNY STANCIL Workers’ rights activists around the globe rejoiced on Friday after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced that his government will repeal three corporate-friendly agricultural laws that the nation’s farmers have steadfastly resisted for more than a year.

This story first appeared in Global Voices.

Protestors highlighted the increasing femicide and violence rates in Turkey

By Arzu Geybullayeva

Hundreds of women took the streets in Istanbul to mark the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women on November 25. However, protestors were met with police violence, including tear gas and rubber bullets, as they tried to break through barricades to march on a busy pedestrian street. Similar protests took place across other cities, including the capital Ankara.

This story first appeared in Mongabay.

By Maxwell Radwin

• Women in a rural part of El Salvador are leading an effort to stop urban development that could result in deforestation and loss of access to water.
• The Ciudad Valle El Ángel project involves the construction of stores, hotels and houses in Apopa municipality, an hour north of the capital, San Salvador.
• It calls for clearing 351 hectares (867 acres) of forest and diverting 17 million liters (4.5 million gallons) of water a day from the Chacalapa River watershed.
• The community has started working with other local organizations to stage protests, sit-ins and letter-writing campaigns, and has also filed numerous lawsuits.

A group of women in rural El Salvador is standing up against a major infrastructure project that threatens to clear hundreds of hectares of forest and cut off access to rivers that provide the community with clean drinking water.

This article first appeared on the Association for the Tree of Live Website.

By JEAN ARNOLD A ravenous, yet decrepit cyborg – part machine, part zombie – lurches onward as it is programmed to do. Its hunger is so insatiable that it eats its own flesh; it eats its offspring; and it eats the future. The catabolic effects are inescapable and its death rattle reverberates for miles. An entire city lives inside this beast. Yet in this late hour, inhabitants put their heads down and carry-on as usual, for they are all dependent upon this monster for their very own food, water, and shelter. No one dares utter a stray word, until the day one brave soul holds up a mirror that reveals who they have become.

This story first appeared in The Dark Mountain Project.

We are excited to announce the publication of our twentieth book, available now from our online shop. This year’s special issue is an all colour collection of prose, poetry and art that delves into the subject of extractivism. Over the next few weeks we’ll be sharing a selection of pieces from its pages. Today, we begin with the book’s editorial and cover by Lawrence Gipe.

“Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.” ― George Orwell, 1984 Editor’s Note: All Empires are evil and they all fall, the sooner the better. A socialist society can be just as ecological destructive as a capitalist one. Better option to the development intensive Green New Deal would be The Red Deal and The Real Green New Deal.

This story was first published in The Ecologist

By Justin Podur

Editor’s note: The preferred method to stop a coal port for hours or days would be anonymously, so as to “live to fight another day”. But this action does highlight the fact that this port exports 158 million tonnes of coal a year. This action shows just how vulnerable the system is. It can be stopped when two people have the courage to throw their bodies on the cogs. We must fight empire “by any means necessary.”" —Frantz Fanon

This story was first published in Mongabay.

By Sandra Cuffe

• In the midst of a long conflict and recent protest over a nickel mine in El Estor, in eastern Guatemala, police have carried out more than 40 raids and 60 arrests, and the government has declared a 30-day state of emergency.
• Indigenous Mayan opponents to the mine say they were never properly consulted about the mine and its impacts on their lands, livelihoods and lake, and protested on the town’s main road, refusing passage to mining vehicles.
• Four police were shot during the police crackdown on protests by what the government blames as armed protestors, although mine opponents say the assailants were not involved in the protest.
• There are concerns mining operations will pose environmental damages to Guatemala’s largest lake, home to diverse fish, bird, reptile and mammal species, including the endangered Guatemalan black howler monkey (Alouatta pigra).

EL ESTOR, Guatemala — Germán Chub was still sleeping when police and military personnel showed up outside his home. It was the fourth day of a month-long state of siege, akin to martial law, in El Estor, eastern Guatemala, in the wake of the latest flashpoint in a decades-long, multifaceted conflict over a nickel mine.

Editor’s note: We would hope that this action would be a turning point where the United States stops its management planning philosophy of “natural resources” and focuses on the protection of all living beings. Yet how tenative only 10-mile buffer for only 20 years and does not include all extractive industries. Basically less than undoing what Trump illegally did. After all they still have the Gulf of Mexico.

This story first appeared in Common Dreams.

Sentenced to eight years in prison for acts of sabotage, water protector Jessica Reznicek reflects on her faith-driven resistance.

By Cristina Yurena Zerr This article was first published in the German newspaper taz, and has been translated and edited for Waging Nonviolence.

On June 28, the federal court in Des Moines, Iowa was silent and filled to capacity. Fifty people were there to witness the sentencing of 40-year old Jessica Reznicek, charged with “conspiracy to damage an energy production facility” and “malicious use of fire.” The prosecution, asking for an extended sentence, argued that Reznicek’s acts could be classified as domestic terrorism.

By Jocelyn Crawley

Women all over the world should be unequivocally enraged about the ongoing abuse, degradation, and harassment that members of the male-invented class “female” continue to experience in these ostensibly “progressive, postmodern” times. They apparently are not. I suspect this is because men in power have systematically obscured information that would enable women to understand the depth of hatred and contempt that men have for them. Ti-Grace Atkinson is aware of this patriarchal reality. In her book Amazon Odyssey, she explores the role that patriarchy plays in confining women to the realm of objectification and oppression which ensures the perpetuity of male supremacy. Atkinson is unflinching, unequivocal in her analysis and condemnation of male supremacy. All women who are interested in understanding and overcoming patriarchy should read it, carefully.

Editor’s note: You don’t have to be indigenous to love the land you live on but it certainly gives moral authority. And in the fight against settler colonialism gives a much greater legitimate claim to virtue. They don’t even follow their own rules. Broken Treaties.

This story first appeared in The Narwhal.

Indigenous Peoples bear the brunt of environmental inaction — and sometimes action. The Narwhal speaks to three women on what they hope to address at the UN climate change summit in Glasgow

This article originally appeared in Survival International.

Featured image: Piripkura men Baita and Tamandua, photographed during an encounter with a FUNAI unit. The two men, who are uncle and nephew, have had sporadic interactions with the local FUNAI team, but returned to live in the forest. © Bruno Jorge

New overflight photos have revealed that the land of one of the world’s most vulnerable uncontacted tribes is being illegally invaded and destroyed for beef production.

This article first appeared in The Revelator.

Editor’s note: It would seem like these rights would be self evident birth rights unrequiring of institutions agency. Unfortunately like all UN resolutions this carries no enforcement, see Palestine. How can enviromental justice come about? Rich nations must stop outsourcing their luxury lifestyle. This does not mean NIMBY Not In My Back Yard, it means NOPE Not On Planet Earth.

By Steve Trent

In October the UN Human Rights Council voted to recognize the right to a safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment as a human right. Notable among the dissenting voices was the United Kingdom, which eventually begrudgingly voted in favor, while stressing the fact that no country would be legally bound to the resolution’s terms. Four member states — China, India, Japan and Russia — abstained.

This story first appeared in Protect Thacker Pass.

By Max Wilbert

It’s been 10 months since I first arrived at Thacker Pass and began work to protect the land from a proposed open-pit lithium mine in earnest. Today I share this video reporting from the land and sharing reflections on where the movement to protect this place is at right now and where we are going. When we do fight, winning is not guaranteed. It takes a lot of people and a lot of hard work to even begin to have an impact.

This story first appeared in Mongabay.

By Karlston Lapniten Editor’s note: And the Struggle endures. “I do not fight fascists because I will win. I fight fascists because they are fascists.” ― Chris Hedges, Wages of Rebellion: The Moral Imperative of Revolt

• Australian-Canadian mining firm OceanaGold was recently granted a renewal of its permit to mine gold and copper in the northern Philippines.
• The mine has faced years of opposition from area residents, mostly Indigenous people, who say it has scarred their land and threatens the water systems they depend on.
• In 2019, when the company’s previous mining permit expired, protesters mounted barricades to block activity at the mine.
• This year, restrictions put in place to curb the spread of COVID-19 have hampered their ability to organize.

NUEVA VIZCAYA, Philippines – Community leader Eduardo Ananayo says he wept when heard the Philippine government had renewed its mining agreement with Australian-Canadian company OceanaGold Corporation this past July.

This story first appeared in By My Solitary Hearth Editor’s note: Albuquerque is in fact too large. It is a city. It is actually the cities that are the cause of all those problems. This article mentions: “This idea that we need to set aside places for wilderness comes from the idea that humans are not part of this world. That humans are above nature and generally destructive of nature.” The writers’ claim to the origin of the idea of wilderness is a false assumption. The point that we are in as a species demands we protect wilderness areas and any indigenous peoples living sustainably that are a part of it.

This article originally appeared in Mongabay.

Editor’s note: The strong focus on mapping forests mentioned in this article makes one suspicious. Mapping is needed for governments to control “natural ressources” and give concessions to companies to exploit them. It was never needed for indigenous populations, so far as, since they’ve known their landbase for millenia. Wherever you are, don’t trust governments. Never. People worldwide must understand that governments always serve the rich and powerful exploiters and never the local residents.

This story first appeared in The Conversation.

As the Glasgow climate conference begins, and the time we have to avert a climate crisis narrows, it is time to revisit successful First Nations campaigns against the fossil fuel industry.

Like the current fight to avert a climate catastrophe, these battles are good, old-fashioned, come-from-behind, David-versus-Goliath examples we can all learn from. The Jabiluka campaign is a good example.

In the late 1990s, a mining company, Energy Resources of Australia, was planning to expand its Kakadu uranium mine into Jabiluka, land belonging to Mirarr Traditional Owners in the Northern Territory. The adjacent Ranger Uranium mine had been operating for 20 years without Traditional Owners’ consent and against their wishes, causing long-term cultural and environmental destruction.

This story first appeared in yintahaccess.com Media contact: Jennifer Wickham, 778-210-0067, yintahaccess@gmail.com Gidimt’en Checkpoint Media Coordinator FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE NOVEMBER 22, 2021

WET’SUWET’EN TERRITORY, SMITHERS, BC: Twenty people who were arrested in a two-day violent raid on Wet’suwet’en territory are appearing at BC Supreme Court in Prince George today at 11 am. Those arrested include Gidimt’en Checkpoint spokesperson Sleydo’ and Dinï ze’ Woos’s daughter Jocelyn Alec, as well as two journalists.

This story first appeared in Mongabay.

Editor’s note: O Canada!Welcome to the new wild west. If you liked Deepwater Horizon you will love Deep Sea Mining. This statement pretty much sums it up, “countries could have their chance to EXPLOIT the valuable metals locked in the deep sea.“Corporations love to deal withpoorer, less developed countries  who can do less by way of supervision because they lack greater resources and capacity.

“Like NORI, TOML began its life as a subsidiary of Nautilus minerals, one of the world’s first deep-sea miners. Just before Nautilus’s project in Papua New Guinea’s waters failed and left the country $157 million in debt, its shareholders created DeepGreen. DeepGreen acquired TOML in early 2020 after Nautilus filed for bankruptcy, the ISA said the Tongan government allowed the transfer and reevaluating the company’s background was not required.”

This story first appeared in Building a Revolutionary Movement

By Adam H

This post briefly describes 25 anarchist thinkers, following on from the political ideology post. I took the list of anarchist thinkers from ‘Demanding the Impossible: A History of Anarchism’ by Peter Marshall.

William Godwin

William Godwin (1756-1836) is said to be the founder of philosophical anarchism. In his book An Enquiry Concerning Political Justice (1793), he argued that “government is a corrupting force in society, perpetuating dependence and ignorance, but that it will be rendered increasingly unnecessary and powerless by the gradual spread of knowledge and the expansion of the human understanding. Politics will be displaced by an enlarged personal morality as truth conquers error and mind subordinates matter. In this development the rigorous exercise of private judgment, and its candid expression in public discussion, plays a central role, motivating his rejection of a wide range of co-operative and rule-governed practices which he regards as tending to mental enslavement, such as law, private property, marriage and concerts.”

Press Release from Gidimt’en Checkpoint

NOVEMBER 14, 2021

This morning, members of the Gidimt’en Clan evicted Coastal GasLink (CGL) employees from unceded Wet’suwet’en territory, upholding ancient Wet’suwet’en trespass laws and an eviction notice first served to CGL in 2020 by the Wet’suwet’en Hereditary Chiefs.

Employees were granted 8 hours to peacefully evacuate the area, before the main road into the Lhudis Bin territory of the Gidimt’en clan was closed.

Sleydo’, Gidimt’en spokesperson, commented on the eviction enforcement:

By Frédéric Moreau

Read Part 1 of this article here.

While the share of solar and wind power is tending to increase, overall energy consumption is rising from all sources — development, demography (a taboo subject that has been neglected for too long), and new uses, such as digital technology in all its forms (12% of the electricity consumed in France, and 3% worldwide, a figure that is constantly rising, with digital technology now emitting more CO2 than air transport⁴⁴). Digital technology also competes with vehicles, especially electric ones, in terms of the consumption of metals and rare earths. This is perfectly logical since the renewable energy industry, and to a lesser extent the hydroelectric industry (dams), requires oil, coal and gas upstream to manufacture the equipment. Solar panels look indeed very clean once installed on a roof or in a field and which will later produce so-called “green” electricity.

By Frédéric Moreau

In memory of Stuart Scott

Each year while winter is coming, my compatriots, whom have already been told to turn off the tap when brushing their teeth, receive a letter from their electricity supplier urging them to turn down the heat and turn off unnecessary lights in case of a cold snap in order to prevent an overload of the grid and a possible blackout. At the same time the French government, appropriately taking on the role of advertiser for the national car manufacturers in which it holds shares¹, is promoting electric cars more and more actively. Even though electric vehicles (EV) have existed since the end of the 19th century (the very first EV prototype dates back to 1834).

Global warming. Biodiversity collapse. Rampant inequality, war, and sexual abuse. The problems we face today are overwhelming and getting worse.

Eco-feminism has answers.

From the philosophy of domination to the practicalities of overpopulation, there are links between the oppression of women and the destruction of the planet. Those links can be used to harm, as we see today. But they can also be used to heal. Women from Rachel Carson to Vandana Shiva have recognized this.

By Max Wilbert

On July 24th, 2017, Ruby Montoya and Jessica Renzicek made a public statement admitting that they had carried out multiple acts of sabotage against the then-under-construction Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) in Spring 2017 during the #NoDAPL #StandingRock movement. The two activists set fire to heavy machinery and used blow torches to damage the oil pipeline and valves in an effort to decisively halt the project.

While the Dakota Access Pipeline was ultimately completed, their actions singlehandedly delayed construction for months. Jessica and Ruby are calling on others to consider similar tactics in their struggles against pipelines and other destructive projects.

This story first appeared in Opendemocracy.

The young indigenous leadership of Múte Bourup Egede is battling for green sovereignty in a time of climate collapse.

By Adam Ramsay and Aaron White

In 2016, Greenland’s then minister responsible for economic development, Vittus Qujaukitsoq, welcomed the appointment of Rex Tillerson, the former CEO of Exxon Mobil, as US secretary of state. Despite representing the centre-Left party Siumut (Forward) and being surrounded by some of the most visible consequences of the warming world, Qujaukitsoq and his colleagues saw the growing potential for mining and drilling brought by the melting glaciers on the world’s biggest island as an opportunity to bring in the cash which would allow the long-desired independence from Denmark.

Editor’s note: This struggle continues and we will continue to cover it. Deep Green Resistance against civilization is the only way to prevail. It “will not go quietly into the night.” - William Shakespeare

This story first appeared in Survival International.

Representatives of India’s Adivasi (Indigenous) people have denounced PM Narendra Modi for proclaiming his green credentials at COP, whilst simultaneously planning a massive expansion of coal mining on their lands.

The lands and livelihoods of tens of thousands of tribal people will be destroyed under Modi’s plan to open 55 new coal mines, expand 193 existing ones, and produce 1 billion tonnes of coal a year. Eighty per cent of the new mines will be on Adivasi land.

By Max Wilbert

- Section 11318: Exempts oil and gas pipelines on most federal lands from environmental analysis.

- Sections 40301-40333 (“Fuels and Technology Infrastructure Investments”): These sections propose nearly $15 billion in taxpayer subsidies for dirty energy, including oil, coal, gas, and woody biomass via investments in largely theoretical and unproven carbon capture and storage technologies, including an additional $3 billion to begin construction of a massive network of new CO2 pipelines (Sec. 41004), while also dishonestly defining “clean hydrogen” to include hydrogen derived from climate-polluting carbon-fuel sources such as biomass and fossil fuels (Sec. 40311). The approach outlined here is riddled with uncertainty and harmful impacts while perpetuating our reliance on fossil fuels, which is why it has been denounced as a false climate solution by the scientific community. An additional $6 billion in subsidies is proposed for nuclear energy ( Sec. 41002).

This article originally appeared in Counterpunch.

Editor’s note: What is the Endgame of capitalism? First destroy the planet for profit then profit on the protection of what is left. Just look at how the market commoditized bottled water, in plastic to boot. How much does a bottle of clean air cost? It will not end until people are turned into copper tops. This is The System, see Surveillance Capitalism.

BY Robert Hunziker

Featured image: Ryan Gsell – CC BY 2.0

This story first appeared in The Conversation.

By Marc Abrams

Fall foliage season is a calendar highlight in states from Maine south to Georgia and west to the Rocky Mountains. It’s especially important in the Northeast, where fall colors attract an estimated US$8 billion in tourism revenues to New England every year.

As a forestry scientist, I’m often asked how climate change is affecting fall foliage displays. What’s clearest so far is that color changes are occurring later in the season. And the persistence of very warm, wet weather in 2021 is reducing color displays in the Northeast and mid-Atlantic. But climate change isn’t the only factor at work, and in some areas, human decisions about forest management are the biggest influences.

Editor’s note: From the 15th to the 22th of November, in different countries, the Glasgow Agreement is articulating mobilizations, protests and blocks against one of the biggest oil & gas companies in the world: Total.

This story first appeared in Common Dreams.

By João Camargo

The social alliance to take on global capitalism must be global, radical, popular, tactically, and strategically focused, while at the same time flexible and imaginative.

Is climate collapse close to being averted? How close are we to winning? Is the climate justice movement organized to win? Are current strategies and tactics enough? What else do we need to try and how fast? The Glasgow Agreement, People’s Climate Commitment, is a global platform of grassroots and social movements for climate justice. It is planning on going after French multinational Total simultaneously all around the world this November, in an action called Collapse Total, and organising climate justice caravans in all continents next Spring.

FOR DECADES, LARGE CORPORATIONS HAVE POISONED RIVERS, DEVASTATED FORESTS AND DISPLACED COMMUNITIES, AND NOW THEY’RE RUSHING TO MINE MINERALS FROM THE LAST UNTOUCHED FRONTIER ON THE PLANET – THE DEEP SEA.

The deep-sea may be vast and unexplored, but it is incredibly important. It encompasses 75% of the ocean’s volume and is the largest and least explored of Earth’s biomes. Some scientists believe that the deep sea and its water column may be the largest carbon sink on Earth. Plus, new species are still being found there, and sometimes, entirely new ecosystems are discovered.

This story first appeared in Mongabay.

by Gladstone Taylor

• Community fishers struggle to hold their own against heavily-subsidized foreign fleets. Fisheries subsidies have long given wealthy nations an edge over Small Island Developing States (SIDS) like Jamaica that are rich in fishing traditions and natural resources.
• In places like the multigenerational fishing village of Manchioneal, Jamaica, artisanal fishers say they simply can’t compete with heavily-subsidized foreign fleets working in depleted waters.
• But decisions made by the WTO this year on subsidies could lead to more sustainable and equitable fisheries around the world, in turn leading to better food security and more fish.
• This story was produced with the support of Internews’ Earth Journalism Network.

MANCHIONEAL, Jamaica — Nestled deep in the northeast coast of Jamaica, hidden in the thick fertile forests of Portland parish, sits the multigenerational fishing community of Manchioneal. Families have been continually fishing these tropical waters since at least the 1950s, preserving and passing down artisanal fishing traditions. The community’s work and lifestyle, which includes earning their catch many miles offshore, has persisted even in the face of foreign competition bolstered by subsidies.

This story first appeared in The Third Pole.

By Saw John Bright.

This week, governments from around the world will convene online for the first part of the UN Biodiversity Summit COP15 (the second part will take place partially in-person in Kunming in spring), which will agree on the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework. Framed as a ‘stepping stone’ to the 2050 Vision of ‘Living in harmony with nature’ as part of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), ratified by 196 countries, this framework is intended to deal with runaway biodiversity loss over the next decade.

Free Jessica Reznicek 15m

BREAKING: As Joe Biden talks of being a climate leader at #COP26 in Glasgow we received our first letter & update from #JessicaReznicek for the people. Jessica is a climate / water protector political prisoner in the U.S. who was labeled a terrorist just months ago by the US government for her nonviolent action against #DAPL. She asked we share this with all of you!

By Jessica Reznicek

“10-29-21

Hello Dear Friends!

This story first appeared in The Conversation.

By Brian Garvey and Sonia Magalhaes.

The Volta Grande region of the Amazon is a lush, fertile zone supplied by the Xingu River, whose biodiverse lagoons and islands have earned its designation as a priority conservation area by Brazil’s Ministry of the Environment.

But a recent decision by the Federal Regional Court in the state of Pará, Brazil, allows the continuing diversion of water from the Xingu River to the Belo Monte hydroelectric dam complex – rather than to local indigenous fishing communities. This is a disaster for the ecosystems and people of the Volta Grande.

The article was first published on the Radical Ecological Democracy website. on 10/24/2021. Article link.

Ending systems of domination: Reclaiming our bodies and politics from global trauma

By Eva Schonveld and Justin Kenrick

As the sun goes down on a system that cannot save us from itself, our only option is to bring that system to an end. But what is that system, and how do we replace it?

We begin from the understanding that systems of domination are, both, inside and between us, and that transforming social and political relations starts as much from our hearts and the personal as from the predicament of the earth, and all our societal relations. We begin from Scotland where we live, and where COP26 will yet again make grand promises but do nothing to stop us all hurtling off the climate cliff edge.

This article originally appeared in Survival International.

Featured image: Mr Mobutu Nakulire Munganga, a Batwa man from Kahuzi Biega National Park, DRC, who was shot by a park guard in 2017. His son was shot and killed in the same attack. They were gathering medicinal plants. The Wildlife Conservation Society has supported the park. © Survival - Committee chair “frustrated, exasperated, incredulous at WWF’s failure to take responsibility” for human rights abuses - Independent expert underlines “continued impacts of colonialism in conservation” - He accuses WWF of “shocking deception” and warns “WWF won’t change their behavior unless forced to do so”

This story was first published in YES! magazine.

By Deonna Anderson.

On a cool morning in December, Johnella LaRose stands in a 2-acre field in east Oakland, overseeing a group of volunteers preparing a section of this land that the Sogorea Te Land Trust stewards for the arrival of a shipping container. LaRose is dressed to work, wearing jeans and boots that look broken in.

The container will serve as storage for farming equipment, she says, and in case of a natural disaster, as a safe shelter for people to gather, sleep, and access resources.

This story was first published on E-International Relations.

Editor’s note: Despite all the “progress” that has been made and all the declarations of freedom and human rights, “Civilization is based on a clearly defined and widely accepted yet often unarticulated hierarchy. Violence done by those higher on the hierarchy to those lower is nearly always invisible, that is, unnoticed. When it is noticed, it is fully rationalized. Violence done by those lower on the hierarchy to those higher is unthinkable, and when it does occur is regarded with shock, horror, and the fetishization of the victims.” (Premise Four) And “The property of those higher on the hierarchy is more valuable than the lives of those below. It is acceptable for those above to increase the amount of property they control—in everyday language, to make money—by destroying or taking the lives of those below. This is called production. If those below damage the property of those above, those above may kill or otherwise destroy the lives of those below. This is called justice.” (Premise five) By Lorenzo Kamel

This is an excerpt from the book Bright Green Lies, P. 20 ff

By Derrick Jensen, Lierre Keith and Max Wilbert

What this adds up to should be clear enough, yet many people who should know better choose not to see it. This is business-as- usual: the expansive, colonizing, progressive human narrative, shorn only of the carbon. It is the latest phase of our careless, self-absorbed, ambition-addled destruction of the wild, the unpolluted, and the nonhuman. It is the mass destruction of the world’s remaining wild places in order to feed the human economy. And without any sense of irony, people are calling this “environmentalism.” 1 —PAUL KINGSNORTH

This story first appeared at Rapid Transition Alliance.

By Matt Rendell This story weaves the indigenous cultural revival of the Muysca people of Suba in Colombia, together with the transition to more sustainable living. It is contributed by award-winning author Matt Rendell who spoke with Muysca social activists and grew to know the community through his work as a cycling journalist in the riding obsessed country, and the elite cyclist, Nairo Quintana, who is probably the best known international Muysca advocate.

This story first appeared in Mongabay.

By  Elizabeth Claire Alberts

• The New Zealand Supreme Court recently blocked consent for a seabed mining operation that would annually extract 50 million tons of iron ore from the seabed off the coast of South Taranaki.
• Environmentalists see this decision as a clear victory, but the mining company has stated its intention to reapply for mining permission.
• But experts say it’s unlikely the company, Trans-Tasman Resources Limited (TTR), will be able to regain consent due to fundamental issues with its application, such as the distinct lack of baseline studies on resident marine life and the potential impacts of mining.
• Conservationists say seabed mining in this part of New Zealand would cause irreversible damage to the ecosystem and threaten many rare and endangered species.

Conservationists have expressed hope that a New Zealand company whose bid to mine the seabed was blocked by the country’s highest court last month has little chance of winning approval.

This story first appeared in Survival.

These Khadia men were thrown off their land after it was turned into a tiger reserve. They lived for months under plastic sheets. Millions more face this fate if the 30% plan goes ahead.

This story first appeared in Mongabay.

By Shanna Hanbury

• Coopcerrado, a farmer’s cooperative of 5,000 families, won the United Nations’ Equator Prize under the category of “New Nature Economies” due to its more than two decades of work in developing a farmer-to-farmer model of mutual support for training, commercializing and setting up organic and regenerative businesses in the Brazilian Cerrado.
• The Cerrado savanna, a biodiversity hotspot holding 5% of the world’s biodiversity is also among one of the most threatened, with almost half of the biome destroyed for agriculture and a process of desertification already underway, scientists say.
• To save the Cerrado, farmers and traditional extractivist communities have developed an expandable model of collective support in knowledge and resource-sharing while restoring the biome and providing an income for thousands of vulnerable families.
• Bureaucratic and logistic hurdles in Brazil traditionally leave small farmers and traditional communities out of mainstream markets and industries, but bridging this gap has been one of the keys to the cooperative’s success.

When farmer Mônica de Souza Ribeiro moved into her landless settlement in the state of Goiás in central Brazil in the late 1990s, she was overwhelmed by the sheer amount of agrotoxins and chemicals deployed in the cattle- and soy-dominated region. At first, she followed suit, using chemical fertilizers to grow the vegetables that she sold for her family business. But she became increasingly concerned as she watched the destruction around her.

This article originally appeared in Climate&Capitalism.

Editor’s note: We are no Marxists, but we find it important to look at history from the perspective of the usual people, the peasants, and the poor, since liberal historians tend to follow the narrative of endless progress and neglect all the violence and injustice this “progress” was and is based on.

How 16th century reformers fought privatization of land and capitalist agriculture

Featured image: A 16th Century printing press. Commonwealth views were widely disseminated in books, pamphlets and broadsides.

This story first appeared in Building a Revolutionary Movement.

Editor’s note: As a radical environmental and social justice organization, we believe it is important to study the history of capitalism. Only by learning about all the force, the violence, the exploitation, and the class struggle involved can we understand how an insane system like industrial capitalism could eventually succeed and create the worldwide mess we are facing today.

The series about the history of trade unions in Britain has six parts. Interested readers can continue reading here:

Editor’s note: Colonialism has not ended. It is in full force. It is what civilization does. For this to end, governments must give the Land Back. All BLM, Forests and Park land should be returned to the sovereign Nations it was stolen from. Turtle Island is Treaty Land, ceded or unceded. Treaties are the Supreme Law of the Land and must be honored. Australia just returned more than 395,000 acres of land to the Eastern Kuku Yalanji people. It included the Daintree National Park which is believed to be the oldest living rainforest in the world. Protections for the Bears Ear National Monument are being reinstated and management of the 1.3 million acres will be placed back into indigenous management. Rightful Lands, Rightful Hands!

This story first appeared in The Conversation.

By Andrea Seielstad.

Pop singer Britney Spears’ quest to end the conservatorship that handed control over her finances and health care to her father demonstrates the double-edged sword of putting people under the legal care and control of another person.

A judge may at times deem it necessary to appoint a guardian or conservator to protect a vulnerable person from abuse and trickery by others, or to protect them from poor decision-making regarding their own health and safety. But when put into the hands of self-serving or otherwise unscrupulous conservators, however, it can lead to exploitation and abuse.

Author Paul Watson has no problem with critics calling him and his marine-life-defending colleagues pirates—it’s far better than helplessly standing by and doing nothing in the face of the violence against animals they have witnessed. This excerpt is from Death of a Whale, by Captain Paul Watson (GroundSwell Books, 2021). This web adaptation was produced by GroundSwell Books in partnership with Earth | Food | Life, a project of the Independent Media Institute.

This story first appeared in Mongabay.

by Fernanda Wenzel

• Brazil’s highest court has upheld a ban on missionaries entering reserves that are home to isolated and recently contacted Indigenous people during the pandemic.
• The decision comes in response to a lawsuit filed by Indigenous organizations against a law passed in July 2020 that allowed missionaries to remain inside these reserves despite the pandemic, in violation of Brazil’s official policy in place since 1987.
• According to Indigenous organizations, it’s crucial to reaffirm the non-contact policy under the administration of President Jair Bolsonaro that has pushed to “integrate” Indigenous people into society, and has been cozy with the evangelical movement.
• Besides the risk of disease spread, the presence of missionaries in these reserves undermines traditional cultures and social cohesion, and compels these nomadic communities to settle down, making the land more vulnerable to invasions by illegal ranchers and loggers, activists say.

Brazil’s highest court has upheld a ban on missionary activity inside reserves that are home to isolated or recently contacted Indigenous people, in a bid to protect the communities against COVID-19.

This article first appeared in Yes! magazine.

By LIBBY LEONARD

There are four things you should know,” says David Fuertes to the youths he mentors. “You should know your origins, because your ancestors have paved the way. You should know your values and connect in those values, because that’s going to drive you to make decisions. You should know your purpose, because that will show the ‘why’ of what you’re doing. And you should envision the ultimate for yourself and your lāhui [or ‘people’].”

Editor’s note: Deep Green Resistance stands in solidarity with the Karen people and the Revolution against the military junta in Myanmar. We will keep it in the headlines to help them raise their voice as we do with all land protectors of Mother Earth. “Until the end of the world we will not give up our efforts…we will not let it happen.”

This article first appeared in Mongabay.

by Esther Wah

• The Tanintharyi Region in southern Myanmar contains an expanse of rainforest, ocean, and mangroves where a range of wildlife – from tigers and elephants to tapirs – roam, and the Indigenous Karen people consider themselves stewards of this richness.
• In 2012, the Karen and the Myanmar military signed a ceasefire to end 70 years of war in their territory, allowing the Indigenous communities an opportunity to develop new institutions, campaigns, and programs to conserve their resources and forests from destruction by outside interests.
• That ended with the military coup of 2021: “Attacks by the military on Indigenous peoples and environmental defenders means that the forests are at risk – and for this reason we want to say to the world ‘this coup doesn’t just affect our country, but the future of the globe.’”
• This article is a commentary, it reflects the views of the author, not necessarily Mongabay.

The Tanintharyi Region in southern Myanmar is a beautiful and rich expanse of rainforest, ocean, and mangroves where we still have wild tigers and elephants, and where the forest provides all that we need in life. It is my home land. Our Indigenous communities depend on the forest for food, water, medicine, and our forests depend on Indigenous communities, who manage, conserve and protect them with great care.

This article originally appeared in Building a Revolutionary Movement

By Adam H

This post looks at if it’s possible to have a coherent strategy for the emancipatory transformation of a complex social system, 5 anti-capitalist strategies and revolutionary strategy.

What does ‘emancipatory transformation of a complex social system’ mean? We currently live in a capitalist society or capitalist social system that is not equal, just, democratic or sustainable. Emancipatory means the struggle for political, economic or social rights or equality for disenfranchised groups or sections of society. So this post is focused on thinking about how we think about the route to ending the dominance of capitalism so we live in an alternative society that is equal, just, democratic and sustainable.

This is an excerpt from the book Bright Green Lies, P. 1-7

By LIERRE KEITH “Once our authoritarian technics consolidates its powers, with the aid of its new forms of mass control, its panoply of tranquilizers and sedatives and aphrodisiacs, could democracy in any form survive? That question is absurd: Life itself will not survive, except what is funneled through the mechanical collective.” 1 LEWIS MUMFORD

There is so little time and even less hope here, in the midst of ruin, at the end of the world. Every biome is in shreds. The green flesh of forests has been stripped to grim sand. The word water has been drained of meaning; the Athabascan River is essentially a planned toxic spill now, oozing from the open wound of the Alberta tar sands. When birds fly over it, they drop dead from the poison. No one believes us when we say that, but it’s true. The Appalachian Mountains are being blown to bits, their dense life of deciduous forests, including their human communities, reduced to a disposal problem called “overburden,” a word that should be considered hate speech: Living creatures—mountain laurels, wood thrush fledglings, somebody’s grandchildren—are not objects to be tossed into gullies. If there is no poetry after Auschwitz, there is no grammar after mountaintop removal. As above, so below. Coral reefs are crumbling under the acid assault of carbon. And the world’s grasslands have been sliced to ribbons, literally, with steel blades fed by fossil fuel. The hunger of those blades would be endless but for the fact that the planet is a bounded sphere: There are no continents left to eat. Every year the average American farm uses the energy equivalent of three to four tons of TNT per acre. And oil burns so easily, once every possibility for self-sustaining cultures has been destroyed. Even the memory of nature is gone, metaphrastic now, something between prehistory and a fairy tale. All that’s left is carbon, accruing into a nightmare from which dawn will not save us. Climate change slipped into climate chaos, which has become a whispered climate holocaust. At least the humans whisper. And the animals? During the 2011 Texas drought, deer abandoned their fawns for lack of milk. That is not a grief that whispers. For living beings like Labrador ducks, Javan rhinos, and Xerces blue butterflies, there is the long silence of extinction.

This article originally appeared in Common Dreams.

The decline is one of the effects of the industrial modernization that is supposed to have brought increasing comfort, health, and advanced knowledge into our lives.

By JOHN BUELL Southwest Harbor, Maine (Special to Informed Comment) – While mainstream media celebrate the remarkable development in record time of vaccines spectacularly effective against the Covid virus, knowledge that might contribute to other medical breakthroughs is being steadily undermined. This decline is not the result of some dramatic lawsuit or corporate takeover. It is one of the effects of the industrial modernization that is supposed to have brought increasing comfort, health and advanced knowledge into our lives. Economic growth has produced not only a climate emergency but a less publicized decline in the many efficacious forms of traditional knowledge and the biodiversity they sustain and are sustained by. In an email exchange I had with ethnobotanist Kirsten Tripplett, Ph.D., she pointed out:

This piece was first published at Democracy Now!

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3O0VBeWkIc&feature=emb_imp_woyt[/embed]

By AMY GOODMAN

In response to the completion of the contested Line 3 pipeline, which is now reportedly operational, thousands of Indigenous leaders and climate justice advocates are kicking off the “People vs. Fossil Fuels’’ mobilization, an Indigenous-led five-day action of civil disobedience at the White House to demand President Biden declare a climate emergency, divest from fossil fuels and launch a “just renewable energy revolution.” “This pipeline doesn’t respect treaty rights,” says Winona LaDuke, longtime Indigenous activist and founder of Honor the Earth, a platform to raise awareness of and money for Indigenous struggles for environmental justice. “They’re just trying to continue their egregious behavior. It’s so tragic that, on the one hand, the Biden administration is like, ’We’re going to have Indigenous Peoples’ Day, but we’re still going to smash you in northern Minnesota and smash the rest of the country.’” LaDuke faces criminal charges linked to her protest of pipelines in three different counties.

This article originally appeared in Common Dreams.

By JULIA CONLEY

“Not a single drop of oil is going to come out of the Amazon until the government takes care of us,” said campaigners.

Demanding stronger social and environmental support in northern Peru’s Loreto region, about 200 Indigenous protesters on Wednesday announced a strike two days after they began occupying a station of the North Peruvian Oil Pipeline controlled by state-owned oil company Petroperu.