Originally published at: http://boingboing.net/2016/11/04/a-first-person-account-of-a-da.html
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I find it disgusting that these non-violent protesters are being treated this way. I support their cause, but even if I didn’t - I would still find their treatment disgusting. A number written on an arm? Damn. Really?
These protesters are heroic. I commend them all.
They have already made gains - and I hope they “win” in this fight.
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It’s almost as if the authorities wanted to communicate exactly how they regard the protesters.
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To “thingify” them…
As I see it. You’re right.
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If they succeed in forcing the US to immediately stop the transport or use of fossil fuels, it is going to be a cold winter for a lot of people.
That is the goal of Climate Direct Action, and Earthjustice. There are a bunch of groups that have descended on Standing Rock for the protests, but these seem to be the primary drivers of the protest. They want immediate end to the transport or use of fossil fuels.
I have not figured out what the agenda of the Standing Rock tribe is. They have put a public face and legitimacy to the protest. I absolutely understand the desire to protect the water source, but I cannot explain the tribe’s disinterest in the process up to now.
If anyone has actually read the ruling http://earthjustice.org/sites/default/files/files/order-denying-PI.pdf
and has a better understanding of why the Tribe would ally themselves with organizations like Climate Direct Action, I would like to hear it. I understand about historic injustices and broken treaties, but this seems like an issue that is going to work against the Tribe when the radicals go back to Seattle and New York.
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Sometimes ya have to get a little “radical”.
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I kinda understand the reasoning behind CDA’s, EarthJustice’s and GreenPeace’s stance on fossil fuel; we’re at the point of which abolishing dirty energy is the only option for the human race to even have a future. Then again, there’s many other factors that contributes to climate change; like the overproduction of food that weren’t distribute due to high cost and low profitability, along with farm animals creating methane gases.
One should also note that although mining and drilling can have a devastating effect on the surrounding environment, our reliance on gadget that were made from said materials pretty much enforced those practices (the materials needed to make our batteries were dug up by child labor in the Congo); this makes most of the activists hypocrites for using their smartphones to raise awareness of environmental destruction.
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On the morning news they were showing a someone get shot in the back with a rubber bullet while being interviewed on camera…
Edit:
Nope, was a congressional candidate from California interviewing the protesters and she got shot in the back.
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And what is the moral status of those who routed the pipeline near native lands after the original plan upstream of Bismarck was nixed by the company, in part, because of the close proximity to the state capital’s drinking-water wells?
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Just as hypocritical as everyone else; which is why I don’t go by moral standard since those were subjective.
But when it comes down to it, none of the pipelines needed to be built in the first place, since we’re on the edge of Climate Collapse.
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I completely understand the motive of wanting to move away from fossil fuels. It is the “immediate” part that puzzles me. If they staged some sort of action that actually disrupted fossil fuel supplies for a couple of months, it would be a global disaster. If people add up all the things that they use that are run by fossil fuel, or the electricity generated by using it, there are many of those things that people are pretty attached to, like food that comes from farther than walking distance, and pressurized water.
It would be great to have other power sources to supply those things, but we should have them in place before we turn off all the old power plants.
The “immediate” part puzzles me too; mostly because the only place I’ve ever heard it is in strawman attacks against environmentalists. I don’t see it anywhere on EarthJustice’s website.
Yes, an “immediate” stop to all use of fossil fuel would be damn disruptive to the world. Luckily there is zero chance of that happening and I’ve never heard of anyone suggesting that it could happen or demanding that it happen.
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The Climate Direct Action people have the following on their site-
“In the absence of any political leadership or legal mechanisms for accomplishing this, these individuals feel duty bound to halt the extraction and combustion of fossil fuels by personal direct action.”
I suspect that most people, even most of the members these particular groups, do not really expect the lights to go out, and would be alarmed if they did. But the sensible majority are irrelevant when the agenda is set by the extremists.
“Thank you, officer, I willfully submit to your bullshit.”
It’s basic economics, the less of a material there is the higher its price gets, and the higher the price of something is the faster people will work to find an alternative. Thus: the less fossil fuels we extract, the more expensive they get, the more renewable energy becomes viable, and the faster the transition to it is.
As much as I wish everyone would work faster to switch to renewables for the benefit of our planet and our people, they won’t. However they will for money. So I say fuck it, (THE FOLLOWING IS AN EXAMPLE SO DON’T EVEN TRY TURNING THIS INTO A STRAW MAN, DON’T YOU EVEN THINK ABOUT IT) let’s give em a motivator and make it soooo expensive to start their humvee in the morning that they decide to switch to a electric car.
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Is that Rich Hall?
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Ya, I guess he’s a crusader now…
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I suspect that any abrupt rise in oil prices will have less effect on the the guy with the humvee than it will on the pensioner who needs to buy heating oil.
I think the point of it all is that if Fossil fuel were to be abruptly abolished, we’ll be quick to install alternative energy source to both power plants and vehicles; the problem is that there will still be corner cut to meet up to the energy demands and as the saying goes “haste make waste”.
