Tag: mountain valley pipeline

Pipeline Fighters Sentenced to Jail Time for Tree-sits

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cross-posted from Appalachians Against the Pipeline
This week a Montgomery County judge sentenced the Yellow Finch treesitters to spend as many days in jail as they spent in the trees blocking the Mountain Valley Pipeline.
Here is a message from Acre in Western Virginia Regional Jail after they were sentenced:
“Hi everyone. You probably just saw my sentence in the paper. I want folks to know regardless of how I’ve been charged, I stand behind my actions. I’ll go day for day tree for jail any day of the week to stop the damn pipeline.
I want people watching who may consider taking action against injustice to not be dissuaded by the law, to know the court is only there to protect the interests of wealthy corporate elite. That by jailing people for protecting the land and water, they show us time and time again how the judicial system is a right hand in colonialism and how it wears the blood of innocent life left in its wake.
Refugees from climate change are on the rise, immigrants remain locked in cages separated from their families dying at our border. And the jails are packed with people preyed upon by both the state and prison industry, exploited for labor and cash and tax cuts. Prison is modern slavery and should be abolished.
To those reading this weighing the efficacy of their actions, planning for the next protest: never forget you are standing for what is right! They may have me in a concrete box, but the woods and nature is something I hold with me always. I can still feel the coming birdsong and blossoms of late spring like a steady pulse. I can feel the soil and running water in my blood.
To believe this world was given to us to do what we want to it, to build monuments to our own ego, is backwards and dangerous. We are only a small part of this place and our relationship with the land and air and water is critical. It’s a fatal error to alienate and place ourselves above all the crawling and swimming and flying and growing things. Earth comes first remember? Show the world what you believe in.
Land for its own autonomy. Dirt for dirt’s sake.”
Donate to support continued resistance to the Mountain Valley Pipeline:
Join us! Email:
appalachiansagainstpipelines@protonmail.com

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More Appalachian Pipeline Fighters Held without Bail

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cross-posted from Appalachians Against Pipelines

Thomas and Molly, who were arrested today after Thomas locked himself to a truck carrying pieces of pipe for the Mountain Valley Pipeline, are being held without bail on bullshit FELONY KIDNAPPING charges!!!
According to the New River Valley Regional Jail, Thomas and Molly’s charges — after 2.5 hours of a nonviolent blockade — are felony kidnapping (abduct by force without justification), felony larceny (unauthorized use of auto worth > $200), and misdemeanor riot/unlawful assembly (obstruction of free passage). Both are scheduled to be arraigned on Monday.
This is truly, astoundingly outrageous. These charges are clearly an intimidation tactic by the cops and the courts. This makes FOUR Mountain Valley Pipeline fighters currently held without bail! As we stated when Acre and Wren were not granted bail after being extracted from the Yellow Finch tree sits, the choice to deny our friends bail and hold them in jail is vindictive and political — a chance to punish pipeline fighters and attempt to scare off continued resistance to the Mountain Valley Pipeline. For years, the courts have shown their contempt for any water protectors who have put themselves in the pipeline’s path to stop construction.
Don’t let the cops and courts stop the resistance! Fight back! Take action in your community! Show up to court dates for pipeline fighters! Support prisoners! Stop the MVP!
Join us: appalachiansagainstpipelines@protonmail.com
First image photo credit Jen Deerinwater

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Virginia: Scientist Locks to Truck to Stop Mountain Valley Pipeline

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cross-posted from Appalachians Against Pipelines

A truck carrying pipe for the Mountain Valley Pipeline has been BLOCKED as it was crossing a bridge over Sinking Creek in Maybrook, Virginia. Thomas Adams, Montgomery County resident, hydrologist, and elected Director of the Skyline Soil and Water Conservation District has locked himself to the pipe truck!
The Mountain Valley Pipeline route crosses Sinking Creek just over a mile away from the site of today’s action.
“I have committed no crime. I would have committed a crime against humanity had I sat as an idle bystander, letting the greed of political and corporate forces advance,” explained Thomas.
Join us on site to rally in support of Thomas and against the Mountain Valley Pipeline!
Donate to support resistance to pipelines in Appalachia: bit.ly/SupportMVPResistance

Statement from the Yellow Finch tree-sit in the path of the Mountain Valley Pipeline

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cross-posted from Appalachians Against Pipelines
An “Earth Day” statement from the Yellow Finch tree sit blockade in the path of the Mountain Valley Pipeline— April 22, 2020 — by Biryani Cudweed

pic via Appalachians Against Pipelines

To our friends, true hearted allies, and especially our accomplices — we here at the tree sits hope life finds you and yours healthy, well, and joyous this springtide, in spite of these sometimes scary and tragic (46000+ lost to the virus in the so-called US! WTF) and sometimes hilariously weird (Missouri is set to sue China, apparently) times.

Gonna say it again: wash your damn hands, and mask up like it’s “The Great Train Robbery!”

Well, I’ll get to the point and the proverbial snag in the forest today folks: we here at the sits wish to tell you to have a very good, pleasant day.

“What the hell, no Earth Day greetings!? No chirpy, pithy jewels of woodsy wisdom!?” I can already hear the good readership folks murmur in surprise and confused, disappointed dismay as they put away their smartphones in disgust.

Nope.

One single measly day of giving the Earth the proper attention and respect, one day of concern (heck, even a well intentioned Friday school strike or tree planting campaign), one day of remembering our place within the vastly intricate ecosystems of the planet is simply a performative bandaid and neoliberal capitalist dog and pony show for social media clout and the easing of settler consciences, if one does not remember the continued theft and genocide committed by capitalist white supremacist settlers upon the Indigenous people here on Turtle Island, who have always been here as long as their stories have said and have been always and ever the caretakers of the land.

“Yeah, yeah, I know Miss Cudweed, but what am I supposed to do? My friends and I planted like a zillion trees today, and we know that the land is stolen and occupied and that banks fund and prop up the fossil fuel behemoths killing the planet! So what do you want us to do?!”

Aside from continued support, land reparations, and forming your own various blockades (however that looks for each situation), here are some ideas to consider!

COVID 19 disproportionately affects elders, folks with auto-immune deficiencies, Black and Indigenous communities, and detained migrants and prisoners. Mutual aid should not be thought of as mere buzzwords, and rent strike is not just a good band! These forms of resistance and direct action are absolutely critical right now! Check up on folks, make sure people who have community and resources to live well. Make sure out of school children are getting fed.

Protest the actual non-essential services: the prison and imperialist military industrial complexes which drain resources and pollute the Earth, robbing people of life and freedom, ICE detention centers which separate families and cage innocents whose only crime is to cross arbitrary lines set out by colonial robbers, and the bloated fossil fuel industry!

$1200? LOL. While the most at risk who yet have the privilege of being documented receive a pittance, Trump is promising the oil and gas industry yet another handout in the form of a bailout. And we the poor and marginalized are supposed to accept our charitable scraps gratefully, shut up, and thank the nice men in suits? Fuck that.

Now more than ever, let us stand firmly and bravely united in solidarity together — six feet apart, of course — and reevaluate and reject the capitalist and utterly untenable mindset that reduces both us and the planet we inhabit to a means of profit and power for the bankers and CEOs who control government policy and write the mainstream historical and cultural narrative.

Capitalism is the most dangerous and destructive pandemic we face.

Solidarity with Wet’suwet’en! Abolish ICE! Doom to the pipeline! Be well and blessed folks!

– Biryani Cudweed, “Worst Trans Girl Ever”
(And everyone at Yellow Finch)