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| Politics: Pigs are Beautiful Creatures |
Posted by
Ironboots on Friday, October 08, 2004 - 04:34 AM PST
The next day the judge gave me a conditional release to sign. Before the action, I had been told that I should not accept any conditions, since 1) They would be forced to either speed up the trial or to release me without the conditions; 2) They infringed on my rights (Cannot enter any public lands in the whole United States, cannot leave the state, cannot go within one mile of logging operations, must be a good citizen, etc.); 3) If I signed the paper, they would be encouraged to do the same thing to other activists down the road.
I was pretty worn down from those seven days in jail, but I wanted to stick with the girls and not budge. I tried calling Athena for clarification, but her phone was not working. They called me out to sign the paper and I refused. The sheriff growled at me and said that if I didn’t sign, I wasn’t going to get out at all. I might even be held in contempt of court. I still refused and returned to my cell. I was really confused; I wondered if I did the right thing - what the girls were doing - if I had slit my throat. Later that evening I heard from my lawyer that the two girls had signed and they were out. I told her I wanted to get out, so she filed a motion to reinstate my release. I signed, and got out the next day.
Kay’s release ordered her to stay in Gold Beach. Tiny Gold Beach, population 1,900. None of whom Kay knew. She had nowhere to stay, and very little money. So Kay slept on the beach and made meals from dumpsters. Every day she dutifully reported to the sheriff station. Only near the end of last month was she able to go to Ashland (after much badgering of the judge by her lawyer). She still can’t go to school in Bellingham, and her life is on hold thanks to this asshole judge.
I received two plea bargains. One reduced the charges to disorderly conduct, but had a year and a half of probation. I still couldn’t go in the forests that I love, and I would not be allowed to make contact with any of the other co-defendants. The second offer was a diversion. If I was a good boy for six months, they’d wipe my slate clean. No record, no nothing. Except that I still couldn’t go in the forests, I couldn’t contact the other co-defendants, and the DA would probably subpoena me to testify against the two girls.
I was not quite sure what I should do. I could live with the second one, but I did not want to rat out my friends. Then came the tiebreaker: Kay’s lawyer was arguing that Kay should be allowed to go to school. The district attorney had attended that same school and had no objections. But the judge was determined to keep Kay in Oregon. He allowed Kay’s lawyer to argue her position, but made it clear that he was not going to change his mind.
This judge was an asshole, plain and simple, and I wasn’t gonna play his game. I pled not guilty and joined my friends in the preparations for trial. My trial date is set November 9th. We’re putting everything we can into this, and we’re not gonna settle.
This blockade was in the Indi timber sale, part of the Biscuit Fire Recovery Project. The area burned back in 2002 and so they want to make money by logging the dead trees and labeling it as ‘restoration’. This area has evolved with fire over thousands of years. Post-fire ecosystems are a vital part of this environment. There are whole classes of plants and animals that exist solely for this type of ecosystem. Only 5% of our ancient forests have been left untouched. This is part of the five. And so the Indi blockade went up to stop logging. It only lasted a few days, but it sent a strong message to any potential bidders for these sales.
Last Thursday they began cutting the Horse timber sale. In response, 30 people formed a human blockade on October 4. They kept loggers out for about five hours. Only one person was arrested, and he’s now out on bail.
Second Note: I used the word pigs repeatedly in a derogatory manner. I recognize that pigs are beautiful creatures deserving of our full respect, but I lacked a better word to describe the conniving bastards that tricked me and my friends.
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| Note: Names have been changed to Greek mythos to protect their identities. I tried to keep the names as similar to their personas as possible. |
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Average Rating : 4.6
Total ratings : 8
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| Pigs are Beautiful Creatures | Login/Create an account | 12 Comments |
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| | Comments are owned by the poster. We aren't responsible for their content. |
Re: Pigs are Beautiful Creatures
by EyeCandyRayce (aesaraymondsdottir@yahoo.com)
on Oct 09, 2004 - 01:04 AM
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When I first moved to Washington State I went on many road trips (and still do). I would go to forest after forest and on the way I would see acre upon acre cut down and destroyed. I thought of how this land used to be with such thick forest that it was considered a very hostile trip and now look at it! DESTROYED!
I support you and your friends. I think you need to contact news stations in the big cities and tell them your story. Get the press as deeply involved as possible. Expecially them keeping someone out of college and forcing them to live in a city with no job, money, lodging or food! The best way to raise hell is to pull the public in.
Hell.. try and get in touch with the reporter who got tossed in jail with you guys. See if you can get him involved as well.
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The Good Fight
by Monolycus on Oct 10, 2004 - 02:05 AM
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Geez, Boots. There are many conservancy groups in the United States with which you can become affiliated. I realise that it does not feel as "hands on" as rallying, but the only way to stop these suicidal maniacs is to have the courts on your side. Even though the David Suzuki Foundation is located in Canada, they have made many legal appeals within the US court system and had a very positive impact upon environmental issues with nobody's life being ruined with a conviction. Look them up, or better still, ask them for assistance and representation in preventing the clear cutting. I admire your ethos wholeheartedly, my friend, but I have concerns about the efficacy of your approach to the problem.
Incidentally, the ploy of "your friends have signed (usually a confession implicating you)" when you are being interrogated and unable to contact them goes back to the earliest days of the Soviet Union. First, there is no way to ascertain that this is true, but second, and more importantly, it NEVER helps your situation to assume it is and sign what they want you to. Thought you might have picked up that they will lie to you to get what they want from you when they arrested you in the first place. If you are going to use an approach that is antagonistic to the system instead of complementary, you ABSOLUTELY have to be savvy about their tactics.
I wish you the best of luck.
~M.
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Re: Pigs are Beautiful Creatures
by Shade (Shade@Gothcult.com)
on Oct 10, 2004 - 04:34 PM
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I am really impressed IronBoots. I spent an unknown portion (the greater portion I know that much) of the first 13 years of my life in Oregon. I know some of the forests in that state like the back of my hand. Or at least I used to. Now the forests I knew are gone.
I remember watching the deer come out of the forest from my bedroom window in the evening. It was a magical sight on a clear night. The forest line was all of five hundred feet from my house and I could watch them emerge and I swear they glowed.
I remember walking through those woods and laying down in the river bed. In one place the river had been running over a single boulder for easily a thousand years. The bed was seventy feet wide at one point, the river was all of four inches deep and in the middle of the summer you could go lay in the water and get a tan at the same time. The running water was just enough to keep the mosquitos at bay, and you could watch the animals flirt with nature while the day rushed through your hair in the form of the river.
Now that river is gone, the forest is gone, it hasn't even been replaced with a mall or a parking lot, it's just gone. The boulder was scraped clean by the tires of logging trucks, the trees have been sold. The private graveyard has vanished without a trace and the sixteen year old girl who died in 1873 will never, ever have an eight year old boy profess undying love and bury his lost tooth above her head again.
So thank you for preserving, if even for five more hours, the forest that you were able to save. For every eco-ecosystem that exists, there are also a thousand thousand memories, and those are just as fragile as the ecosystem itself, the only difference is the eco system can remake itself. Our humanity cannot.
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Re: Pigs are Beautiful Creatures
by Anonymous-Coward on Oct 12, 2004 - 09:21 PM
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That's a hell of a way to spend a couple of weeks, man. I grew up in one of the close to south mountain states, and it had beautiful mountains, covered with beautiful trees that would occasionally be completely cleared by a mining operation.
But what pisses me off even more is the government trying to justify the clear cutting of old growth forest by saying that they are preserving the ecosystem. The ecosystem has been preserving itself for millennia, change is not necessarily a bad thing. The global environment changes over time, and doesn’t really care if we notice or not. What happens is you get a bunch of people who think they know what the correct “environment” should be throwing off the natural balance.
A fire is a good thing. It clears up the underbrush and helps seedlings to sprout. There are certain types of seeds that won’t open until they have been heated to a certain temperature. Not having fires means lots of undergrowth, weeds, non-native plants, and other invasive species have time to work in. It becomes a million acre powder keg waiting for a strike of lighting, or an idiot tossing his smoke out the window, and boom, suddenly you have a “natural disaster” on your hands, only, it’s been caused by people trying to impose restrictions on the natural process.
I’m glad to know your out there fighting the good fight, while all I do is sit here and whine. Keep at it, and try to stay out of way of those authorities who are of course only "looking out for your best interests".
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Re: Pigs are Beautiful Creatures
by RedQueen (-)
on Oct 19, 2004 - 09:48 AM
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I have no legal advice to offer, but I know how you feel. The land my grandparents have lived on for years has been sold out from underneath them, and will soon be developed into subdivisions. Their house is a 125 year-old farm house sitting perched on the edge of some of the most beautiful wooded hills I have ever walked in. The woods are home to deer, coyotes, hawks, owls, and other wildlife, not to mention countless Native burial sites and artifacts. There is a Civil War cemetary on that land as well. The site near the cemetary is also a very powerful place spiritually, one my mother struggled to get recognized for the Native Americans before it was too late. Now it is too late.
I am continuously saddened by the careless disregard for nature and the environment here in America, and your story just went right to my heart. You have my best wishes and strongest hope, however much that might mean to you. Good luck, IronBoots. I hope someday you can walk again in the forests that mean so much to you.
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