History

Will Falk / Deep Green Resistance Great Basin Photo by Max Wilbert Public lands ranching is destroying the Western United States. It has pushed native plant species to the brink of extinction. It causes soil to erode so quickly the land cannot keep up. Livestock are poisoning and depleting water supplies, killing perennial stream flows, and making it increasingly difficult for surface water to accumulate. Stockmen and the animals they raise have devastated populations of iconic American animals like bison, elk, pronghorn, and sage-grouse. Ranchers, ever jealous of the trees their stock cannot eat, encourage the clear-cutting of forests. ...

At this point, there should be no doubt in anyone’s mind that civilization, especially industrial civilization, inherently destroys the land. It’s part of the very nature of this culture. If you need any more convincing, research into the history of mining in the Great Basin will provide you evidence aplenty. Today, we bring you an excerpt from a book called “The Piñon Pine: A Natural and Cultural History” by Ronald M. Lanner from the University of Nevada Press, originally published in 1981. This passage discusses the impact of the mining boom in Nevada in the mid- and late-1800s. We invite you to read this passage, and to reflect that modern mining, far from being less destructive, might even be worse, due to the bigger machines, more toxic chemicals, and abundance of fossil fuels (as well as the fact that such mining, once restricted to small areas, has metastasized around the world and destroyed some of the most beautiful and pristine lands on Earth). ...

This article out of Kurdish territory in the northern regions of Iraq struck our interest. We think you’ll enjoy it as well. Feminism is by no means a western creation, or a worldview that is only applicable in certain contexts. This branch is fascinating to us, and is engaging in direct conflicts with some of the most overtly violent patriarchal institutions in the world, such as ISIS. Without further ado, here is the article by Gönül Kaya, a journalist and representative of the Kurdish women’s movement. This article is the transcript of her speech at the Jineology Conference in March 2014 in Cologne, Germany. ...

The Modern COINTELPRO and How To Fight It Despite the seeming popularity of environmental and social justice work in the modern world, we’re not winning. We’re losing. In fact, we’re losing really badly. Why is that? One reason is because few popular strategies pose real threats to power. That’s not an accident: the rules of social change have been clearly defined by those in power. Either you play by the rules — rules which don’t allow you to win — or you break free of the rules, and face the consequences. ...

“Hatcheries not only failed to boost the number of fish but also actually harmed the salmon by mining billions of eggs from wild populations. The fish hatcheries were designed to collect and incubate the maximum number of eggs with the greatest efficiency. In many cases, that meant all the eggs in the entire salmon run into a tributary were collected and brought into the hatchery. A rack or weir placed across a river blocked the migration and concentrated all the salmon trying to reach their spawning grounds. Adult fish held below a rack were easily captured and artificially spawned… ...