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New Perspectives on Politics, Culture, f/ledia and Life

PRTHlilRECKER 2001

Even lower gas mileage.. You can afford it, so who cares?

Steering wheel has a Palm Pilot with a wireless Internet connection. Who says you can't eat , cirink, talk on the phone, surf the Internet, and drive at the same time?

'Gritted teeth grill' makes you the alpha dog on the road.

Powerful headlights can be positioned to shine directly in rearview mirror of anyone who gets in your way.

Intimidate other SUV's with inflatable side panels. After all, the biggest vehicle gets right of way!

Make your mark on the nation . tear up national parkland with spiked tires.

Padded undercarriage reduces injuries to pesky pedestrians - that means lower liability for you!

Extra thick rubber bumpers to ram losers who observe speed limits.

.PATHWRECK^^

THE NEUI ECONOmV* SUU

'ou rule the etock merket uhy not rule the roed?

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V\/e finalize this issue scarcely two weeks after the events of September 11, 2001. These events and their implications are so overwhelming that we have decided to allow only minimal coverage this issue. We understand that the impact of these events is so far- reaching and as yet to be discovered. The January/February 2002 issue of CLAMOR, in addition to focusing on consumerism and consumption, will feature stories and analysis of how this has affected our lives.

The Environment.

A clear cut is an area of forest where a logging company has gone In and cut down all of the trees. Trees, which took hundreds of years to grow, are gone, along with the wildlife and undergrowth that they protected. All in the name of progress and the bottom line.

The idea of a clear cut, simply put, is horrifying. A big gaping area of land where life once was. The fact that sustainable harvesting is possible but not used, well, that's enough to turn one into an activist.

We have chosen to put Ecology and the Environment on the cover because this is an issue, long belabored, that is still worth talking about. The fact that at this moment our forests are being cut down and our water and land is being poluted is reason enough. We have highlighted here many people who we believe are noticing how environmental issues affect each and every one of us and are doing something about it. From local citizens here in Bowling Green who are opposing factory farms or fighting sprawl, to people who are dedicating their lives to saving our magnificent forests like the folks at the Eagle Creek Free State in Oregon or at Sun Peaks in British Columbia. There are many ways to "save the trees," and we want to encourage all of them by advocating a connection with the environment around us and an awareness of the long-term implications of our culture and civilization.

Please visit our website at www.clamormagazine.org for a list of organizations who are a

defending the planet and ways that you can help.

Thank you.

■e^

^ l^f'

ClAMCfi (ISSN 1 S-34 .9489) IS published sn times a yeai Uan/ Feb. Mar/Apr May/lun lul/Aug Sept/Oct. Nov/Decl O200I in the US by Become Ihe Media Incwpofated. PC B« \22i. emiing Green. OH 43402. Telephone 419 3S3 703S

Postmaster Send address changes to Clamor Maganne. PO Ba mi. Bowling Green OH 43402 PetiodKals postage paid at Booting Gnen. OH

[ECONOMICS]

[PEOPLE]

11 The Eagle Creek Free State

An Interview with an Oregon Forest Activist

14 Practical Ecology

The Black Swamp Conservancy Marcus Ricci

15 We Are Agrarian Reform

The Campesmo Movement of the Aguan River Valley, Honduras Jeff Conant 17 Angier Avenue and the New Corporate Enclave Jordan Green

[CULTURE]

22 Derrick Jensen: Fightmg Civilization

Sera Bilezikyan 26 Resisting Colonization

Photos by Chris Boarts Larson 28 Wild Magic: A Defense of Spiritual Ecology

Sunfrog 31 In Search of Jesus

The American Passion Play

Karen Switzer

48 Five Million Ways

A Conversation with Boots Riley of The Coup Not4Prophet

53 Postcards from the Edge

Tales from the Anti-Nuclear Movement in the UK Catriona

54 The Memorization of Clarity Part 2 Fiction by James Marks

56 Hiking the Turkey Mountain Savannah

At Play in the Arena of Evolution

Christopher Tracey 59 Getting involved:

Wood County Citizens Opposed to Factory Farms

Interview with Anesa Miller by Jen Angel

[GENDER &SEXUALITV]

62 No Shirt, No Shoes, No Reproduction

Margaret Sanger and the Fraud of Eugenics Tom Breen 64 Real Feminists Don't Get Raped And Other Fairy Tales T-Bone Kneegrabber

[POLITICS]

[MEDIA]

36 Another Piece In The Puzzle

Pan Puebia Panama: Mexico's Latest Assault on the

Environment and Indigenous Culture

Kari Lyderson 40 Oil and War

Fragments of the Long Line from Combat to Car

Hal Hixson 42 Activism at Sun Peaks

Thatcher Collins

■on the ins:d'; ■ (H" ■

Pathwrecker 2001 parody ad was written by Sheila Walsh and illustrated by Robert

Bevans. Contact them via CLAMOR

68 The Crash of TWA Flight 800

Missle or Mechanical Failure? Gavin Phillips 72 The FCC Crackdown

Oregon's KBOO Fights an Indecency Ruling Catherine Komp

[PREVIEk-]

74 Vanity Kills

Phil LeFebvre

please address any correspondence to letters@clamormagazine.org or via USPS at PO Box 1225 Bowhng Green. OH 43402

Dear Clamor,

Since the April relicllion here in Cincin- nati, there ha.s been much discussion about what took place and how we should move for- ward. Particularly within our white, anti-au- thoritarian activist circles, debate has been heav\ about what our roles were before and dunng the uprising. .Most miportantly, u e ha\ e struggled to understand what we could ha\e been or should ha\c been doing then. Anned with that knowledge we ha\e moved to make educated decisions about what we should be doing now, as well as how to focus our en- ergy. Although there has been considerable dialogue about these issues, these are our per- sonal V iew s and we do not claim to speak for all activ ists in Cincinnati.

J. Uprising's article, subtitled "But where are all the radicals and anarchists?" (July Au- gust 2001), led to a host of concerns and ideas that we believe go beyond this particular set of events and speak to the larger tendencies of the anti-authoritarian mov emcnt in general, in attempt to further a necessary dialogue, we would like to offer the following critical analy- sis of Uprising's piece.

From the outset, reading "But w here are all the radicals and anarchists?" gives the reader a feeling that the rebellion did not reach it's full potential because of the absence of a strong contingent of "radicals and anarchists." We feel "radicals and anarchists" referred ex- clusively to w hite people, and that an "us" and "them" dichotomy resonated throughout the article. This mentality illegitamizcs what was an overwhelmingly black rebellion that U'p- rising seems to suggest would have been some- how validated by white anarchist presence and theory. While this uprising was clearly radi- cal and anarchist by its very nature, there has been a refusal to recogni/e it for what it was. Rather, wc continue to try to fit this set of events into an "ideology box" that mirrors our typically white beliefs and ideas rather than recogni/cs that things will not happen in anv set way at anv set lime. I or example, the fact that corporate banks w ere attacked w as quicklv mentioned while the smashing of local and independent businesses was conveniently left out riie leal strength of this rebellion was in

its spontaneity and in its motivation rooted in desire, not theorv. In this way. the uprising was probably closer to the pure sense of anar- chy than any planned protest held thus far.

It is when we examine our relationship as white activists to a primarily black uprising that we realize our distance from what took place. We do not yet have significant ties within the black community and the implica- tions of this shortcoming are many, if those connections were alreadv established, we would be much closer to a place where we would be a part of the spontaneity and desire rather than a group of people trying to simply ride that energy. Ideallv. there would already be an established, sustained relationship of trust developed between communities of color and w hite activ ists. In this scenario, wc would already be know n as allies to the struggle w hen it takes place. Without the establishment of these relationships, to suggest that Cincinnati's w hite activist population, let alone "anarchists in surrounding areas of Ohio, Michigan, Indi- ana, and Kentucky." should have "run the streets with the urban rebels" is to make some broad assumptions that raise many questions. Mainly, would they have been welcomed as allies?

Obviously, solidarity needs to exist so that these questions are not left unanswered. True solidarity does not begin in the streets, true solidarity begins w hen long-temi relationships are established in vour communitv. Through these relationships, a comfortable and mutual exchange of ideas that would allow for the in- troduction of anarchism to take place. Instead, wecoiisistcntlv allow ourselves to go into com- munities where we have no ties or sustained relationships and push our ideas. The mental- itv that we are white v essels of knowledge that hold the key to anarchist Utopia needs to be seriously confronted and challenged early and often if wc really want to work towards a so- ciety that is free of hierarchy and autht>ritarianism. While this is an ol^ repeated iilea. actions speak louder than wurds, and we need to realize that we are not immune lo dog- matism ourselves.

Clearly, committed and coiiMstenl com- munity organizing and outreach needs to be at

the center of our work if we hope to establish sustainable long-term relationships with com- munities of color. Furthermore, this topic needs to be discussed both in white activ ist circles, and more importantly with communi- ties of color which we seek to establish rela- tionships with and learn from. Keeping this discussion exclusivel) w ithin our own white circles not only limits our exchange of ideas and our ability to learn from people of color, but it perpetuates the problem of white people deciding for themselv es how they fit into com- munities of color without input from those communities. We are open to and encourage anv and all responses and look forward to con- tinuing dialogue in the future.

Cincinnati activists

fiveoncthrce'V/ hotniail.com.

Dear Clamor.

This article written by Pavlito Geshos ("The Siege of Toledo," April May 2001) is the most truthful and comprehensive report- ing I have ever come across on the situation that has been unfolding at Toledo Jeep for many decades.

I w ish to commend and thank Mr. Geshos for the research and honest examination of the facts. I hope you will forward this note to him on my behalf

I worked for Jeep for 14 \ears from IW} to 1997. I worked in ever> pha.se of produc- tion and inspection during mv v ears there, and even did a stint in management for awhile.

I was often vocal about my thoughts on ditTercnt happenings ov er the years. I was al- wa\ s disregarded by mv co-vv orkers. It seemed to me that as long as they had a pa\ check, they were willing to be blind to what was happen- ing, for the most part.

I was injured while working on a certain job, and sulTered w ith chronic neck strain for many years, compounded with fibromyalgia which I feel resulted from all the stress and physical strain of assemblv work and bad en- gineering of job setup. I finallv decided that my life and health was not worth the pav check, and I nev er went back to w ork after the Julv shutdown (vacation) in 1997. I didn't quit. I just went AWOL. and never contacted Jeep

again. I ha\ e since left the Toledo area, the home town I grew up in. I have family still working there now.

I am a "real union worker" from Jeep. I have many memories of many instances of man- agement abuse, health and safety issues, illegal union and labor activities. I was a witness to the media spin and local community misperception.

The article is truthful. Understandably, it cannot delve into the total and overwhelming expanse of all the issues involved. Even I could not write a full expose on it all, but still I carry years of experiences and memories and impres- sions from that place, that town, and all the in- teractions.

I can aptly add that it seems every Jeep worker has sold a part of their soul, and has be- come a willing victim to the mindset being forced upon them by the corporate machine, just for a paycheck, and the illusion of job security.

I am glad I got out when 1 did.

But I agree with the author, the citizens of the US should converge their focus on Toledo Jeep, making a strong bid against the capitalis- tic machine. 1 would love to sec the Blade and other local media moguls taken down. I would love to see The People bring Chrysler to it's knees, simply as a symbolic act against the money machine. Every corportation that has ever owned the Jeep plant and workforce has raped them for all they could get, and never given a just amount back.

Anyway, I better quit before I go uito a full rant. I just wanted to say thanks for putting the truth into print!

Lauri Benedict

Po) lions of this article arc posted online at w'ww.clamormagazine.or^

cussmiDS

Classifieds are accepted on an ongoing basis^ Ads are $.50 per word, per insertion. Please submit ad witti payment to Become The Media. PO Box 1225. Bowling Green OH 43402.

The Salt Lake City Public Library is one of the up and coming zine collections in the US. If you have zines to donate or you publish azme, please send them! Salt Lake city Public Library. Attention; Zine Collection: 209 East 500 South, Salt Lake City, Utah 84111. Ques- tions can be directed to Julie Bartel, ]thomas@mail.slcpl,lib.ut,us.

Z is an independent political magazine/ web commu- nity of critical thinking on political, cultural, social, and economic life in the United States. It sees the racial, sexual, political, and class dimensions of per- sonal life as fundamental to understanding and im- proving contemporary circumstances and it aims to assist activist efforts to attain a better future. For more information visit Z online at: http://www.zmag.org

On The Cover

In this photo by Greg Fuchs, a demonstrator holds a bouquet of roses during a Save The Gardens Rally in New York City during the Spring of 1999. The community gardens have been an ongoing political and environmental issue in NYC and nationally.

During the last several years Mayor Guiliani has been taking back the leases on community gardens and supposedly selling them to developers to build low income housing. The fact IS the gardens are disappearing and expensive condos are going up. The gardens give NYC fresh air. fresh produce, and a place to gather.

Statistics from the Green Guerillas website (www.greenguerillas.org):

• There are more than 750 community gardens in New York City

• 731 gardens grow something that you can eat

• 64 couples have been married in community gardens since 1975

• If you straightened out all of the roots in community gardens and laid them end to end, they

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would stretch from the Empire State Building to the Taj Mahal and back — at least twice

• The cost to taxpayers for maintaining 750 community gardens in New York City: $0

• Someone touches the soil of a community garden almost once every second of every day

• 500 pounds of fresh honey has been harvested in community gardens since 1973

• 20 murals are painted in community gardens each year

• The air temperature in community gardens is (on average) 11 degrees cooler than on a city street during the summer.

For more information, contact Green Guerillas. 151 West 30th Street. 10th Floor, New York, NY 10001, USA, 212-594-2155, info@greenguerillas.org.

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Photographs and a Reflection of the Crash of the World Trade Center

By Greg Fuchs

I took these photographs the day after two hijacked planes crashed into the World Trade Center (WTC) causing their collapse. I got to Cham- bers Street, which was as far south as the authorities allowed any press, just two blocks from where the WTC stood the day before.

On Tuesday morning, September 11, 2001, 1 watched the WTC col- lapse from my fire escape in Brooklyn and listened to the radio news in disbelief. Immediately I thought of trying to get downtown to document this horrific and historic event. Yet I suspected every journalist in New York City would clamor toward Lower Manhattan to get his or her big story. 1 decided that my time would be better spent analyzing the media cover- age as well as the government's official response to the events, talking to my loved ones on the phone, reassuring them that I was okay, and con- templating what this would mean for the United States and New York City.

After spending an entire day listening to three radio stations and the only non-cable television news whose signal wasn't knocked out, I knew that the next morning I would want to go downtown and witness the aftermath, to gain my own first hand perspective. I was troubled by the media frenzy and wanted to create a response that would be thoughtful and contemplative.

I was shocked by what I witnessed. The city that pulsed with activity day and night, the city in which I could take three subways home or just jump into a taxi, pick up my laundry, and still get dinner when most Ameri- cans are fast asleep, was crippled. It had become a police state over- night. I had to show identification to walk south of Houston Street. U.S. military personnel cordoned off Chambers Street creating a perimeter around what the media had christened "ground zero."

Camouflage humvees carried officers into the perimeter. Thousands of firemen from all over the northeast walked towards the rubble to try to put out fire after fire Bus after bus shuttled steelworkers and other burly working men to cut steel and move concrete hoping to rescue survivors and stop any further destruction. Medical workers set up trauma centers in public schools and underneath the Tribeca bridge. Priests in full cas- socks, obviously ready to say last rights, helped set up I.V. bags. All of Lower Manhattan was covered in dust and important documents were strewn all over the streets. The air smelt like a barbecue pit. It was as close to a war zone as I've ever been

I am outraged by the thousands of deaths. The somber pall darken- ing our neighborhoods devastates me I am shell shocked by recurring images of such a tremendous building crumbling into dust. I am sad- dened by the swift and jingo-istic cries for vengeance. I am scared at the thought of our current and future loss of civil rights. And I wish in our attempt to recover that we'd consider how we really all are culpable.

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It's been 18 days since the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were attacked by hijacked airplanes. And even though you will be reading this almost two months atter the tragedy, it feels hard to imagine a time when we won't be temporally placing ourselves in relation to September 1 1, 2001. "It's been three years and four months since that unforgettable day," we'll be telling each other somewhere down the road. Hopefully September 11 will remain the day that we will remember when thousands of Americans died from the indiscriminate violence turned to in retaliation and frustration by the hijackers. Hopefully September 1 1 won't be replaced by November 10. December 12 or some other potential date when US bombs turn Afghanistan into "a glass factory" as some of our fellow "patriots" have suggested we do. Hopefully we will learn a lesson from what has happened and make sure that the violence wrought on our own land will serve as a reminder when the lives of innocent citizens in other countnes hang in the balance, awaiting the_US Government's decisions as an international "superpower."

n Today, thousands marched on Washington to let outlgofemment know that there is a sizable opposition to the notion that retaliation with extreme prejudice is the only response that the "terrorists" will be able to hear. U Options otherthan violent retribution were ruled out from the moment the attacks happened and the wheels of the war machine began to turn. It is encouraging to hear "patriots" of another bent simultaneously mourning

the loss of thousands of fellow citizens while also vehemently opposing the potential bombing of unknown numbers of innocent victims in our name. One need only go down to Ground Zero where rescue workers have worked tirelessly for weeks to see what sort of response we should be taking. They've seen the violence firsthand and they aren't calling for us to do the same thing to another country. Such retaliation would only legitimate this cycle of violence and ensure that the horror of September 11. 2001 will be played over and over again in various parts of the globe. And we'd be naive to think that it won't happen again in America. Our government has already proven itself unable to defend us from the such attacks, so why shouldn't we consider the current arrogance of our leaders to be not only embarrassing (like a bully trying to save face after being brought down) but also dangerous — putting the lives of its citizens in jeopardy without our consent^

And wliile there was an anti^'fr march in Washington today, there was^^ pro-wiar march this week in'Berkeley. California. Needless to say. it seettfs less possible to predict what will happen in the coming weeks and months. Hopefully our next issue won't be put together m the midst of a world war. Too many people have died already. ^

Jen & Jason 09.29.01

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clambr contributors

Joe Adolphe (p. 22) is currently living and working in Williamsburg, Brooklyn and IS married with two daughters. He is also a tulltime Instructor at St. John's University, Department of Fine Arts Jamaica, NY. Visit his web site: www.jadolphe.com or e-mail: )adolphe@)uno.com

Beth A. Barnett (p. 11) writes for CLAMOR sort of regularly from Corvallis, Oregon, write to her via bethbee@ziplip.com or through CLAMOR.

Sera Bilezikyan (p. 22) divides her time between ancient forests and urban decay. Send recipes to: SeraBZ@hotmail.com

Chns Boarts Larson (p. 26) photographs old abandoned buildings, plants busting out of old houses, and plenty of punk bands. She's been publishing her zine. Slug & Lettuce, for half her life. Every spare moment is spent in the gar- den, or surrounded by books she's reading or selling through her distro. She can be contacted care of CLAMOR.

Tom Breen (p. 62) is a freelance journalist who lives in Southern New En- gland. In addition to journalism, he is also one of the stewards of the Paran- ormal Connecticut web site (www.paranormalct.com). This is his first article for CLAMOR. Sass him direct at: tbreenct@earthlink.net or PO Box 353 Manchester, CT 06040

Catriona (p. 53) is a peace activist in Scotland; who is heading west to Canada at the beginning of November and will be travelling around North America for the next few months. She has a sneaking suspicion that she's a hippie in dis- guise because of her love for trees, nature and the ocean. Reach her at grri love@gurlmail.com and suggest interesting places for her to visit in Canada/ America.

Tliatctier Collins (p. 42) works with the Independent Media Center and is a correspondent for Free Speech Radio News. He has a degree in Mathematics. thatchercollins@yahoo.com

Joshua Krause (p 72) is an artist living in New York, He uses illustration, design. photography and fine art in a variety of approaches. You can view his work at http:// www.KrauseArt.com

Philip Lefebvre (p. 74) lives in Anguish, TX and bears a striking resemblance to the god. Pan. Hise-mailaddressissirphilip@att.net. Philip knows Walter.

Karl Lydersen (p. 36) is DJ Gurgle at Guerrilla Love Radio in Chicago and is trying to overthrow "the boss's sick system" at Streetwise newspaper, where the staff just won a nasty battle to unionize and had fun doing it. She is also an instructor in the Urban Youth International Journalism Program. Karilyde@aol.com

James Marks (p. 54) currently resides in the mythical city of Ypsilanti and lays awake long into the night scheming of ways to incorporate a zip-line into his daily routine. Contact him c/o VG Kids! 117 Pearl Street Ypsilanti, Ml 48197. www.vgkids.com - james@vgkids.com

Not4Prophet{p. 48) currently resides somewhere in the underground El Barrio autono- mous zone, and is the voice of reason for the New York City "Puerto Punx" known as Ricanstruction. His electronic identity can be contacted at Ricanstruction.net

Gavin Phillips (p. 68) traveled extensively in his mid-20's. He has an eclectic, insa- tiable curiosity and constantly questions conventional wisdom and the so-called ex- perts. He has found both to be severely wanting. He adores his two-year-old daughter, loves writing, the movies, reading and laughing. Reach him at twaarticle@yahoo.com

Marcus Ricci (p. 14) is the Executive Director for the Black Swamp Conservancy, a not-for-profit land trust based in Perrysburg. Ohio. A graduate of Bowling Green State University's wonderful Environmental Studies Program, he is putting into practice the theories of conservation biology through wildlife corridors, habitat "de"-fragmenta- tion and environmental restoration. In all his spare time, he works on home restora- tion and dances the salsa with his partner, Jeannie Ludlow, and works on the finer points of science fiction and RPG's with his son. Zac Daniel. Reach him c/o CLAMOR

JeffConant (p. 15) is a writer, editor and activist based in Oakland, CA. He has worked in Honduras, Mexico, Ecuador and other countries researching environ- mental health initiatives for the Hesperian Foundation, a non-profit publisher of books on health and social justice. He can be contacted care of CLAMOR.

Greg Fuchs (cover, pp. 8, 9) is a photographer and writer living in New York City. You can reach him at greg@communiqueny.com.

Jordan Green (p. 17) now makes his home in New York City. He is a member of the editorial collective of La Lutta Dispatch (www.lalutta.org "dispatch").

Hal Hixson (p. 40) is a musician and writer living in Chicago, IL. reached at hixsonlour@yahoo,com

He can be

T-BoneKneegrabber (p. 64) is an anarchist living in Philadelphia, the city that loves you back. She works with a variety of groups including ACTUP Philly, the Wooden Shoe Books, and a wonderful radical feminist group still searching for a catchy name She has been personally involved in a long and intense situation dealing with a repeat sexual assaulter within the activist community and has learned a lot because of her personal experiences. She can be contacted care of CLAMOR

Catherine Komp (p 72, various reviews) lives in Portland. Oregon By day, she wields the powerful airwaves of community radio station KBOO 90.7 FM to battle the 9-headed corporate media behemoth By night, she goes undercover and slings drinks to pay rent and William D. Ford. She can be contacted at |oanoxford@yahoo.com

Ailecia Ruscin (p, 31) is an American Studies grad student at the University of Kan- sas in Lawrence. She is available to do photography work for small zines. She writes a personal political zine called Alabama Grrrlan6 keeps busy doing radical commu- nity organizing. Her zine is $2 from PO Box 297 Lawrence. KS 66044 or ailecia@hotmail.com.

When not getting hate mail from angry Christians. KarenSwitzer (p. 31) is letterpress printing anarchist booklets, trying to sell fancy greeting cards to rich people and learning to speak Korean. You can reach her at PO Box 3525. Oakland, CA 94609

Robert L league (p. 29) has been an artist for most of his life. He is married with one daughter and lives in the Seattle ares. He is also an avid NFL fan.

Christopher Tracey (p. 56) is currently a graduate student at Bowling Green State University studying the conservation of small plant populations. He spends his time learning ecology and dabbling in other things. Reach him at ctracey@enviroweb org or in care of CLAMOR

Andrew Wahl (p. 40) is an award-wmning journalist based in the rural metropolis of Waterville, Washington (population 1,163). During the day he works for the main- stream press as features editor for The Wenatchee World. At night, he's a freelance editorial cartoonist. He can be reached at andrew@offthewahl.com.

JT Yost (p. 31) IS currently starring m the off-off-Broadway production of JT Yost Superstar. He can be reached at www.jtyost.com or via phone at 1.800.745.7013

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an interview with an Oregon forest activist by Beth Barnett

**JI^

When I learned that Alfonso, an old friend, was spending the summer living in the Eagle Creek Free Slate in defense of an area of forest, I thought it would be a good oppor- tunity to learn about it first hand. I'm pretty aware of cn\ ironmental issues and forest ecol- ogy and \ iew our forests as important resources intact. liowe\er. I don't \ igorously keep tabs on forest activism news and ha\en"t been in- \ohed personally. I know there are a lot of people out there like me who want to hear about environmental activism and get more exposed, if not involved.

Forest Activism and Forest issues are a hot topic in the Northwest, and in California particularly, because of the abundance of Na- tional Forests. Many states east of the Rocky Mountains cut their native forests out of exist- ence in the 19"' Century. In Oregon, because of the relatnely small population of 3 million, concentrated primarily m the Willamette Val- ley west of the Cascade Range, there are ac- tually a few remaining old-grov\ th forest frag- ments that ha\ e ne\ er been logged, or at least never logged by non-indigenous groups. Di- versely populated forests and roadless wilder- ness are increasingly rare due to logging. 1 have found such areas that 1 have hiked into to be unique and wonderful places — especially when contrasted with clear-cut areas. Forest activism calls attention to the behavior of log- ging corporations and of our National Forest Service, with a hope of preventing unneces- sary and excessive logging and increasing pub- lic awareness of forest issues.

Clamor: I \e liecinl ahoiii the Eagle Creek sale situation, hut could use a summary - as could a lot ofolher folks. What's the histo/y of the situation und what 's going on right now that people should know about'.'

Alfonso: The Eagle Creek Free State is a mot- ley, yet effective, collection of structures (tree sits and road blockades). indi\ iduals, and base camps in the Mt. Hood National Forest. The Free State is located within the Eagle Creek Timber Sale that is about an hour and half out- side of Portland. Oregon. The Free State is currently stopping the logging of native forest within the Eagle Creek watershed, which pro- \ ides water for o\er 250.000 people.

In 1995, the US Legislature passed this really fucked bill that allowed "salvage log- ging" all over the northwestern part of the United States. This bill allowed the US For- est Service and other go\ ernmental organiza- tions to facilitate their destruction of indig- enous eco-systems. The "salvage logging" bill allows timber harvesting that is not regulated by other environmental laws such as the En- dangered Species .'\ct. This creates a situation in which groups can't really challenge the fucked-up, ecologically unsustainable prac- tices of corporate limber har\ esting such as clear cutting or logging in old growth and na- tive forests. In addition, the "salvage" bill was only passed because it was put in front of the legislature as a rider on to the same bill that authorized relief funds for the victims of the Oklahoma City Bombing. No representative in her right mind would have voted against that.

Anyway, folks have been working to stop the logging of F.agle Creek for 5 or 6 years. There ha\ e been full-time direct actions in the woods for 3 years. These actions ha\ e included lock-downs, tree-sits, suicide platforms block- ing the road, and disruptions of acti\ e logging.

H'hy Eagle Creek and not some other part of the patch-work of clear-cut forest plots in the mountains around Portland, or some other area of old growth ?

Nobody wants this forest to be cut dow n. It is

nati\ e forest. That means that it has nc\ er been logged. It is the home of red tree \oles, spot- ted ow Is, cougars, salamanders, and dirty kids in the trees. The logging company doesn't want to cut it. The locals don't want it cut. The people of Portland don't want it cut. The eco-groups don't want it cut. The only group that wants to cut it is the Forest Service. Well, so far. this logging season as of September 2001 . they have failed. Not one single tree has been cut or taken.

Furthermore it is nght next to the Salmon- Huckleberry wilderness area, a huge un- touched w ildemess area that is only over the ridge. Eagle Creek is an important chunk of roadless area that is integral to the habitat con- tained w ithin the Salmon-Huckleberrv area.

If'hy is the preservation oj remaining old- growth forest so important to you.'

VVc have so little intact wilderness areas left in this part of the world. 1 could give all sons of valid ecological reasons for maintaining wa- tersheds and bio-diversity. But to be com- pletely clear, 1 think that our culture has de- veloped an unhealthy way of viewing our re- lationship with each other and the Eanh. 1 believe in rev olution for social and ecological reasons. .And 1 think that defending the little wilderness we have left is a part of that revo- lution.

Yes. So what type of resistance is actually go- ing on at Eagle Creek? What are the activist

tactics?

The entire campaign is using sev eral different types of strategies. We, as a campaign, en- gage in lobbving the Forest Serv ice. the De- partment of .Agriculture, and the Legislature. We would challenge the sale in the courts, but the "Salvage" bill efTectiv cly limited that op- tion. We build mass support against the sale, and we engage in direct action in the woods.

.•\t this point. 1 am most know ledgcable .ibout the direct action in the v\'oods end of the campaign at Eagle. In the woods, folks are mv olv cd in sitting stmctures. w hich phv sicalK protect a tree and a circle of 250 feet around the structure or last support line. We use tree sits and suspended platfomis at heights of up 10 1 50 feet, but often low er.

We hav e also engaged in lock-downs to gates and vehicles on the road to limit their .iccess to the timber sale. In addition, for the

I could give all sorts of v^ be completely clear, I thi I ship with each other ancM

tCJNJMlCI

two logging seasons before this current one (2001 ). there were suicide pods suspended over the roads. In short, folks couldn't drive down the road or through the gates cuz if they did. activists would fall to their deaths or be hung. We've also played cat and mouse with the Freddies (Forest Service Officers) and the log- gers in active cuts. This is a method of putting our bodies physically in the way of logging on the ground. It is very dangerous, scary and strenuous. This is the tactic that Gypsy was engaged in in Humboldt County, when he was killed by a logger in 1998.

That sounds pretty scary. Are the activists at Eagle Creek pretty flexible about who does that type of high-risk stuff? I know there are usu- ally a few activists who are real risk takers and others who choose not to do everything that is thought up...

Of course. Folks decide for themselves what types of activities in which they want to be involved. And people have different levels of comfort, skills, and sheer dedication. In gen- eral, all the forest campaigns that I've been a part of have had really good operational secu- rity. This means that folks are careful about whom they involve in illegal actions such as building sits, sitting structures, supplying struc- tures, etc. 1 should really point that at Eagle we try hard to root out the stupid macho patri- archal pressure that is often placed upon ac- tivists to be "core." We try and respect folks' comfort le\ els, and uct rid of macho attitudes.

Is forest activism a full-time commitment and if so, how do you guys support yourselves?

It depends on the activists. There are some activists who have a place in town and come out every once in a while. And there are some activ ists who work in town with getting sup- plies, making phone calls, etc. .'Xnd there are some activists who pretty much live in the woods full time. People support themselves in different ways. In general, we are a com- munity and we take care of each other We salvage most of our supplies/building materi- als. Local stores kick down an amazing amount of goods and supplies. And Eagle is lucky enough to have a strong donation base.

/ know there .'v constant conflict with the For- est Service in actions like the one at Eagle Creek, how much trouble is there with the

forest serx'ice police? What kind of interac- tion have you seen or experienced up there'.^

The forest service's job is to harass us and stop us from interfering in the logging operations. They constantly spy on us, file made-up charges, and generally act like assholes. For example, just a few months ago, there was this one Freddy who would dress in camo. night- vision, and face make-up. He'd be out spying and surveilling us all night. It turns out that his co-workers are even scared of him cuz he is a real fucking psycho.

I've seen Freddies try and get [our] dogs to come close to them so that they can mace them or hit them with tactical batons. I saw a Freddy and four paramedics tackle and hit a wounded activist. I saw one Freddy almost cut a support line that was holding an activist up in a blockade. That acti\ ist was 70-80 feet up in a collapsible suicide platform that was blocking the road. Right after that, the Freddy cut an activist's hand with his knife. 1 have to admit that we kinda hate the Freddies. It is hard v\alching them consistcntK torture and threaten your friends lives.

IVhat's the legal authority of Forest Senice officers? How are they different from cops encountered in urban activism?

The Freddies are detlnitely cops. They carry weapons. They ha\e police powers. They have investigative authority. In fact, they are Fed- eral officers. They can carry weapons over state lines. They file federal charges. They are frequently transferred from one National Forest to another

/ debate "activism " and direct action within myself a lot. often because I tend to be cau- tious and avoid situations where there is a pos- sibility of arrest, getting sucked into the "Jus- tice system. " or Just getting hurt. What is it that empowers you to be an activist and put yourself at risk? Do you feel like this issue strikes something deeply personal, or it ,'v some- thing about your personality makes you in- clined to act?

1 hate being arrested. 1 hate losing my free- dom. 1 hate being vulnerable to the police and those with police powers. So. I don't put my- self in positions where I'm definitely going to be aiTcsted. In the woods, it is totally differ- ent than in the city. If a Freddy is trying to arrest a person, they ha\ c to catch that person

first. And most Freddies are fat assholes who can't walk through the forest without falling on their ass. Of course, there are exceptions (i.e. Super-Freddies, poaching enforcement agents, etc.). Or you are 1 50 feet in the canopy and they can't get you.

Activism is empowering. It makes me feel like 1 have some control in my life. It allows me to look myself in the mirror in the morning without being disgusted. Further- more, w ith forest defense, you can see the re- sults. They are right in front of you. There are parts of Eagle Creek that would be totally destroyed if it weren't for our silly little tac- tics. But, nope, the forests are still forests. The forests keep you going.

And of course, I have to admit my class privilege that allows me to be an "activist," whatever that is. I'm definitely a privileged member of society. Hell, I'm on vacation from the woods typing this interview on my mamma's computer, in her middle class bour- geois paradise.

Have there been any victories for the activists ' nu)vemcnt that give you and your colleagues momoitum to continue in Forest .Activism?

Well, I'm pretty new to backw oods direct ac- tion, but there are definitely some victories. For example, Warner Creek is a notable vic- tory. Warner Creek was a salvage sale in the mid-late ■90s. There was a Free State block- ade. It was totally empowering and success- ful. There is a documentary on it called FIcka.xe. Another inspiring campaign is the Watch mountain campaign. Watch mountain is a great example of direct action and local support coming together to stop Capital and State from destroying wilderness,

li'hen f spend time in the national forests hik- ing and camping. I always laugh at the irony that literature for hikers and backpackers stresses the "Leave No Trace " ethic, encour- aging us not to take shortcuts on trails because it causes erosion. But then in the same forest we pass steep, chewed-up hillsides where ev- ery tree has been cut and erosion is destined to occur Do you encounter this conflict in encounters with forest service employees? Do you sense the competing interests within the "opposition " which tries to silence and eradi- cate activists in the forest?

Definitely. The Forest service likes to green wash itself as protecting the environment.

Ideological reasons for maintaining watersheds and bio-diversity. But to liat our culture has developed an unhealthy way of viewing our relation- € Earth. I believe in revolution for social and ecological reasons.

f

ECONOMICS

However, they are really there to promote tim- ber agriculture. Hell, the USPS is part of the US Dept. of Agriculture.

The Forest Ser\ice constantly sends out these press releases that say that activists are destroying "Resources." For example, they will tell the press that we arc shitting in the watershed. Well, 1 have to admit that it is true. We are shitting in the watershed. But, every- one shits in a watershed. Everything is a wa- tershed. The entire planet is comprised of dif- ferent watersheds. Or. the Forest Scr\ ice will say that vve are trampinig under-growth under the tree-sits. This is also true - people have to make paths to walk around under the trees. But if there weren't tree-sits, then the whole stand WDuld be a big clear-cut. It is totallv ridicu- lous.

/ hi'lievc that forests hciw value as natural sys- tems, and appreciate old growth ami naturally diverse tree populations. But. I also know there is a huge demand for wood products. What would you envision as the ideal policy for the forest service and the countiy toward our for- ests that would provide a healthy ecosystem and limber for the wood product demand?

First ol'all. I personalis am not against all log- ging. I think that humans can log sustainably. At this late point in the game, 1 am against all logging on lands that are old-growth or native forest.

As a society we can do much to limit our consumption of wood products. A few ex- amples: stop using stud framing and return to timber frame construction, use more natural alternative construction materials such as straw bales, or cob. We could use far less paper

As for supply, i think that it is possible to log selectively and sustainably (although, many places use those terms to green-wash their clear cutting practices). In British Co- lumbia, a First Nation has created a timber company \\ ith Wcyerhauser (a pretty horrible company). But the First Nation has retained a permanent majority in stock. I haven't seen it, but supposedly on Cat Mountain, they are doing really revolutionary and sustainable se- lective logging.

At the very least. 1 would hope that multina- tional corporations would be broken up, and the local logging companies w ould be relumed to local hands. Many of the huge tmiber com- panies became really horrible after being pur- chased by these huge multinationals that have no ties to the local communities.

.Anything else I should have asked you or that you really want to tell me about?

It is amazing traversing from one huge old Doug Fir tree to another, 150 feet from the ground with snow falling around you. It is amazing running through the forest with the pigs chasing you only to get aw ay, cuz you arc

a part of the forest and they are just in it to destroy it. It is amazing stumbling back into camp after a 1 5 mile hike up and down ridges with a heavy pack. The circle of firelight is filled with your friends, lovers, and annoy- ances. Smoke is the smell of home. Soup is dinner The forest is alive.

Are there any good resources on Eagle Creek, forests, or environment in general that inter- ested people should be looking up - that you recommend?

Folks should come out and visit us if they are in Portland, Oregon. We have an office at 1540 SE Clinton, Portland OR, 97208. Our phone number is 503.241 .4879. And our web site is at wvvw.caseadiaforestalliance.com.

As well, folks should check out the Picka.\e v ideo on Warner Creek. .•Xnd v isit sup- port vour local Forest Defense Campaign, ir

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Practical Ecology: The Black Swamp Conservancy

In the past 16 years there has been a staggering loss of farmland and natural areas as a result of unmanaged growth into the suburban, rural and wild areas of our nation. A U.S. Department of Agriculture report shows that nearly 16 million acres of land were converted to development from 1992 to 1997 - a rate of 3.2 million acres a year, Ohio ranked sixth in the nation in the percentage of prime or unique farm- land that was developed: 54 percent of the 521.000 acres of cropland, forests, and other open spaces converted (281,000 acres) was prime or unique farmland.

Concerned by the rapidly accelerating rate of de- velopment, the Black Swamp Conservancy, a not-for- profit regional land trust, was formed by a group of local citizens in 1993 to encourage the conservation and preservation of agricultural and natural areas in Northwest Ohio for the benefit of future generations. Its primary area of action includes those counties com- prising and bordering the historic Great Black Swamp region: Defiance. Fulton, Henry, Lucas, Ottawa, Sandusky, Seneca, Williams and Wood The Conservancy's success will result in both an increased

quality of life for humans by promot- ing Increased recreation and tour- ism opportunities as well asagricultural sustainability. It will also result in the protection of natural and biological functions by improving wildlife and plant diversity, air and wa- ter quality, and floodwater and toxin man- agement.

To meet its goal of protecting farmlands, wetlands, and wildlife areas in northwest Ohio, the Conservancy developed a two-pronged ap- proach:

1 ) promote educational and research activities in- tended to bring about the wise use and conservation of local land and water resources and

2) provide local property owners with a vehicle through which land preservation can be realized.

The Conservancy educates people on the impor- tance of conserving our natural resources through in- dividual and group presentations to landowners, real estate, legal and tax professionals, elected officials, and agencies. In 2000, the Conservancy gave presen- tations and provided educational tables to 15 com-

munity organizations reaching over 450 people.

The Conservancy also promotes land conserva- tion by working with public and private landowners through the transfer of a conservation easement on their property. Conservation easements are voluntary agreements that allow property owners to limit the type of development on all or part of their property, while retaining ownership of the land. This land restriction may also give landowner certain tax benefits. In 2000. the Black Swamp Conservancy tripled its easement holdings to 725 acres in eight easements in Wood. Sandusky and Ottawa Counties.

It has become exceedingly apparent from our ac- tivities over the past five years that there continues to be a need to educate the public about land use plan- ning and the preservation of natural areas and farm- lands to maintain a balance with developed land. Also, people on the whole are still unaware of how they can participate in preserving their property Thus, the Black Swamp Consen/ancy still has a significant role to play to conserve and protect our lands in Northwest Ohio and the Great Black Swamp.

For more information, contact the Black Swamp Conservancy at 115 W. Front St.. PO Box 332. Perrysburg. OH 43552.

-Marcus Ricci

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We Are Agrarian Reform

The Campesino Movement of the Aguan River Valley, Honduras

byJeff Conant

As our landcruiser speeds inland across the low Caribbean coastal plain, a caravan of trailer trucks with the Dole fruit sunburst logo and the slogan "naturally good" (in English) blasts by us in the other direction, hauling their precious cargo to the packing plants at Puerto Castillo.

"Each one of those trucks is carrying tens of thousands of dollars worth of bananas." Fa- ther Pedro Marchetti points out. Father Marchetti is a gray-bearded Jesuit with years of work in the killing fields of Central America behind him. "So when the peasants come out and block the highway, and the fruit begins to rot in the trucks, there's a certain amount of political pressure there."

He gives me a lesson in local history as we dri» e up the Aguan River Valley to visit a community of his parishioners - I ()()() peasant families who've occupied some valuable ranchland formerly owned by a handful of Honduras's most powerful men. "This high- way was built two years after Hurricane Mitch washed out the old road." he tells me. "If it wasn't for the fruit, they would've taken five years to build it. or ten. Never mind the needs of the local people. The fniit has to keep mov- ing."

Along this same highway. Father Marchetti tells me, between the plantations of bananas and African palm, are the homes of Honduras' most feared drug lords. "They claim to be cattle ranchers and the State sells them the land as part of the agrarian reform. In fact, they are cattle ranchers, but their ranches also serve as the enti7 point for Colombian cocaine on its way north. La droga. This is what the peasants are up against."

Puerto Castillo, the destination of the fruit trucks blasting by us, is a large industrial port on the spit of land that separates the Bay of Trujillo from the sea. This place has a long history of plunder: Christopher Columbus landed here on his final voyage; Captain Henry

Morgan conscripted sailors from among the Miskito Indiansjust south of here, and buried his treasure on the nearby Bay Islands. And William Walker, the American adv enturer who tried to conquer these humid latitudes for the United States in the mid-nineteenth century, was executed in the city of Trujillo. the old colonial capital of Honduras. Now, Standard Fruit operates one of the world's largest fruit- packing operations from Puerto Castillo. Sit- ting among the old cannons that point out into the Bay from the decayed fortress in Trujillo, you can see the lights on the loading docks out on the point. They are mo\ ing fruit twenty- four hours a day.

Given its violent history, it is not surprising that this area was once home to one of the United States military's chief training centers for the wars in Central America in the 1980s. Here the U.S. trained Salvadorans. Nicaraguans, and I londurans m the art of dirty war. and sent them to oveilhrow the Sandinista rebels of Nicaragua, who, according to President Reagan, were only a day's march from the Texas border. What used to be the Regional Military Training Center, however, has changed hands se\cral times since then. After a period when its airstrip was used by drug lords and its vast acreage was used to graze cattle, this 5000 hectare piece of real estate is now in the hands of the peasants. On May 14, 2000. under cover of darkness, nearly 1000 families who had lost everything to Hurricane Mitch hopped the fence and squatted these lands.

Nearly a year later, the site is home to a bustling village of thatch huts and families struggling to get through another hungry sea- son. The Movimiento Campesino del Aguan (MCA), was formedjust afier Mitch in a des- perate attempt to force the state to honor its word and give aid to the displaced in the fomi of long-term land refonn rather than short-term emergency handouts. These villagers - still

more like refugees than villagers - are work- ing hard to plant the seeds of a secure future not only for themselves, but for all the rural poor of Honduras.

Their land takeover has not been well re- cei\ ed. Police and military tried to prevent their entrance, and on se\ eral occasions, the ranch- ers have tried to chase them off There have been exchanges of gunfire and a few deaths. Sev eral of the mov ement's organizers have re- ceived death threats. But on October 1 2. 2000, the President of Honduras gave them title to nearly 1000 of the 5000 hectares of land they hope to own and protect, as part of the Na- tional Agrarian Reform program.

"It is only just," says Donaldo Aguilar Valle. one of the organizers of the MCA. "As campesinos. we ARE agrarian reform."

The MCA named their village Comunidad Uuadelupe Carney, after an Ameri- can Jesuit priest who was assassinated here in the 1 980s for working with campesinos who'd taken up amis. .-Xccording to the word on the street, Jim "Guadelupe" Carney was drugged, tied up and thrown from a helicopter into the Bay of Trujillo. halfway between William Walker's grave and the Standard Fruit ship- ping plants. But his spirit, and the spirit of this whole haunted and embattled region, lives on in the village that bears his name.

The MCA is dug in for the long haul, and they hope to be a model for the rest of Hondu- ras. They lost their harvest to torrential rains the first summer and live in a constant state of emergency, but they are still out in the fields planting more crops: beans, yucca, banana, watermelon and whatever else they can get their hands on. And they are doing it organi- cally. Also in the works is a massive reforesta- tion project to restore their watershed and pro- tect the mangrove swamp and open lagoon that abut their fields. With the help of the local dio- cese, they are also hoping to establish a train- ing center for health, ecology and organizing.

ECONOMICS

"If the ranchers and the government leave us alone, and with a httle help from the inter- national community, there is no reason why we cannot make this work," says Ruben Valazquez, a veteran of the struggles in both El Salvador and Nicaragua.

"Ten years ago we could never have done this," says Ruben. "There is a new respect for human rights now. Ten years ago we would ha\e been massacred like in El Salvador, Nica- ragua, Guatemala. But this doesn't mean we ha\ e it easy. W'c ha\ e a long way to go."

The land they've occupied is a long val- ley ending in an enclosed lagoon, the Laguna Guaymoreto. According to the guidebooks, this is an eco-tourist destination. But there are no tourists here. 1 went for a paddle out on the lagoon with Guillermo, one of the coordina- tors of the environmental protection team of the MCA, and he told me the story:

"The lagoon is sup- posed to be protected by a local NGO that gets money from the U.S. Aid for In- ternational Development Program. But the cattle ranchers came in and cut down all the trees, leaving the lagoon totally unpro- tected. Now that we're here we want to reforest. and we arc making the cattle ranchers leave. They have guns, but we're a lot of people. The environ- mentalists say they are pro- tecting this place, but they can't do anything against amied ranchers. But us, we live here. Just by being here we can protect the lagoon better than anyone."

Guillermo fails to mention what lather Marchetti hinted to me in the truck as u e dro\ e in: these cattle ranchers are some of the most dangerous and well-connected men in the country.Since Colonial times, Honduras has seen its best lands steadily concentrated in the hands of the wealthy elite. It is the archetype of the banana republic, u ilh multinational con- glomerates exploiting the region's rich agri-

nal debt. Consequently, small farmers who had benefited from the years of agrarian reform had to sell their lands to foreign and national in- vestors.

The MCA is trying to reverse all that. Rather than doing it by asking for handouts, they are taking it upon themselves to become a model of the new agrarian refonn. The mo\ e- ment is organized and led by women as well as men, and gender equality - along with

riers and contour ditches that are a fundamen- tal strategy in sustainable tropical agriculture. But the majority of the rural poor, forced onto barren lands and degraded slopes by the large landow ners, were de\ astated by the impact of the hurricane.

It is well know n that agrobusiness is one of the most en\ ironmentally destructi\ e indus- tries in the world, and the sloping, tropical soils of Central America are especially vulnerable

4Bf

cultural potential through the production of comparing the effects of Hurricane Mitch on

various monocrops (sugar, cotton, cofl'ee. and most recently, African Palm.) Between l')62 and 19^)2 - years of revolution throughout C entral America - a national agrarian refonn program attempted to reverse this process. But thel992 Law of Modernization and .Agricul- tural Development part of a World Bank Structural Adjustment Package brought an end to the attempted refomis. Under this new law, rural cooperatives were forced to pay their debts in full to the national government, in order for the government to serv ice the exler-

ECONOMICS

health, environment, economics - is a regular to degradation. The wholesale removal of topic for discussion in the work groups and tropical forests and their replacement with a community meetings. The women have their monoculture of sugar, bananas, and oil palm own cooperative garden plots, and each of the is one of the leading causes of the devastating MCA's twelve work groups must contain at mudslides and flooding brought on by Hurri- least one woman. Both gender equality and cane Mitch.

protection of the env ironment are crucial to The MCA, w ith its hopes of reforesting

their vision of w hat their country needs. An- lands around the Laguna Guaymoreto and es- tablishing ecological sanitation and organic gardens, is just one example of a grow ing env iron- mental consciousness among peasant farmers throughout Central America. But the pres- sure coming down from local and national otTicials puts them at a dangerous juncture where dreams of a sustainable future come into conflict with the short-term economic interests of wealthy elites and interna- tional business.

The Comunidad

Gualdelupe Carney wants to be- come a legal municipality with full representation before the law, but they hav e recently suf- fered a series of dramatic set- backs. On June 26. 2001. in an ctTort to bring attention to their petition for more land, the MCA blocked the highwav. \\ hen police and mili- tar> were sent in to break the blockade, two days of struggle ensued, leav ing several wounded on both sides. Under threats to his life. Father Marchetti, one of their strongest supporters, was forced to tlee the countrv. The struggle to hold onto their land takes valuable time aw av from food culliv ation, and the com- munity still has no sanitation infrastructure or clean drinking water. .And w ith further milita- rization of the region U.S. troops digging in from \ieques to Colombia and establishing new footholds in Guatemala and El Salvador as thev brace for the implementation of the Free Trade .Area of the Americas it looks like the new respect for human rights that has allowed the MCA to be bom is under increasing pres- sure from the forces of globalization. The struggle of the MCA and other groups in the vanguard of the peasant land reform move- ment, w ith its new ecoloiiical consciousness.

The environmentalists say they are protecting this place, but they can't do anything against armed ranchers. But us, we live here. Just by being here we can protect the lagoon better than anyone.

other hope is to establish a free universitv and training center for popular education, with a focus on ecology and land management.

"We ARE the environment," says Donaldo V'alle, putting his fist to his chest. "If w c destrov the env ironment. w c destrov our- sclves."

In the summer of 2000. during the same months that saw the MCA beginning their land occupation, the international development or- ganization World Neighbors conducted a studv

fanns which practiced conventional chemical agriculture to those which practiced sustain- able, organic farnnng. The studv showed con- clusively that those farms which had estab- lished soil conservation strategies such as ter- racing, forest fanning and soil building through composting and other organic methods sufl'cred dramatically fewer landslides and other disas- ters than conventionally fanned lands, Manv sustainable farmers actually benefited from may continue to bear frightening parallels to Mitch, as silt from flooding and soil v\;ished the bknulv struggles that wracked Central down from the uplands came to rest in the bar- .America in the not-so-distant past, if

i\

Angier Avenue and the fjgyy CoFporate Enclave

I

I

Durham's Angier Avenue goes from ghetto fabulous to bairio to hillbilly heaven to gas station strip to farmland to corporate en- clave in roughly the space often miles. This is the litmus strip of North Carolina's high tech corridor.

Angier A\cnuc runs a course from the old Hosiery Mill through the heart of the city's African-American East Side out towards the pinewoods and familands of the county. The varied prospects of its mhabitants retlect the turbulence of 30 years of abrupt economic change, glaring racial segregation and class division.

On one end of the spectrum is the stniggle for economic vitality of an oppressed commu- nity with a long history of economic and cul- tural vibrancy. On the other end is a no man's land of gated communities and corporate of- fice parks springing up ne.xt to the weathered shells of old tobacco bams and the ghost of farm culture.

In the summer of 2000, under the patron- age of the US Census and before the economy soured, I learned Durham's unique spatial ar- rangement of class and race. Floating over the hot asphalt on a second-hand bicycle, I gained a passport into Durham's demographic me- lange, passing discretely across the color line. I was invited into the homes of mildly irritated whites consumed with careers and tight sched- ules. I was welcomed into public housing apartments of blacks, friendly but wary of fur- ther government intervention. I met Latinos who had arrived in Durham to take part in the booming building trade as well as Lumbec and Cherokee Indians.

by Jordan Green photos byAlexManess

Durham's East Side is not the picture of blighted social decay and economic shambles that many like to project on the black inner city. The East Side is a thriving hub of local enterprise. The neighborhood boasts a hand- ful of hair salons and soul food restaurants, some auto detailing shops and muftler joints. Streams of people head down the sidewalk and crowd onto front porches. There seems to be a solid brick church ever\' two blocks promis- ing transcendence from strain and poverty in magnetic block letters.

Durham, like many other mid-sized American cities, has made a concerted push to rc\ italize its downtown. The southern end got the new Durham Bulls minor league baseball park and a high-rise county jail. The northern end got a renovated Carolina Theater and a modem blue glass office tower. The final fron- tier of downtown development is the West Side's renovated tobacco warehouses, con- verted into condos and office space for a hip, young, white generation's reasseilion of urban royalty. According to Barbara Solow. manag- ing editor of Durham's Independent Weekly, there have been several plans to revitalize the East Side which have met with little success. A phalanx of public services, from the Public Library to the Health Department and the Housing Authority, make life bearable but ef- fectively cut the East Side off from the heart of downtow n. Huge vacant lots abandoned by the textile industry and the infamous railroad tracks serve the same purpose. The East Side is literally on the other side of the tracks.

Scattered through the East Side are many new Latino households. In my work collect-

ECONOMICS

ing Census data. 1 interviewed a Honduran family man flush with civie passion, proud to ha\c his family counted. I met single Salva- doran men packed in upstairs apartments by the dozen. These journeyman carpenters gamely humored my awkward Spanish to en- sure that I had accurate infomiation. A house- hold of single Mexican men wanted assurance that I would not share information with la policia.

Past the black-owned businesses and Latino households on Angicr.'\venue. the city gives way to boarded-up industrial buildings and country dry goods stores. The complex- ion lightens, fading into a neighborhood where white folks sit under shade trees fixing motor- cycles and cooking out. Two Confederate flags flap over a modest farmhouse, testifying to that old white quest for independent yeomanry, to be left alone. Then further along is the great American gated community.

The people who live out here, mostly but not exclusively white, are not the type to fear the rage of the underclass or even necessarily want to distance themselves from social clamor and strain. They are not quite upper class them- selves, but they are workers who have given themselves entirely over to the new economy. They need easy access to the corporate campuses where they work, access to Inter- state 40 and to Raleigh-Durham Urban Air- port. Most importantly, they need to be freed from the burden of civic responsibility. With an increasmg share of corporate work being outsourced to temporary staffing services, mobility is at a premium while community in- volvement is at an all-time low.

1 rode out to Pinewoods Apartments with another Census worker named John Brant (the Census ensures confidentiality; no real names are used in this article). Mr. Brant, an impos- ing African-American man who had wrapped up a career as a federal marshal, was now preaching in the Baptist church. Without his combination of cajoling charm and blunt in- sistence, 1 would have left Pinewoods Apart- ments empty-handed. Already four different enumerators had been frustrated. The residents were either never home or too busy to be both- ered.

When we walked into the lobby, the of- fice was undergoing a changing of the guard. The new community manager, Carrie Licsen, had just arrived from Atlanta She was an em- ployee of Ram Corporation, recently awarded the management contract for Pinewoods. The crisis at hand: high rates of vacancy. ^ We took a scat in a lobby that had the

■o look of a dusty Huropean study crossed with a o rustic ski lodge. Hardbound encyclopedias 5 rested on bookshelves and glass coffee tables. ^ A splendid chandelier hung overhead from the " domed ceilinu .At the end ot the room, a wide •- plate glass windosv looked out onto a lake sur-

rounded by stately towering pines. Set into a terrace halfway down was a kidney-shaped pool where two unattended children splashed listlessly.

Liesen walked in, declaring, "Mr. Cen- sus, your people have been here four times al- ready. I've got a million things to do and you're not at the top of my list."

Our request- for "pop counts" for each housing unit was refused first because the in- fomiation was supposedly confidential, then because she didn't have time to pull the files.

"Listen ma'am," pleaded Brant, "we just need some estimates."

Liesen snapped her fingers at a young Af- rican-American assistant. "These guys need some numbers. Make up some numbers!"

"Just make the numbers up?" the assis- tant asked in distress.

"Make 'em up. Sure, why not?" The as- sistant shook her head doubtfully. Since she was unwilling to fabricate data for the Cen- sus, we waited for Sherry Long, another Ram employee who had also just transferred in from Atlanta in the past 24 hours.

"Please help yourself to some cookies," Long offered cheerfully. "They're Otis Spunkmeyer!" Then she gushed. "I think it's just wonderful here. Beautiful."

The conversation inexplicably turned to residential hotels and how hard it could be to count people in them. Brant posited that some- one who wanted to take himself off the grid could pay cash at a residential hotel and com- pletely frustrate any attempt to trace him.

"I swear," Ms. Long exclaimed, "A per- son could just disappear!"

Brant started in on a story about how President Clinton was nailed in the Monica Lewinsky scandal because of credit card point- of-sale records. "After the President got into that trouble with the young lady." he explained, "businessmen and politicians started carrying hundred dollar bills in money belts so they could maintain discretion in their entertaining expenses."

"Those arc the big guys," Long replied. "I'm just one of the little people. We can't get away w ith that."

Pinewoods ,\partments is part of a satel- lite of exclusive communities ringing Research Triangle Park, a high tech free trade zone. One Durham activist I know refers to it as "a cor- porate sweatshop" because the activity there so thoroughly excludes ain thing social or w ith- out a profit motive.

Research Triangle Park, or RTP, is one of manv such capitalist nerve centers around the country, pulling the doors shut in fortrcss-likc seclusion and grcativ fueling the vast boredom and seething rage of the suburbs. The ascen- dancy of the Internet has made it finally pos- sible for ciirporaluMis to coinpletelv abandon the cities with their nagging civic obligations

and set up secure outposts along the conduits of the interstate highway system.

RTP was devised in the late 1950s by Durham's moderate civ ic leadership to replace North Carolina's faltering agricultural economy. Positioned midway between Chapel Hill and Raleigh with easy interstate access, it would benefit from the energy of three grow- ing cities. Harnessing the doctoral scholarship of the area's three largest universities (Duke, North Carolina State and UNC-Chapel Hill) it could rapidly establish itself as a research and development hub.

RTP proper is actually an eight mile long, two mile wide corridor shared by Durham and Wake counties and it has its own zip code. It is administered not by a mayor and city council but by a private nonprofit foundation. It hosts R&D facilities for a vast array of industries: pharmaceuticals, computer software, healthcare and telecommunications. The mul- tinational companies that make use of RTP include IBM, Glaxo-Wellcome, DuPont, Sumitomo. Nov artis, Nortel, Bayer, Cisco Sys- tems and Lockheed Martin.

RTP is the fiagship of North Carolina's participation in the globalization of capitalism. In some ways. RTP could be considered a free trade zone. Its rise mirrors the development of the maquiladoras in Latin America, set up spe- cifically to induce foreign investment with a minimum of interaction or commitment to the local economy — walled compounds which also recruit an alienated, migratory workforce from outside the community.

Many of the people who work in RTP are, of course, researchers. Many others are the blacks who commute in from Durham's East Side to w ork for the food sen ice and cleaning companies that keep business humming. RTP thrives on an amiy of flexible employees who work through temporary statTing agencies. Forklift operators and assembly workers who make computer processors for IBM, once guar- anteed generous wages, health care and job security as IBM employees, now earn S"! an hour through Manpower.

In Durham, the East Side has persisted by the sheer w ill of its entrepreneurs and com- munity organizers. Meanwhile, following a national pattern of investment. North Carolina has aggressively targeted high tech companies w ho take adv antage of generous tax breaks and emplov a transient workforce v\ ithout anv pas- sion or energy to return to the community. North Carolina, as a province in the global economy, has changed in some ways. RTP is emblematic of the governing class' decision to displace local white elites in favor of mi- gratory white elites while maintaining the eco- nomic strangulation of the black majority.

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ECONOMICS

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Derrick Jensen

Fighting Civilization

Derrick Jensen is a writer and an activist on be- half of forests, salmon, and domestic violence survi- vors. He is the author of Listening to the Land and Railroads and Clearcuts, and a regular contributor to The Sun. His most recent book, A Language Older Than Words, has become a common sight in the hands of activists and anarchists everywhere. It is a beauti- ful, cyclical narrative combining memoir, politics, and philosophy concerning the relationship of humans to the land and to other species as well as the dangers of an economic system that dehumanizes everything in its path. Jensen has been an inspiration to radical en- vironmental activists for years, as well as to indig- enous people and survivors of violence. A surv ivor of family violence himself, he has been described as one who has "looked evil in the face yet not lost his capacity to love." I cannot recommend his writings enough, to anyone who cares about what it means to rediscover what it is to be a human inextricably con- nected to the land, in a society w hich has done every- thing to destroy that connection, to make the decima- tion of all communities, ecological and social, all the more possible.

This interview was conducted on the beach near Jensen's home in Crescent City, California, where he is working on a new book, helping to restore the his- toric salmon runs, and teaching writing to inmates at Pelican Bay State Prison. He recently did a benefit in Eugene, Oregon, for imprisoned eco-activists Free and Critter. This is just a small portion of the interview, and Jensen's website, www.derrickjensen.org, can give further background on his work and current projects. Interview by Sera Bilezikyan, Summer 2001.

Clamor: Is writing a personal outlet for interna! ideas and creativities or is it a necessit}: a contribution to the larger struggle?

Jensen: Writing is definitely how 1 contribute and communi- cate. I u rite to bring about social change and if my writing doesn't achie\e it then 1 am going to attempt to achie\c social change through other means. It's all aimed towards bringing down civili- zation.

When did you start writing?

1 dedicated my hfe to writing in about 19S7. By that time 1 knew that everything in the culture was fucked up. but 1 didn't have an outlet for it. Then 1 met John Osborn. the heart and soul of the Spokane. Washington en\ ironmental community. He really helped channel my energy. 1 had this huge amount of pent-up energN. and 1 didn't know where to take it and what to do with it... and 1 will be forever thankful to him for helping me find direction. So. 1 really started writing when 1 was about 26. And r\ e been writing more and more ever since. These days it's pretty much all 1 do.

When I wrote Language, I had this Madison Av enue agent. I sent her the first 70 pages, and she hated it. She told me, "if \ou take out the social criticism and the stuff about your family, 1 think you'll ha\e a book." She told me this on April 22, 1997, the day US-backed troops in Peru slaughtered the Tupacamaristas. 1 e-mailed her. "if they are going to give their lives, the least 1 can do is tell the truth. You're fired." She also said that 1 was a nihilist.

There s nothing wrong with thai.

At the time. 1 didn't even know what it meant. 1 looked it up in the dictionary. The first definition is somebody that hates life, which is obviously not me. The second definition is somebody who thinks society is so rotten that it needs to be taken down to its core, which is definitely me. What all of this means is that I really want to write for the people who have thought about it all for a long time, and I want to push them further. Push them harder, push the analysis harder. For whatever reason, the universe, plus my family, plus e\er\thing else have made it so I ha\e the capacity to look at these things and analyze them; so goddamnit. 1 have to.

JUI

Do you consider yourself an anarchist?

That depends on how \vc dci'me il. I like John Zerzan's definition of anarchist: someone who wants to eradicate all fonns ofoppression. In that detlnilion. ses. But then I saw this article the other day in Green Anarchy saying that the Zapatistas aren't anarchists.

Thai has conic up in every conversation I have had this week.

^ou know what? I don't care v\hether the Zapatistas are anarchists. There is definitely a strain of anarchism that can get kind of convo- luted and silly. But I think that's true of any "ism." Am I an anarchist? Sure. Am I an anarchist? No. It took me years to even call myself a writer. I'm happy to publicly associate myself v\ith anarchists, and speak out in support of the ELF (Earth Liberation Front) and the ALF (Ani- mal Liberation Front).

Speaking of ihe ELF. do you believe in the power of economic sabotage as a tactic to slow down llic machine?

Yes. I tiiink that is a wonderful tactic and should be used far more often. The problem I have with it is that, and I will talk about this in my next book I'm going to write this fall, I think it needs to go to a whole other level. What we do far too often is endpoint sabotage. De- stroying the SL'V or the house at the end. So is tree spiking, which I think IS a realK good idea. We need to take otTensive. We need to begin dismantling the entire economic infrastructure. Which includes chang- ing people's hearts, education — everything. I mean, I'm a writer. Of course, I have no problem with that. There is another level that needs to be happening. We need to recogni/e that ours is a go\emment of occupation. How do you disable the infrastructure of this country? 1 don't know. That's \vhy I ha\e to write the new book. Another way to say this is that 1 percei\e a lot of the activities of the ELF as "propa- ganda by deed." I think that's incredibly important, but 1 would also like to sec us systematically dismantle the economic and physical in- frastructure of this civilization. To tell the truth, I don't think it would take that many people.

.Albert Speer. the amiaments minister for the Nazis, w rote that the American and British carpet bombers were not as etTective as the\ could have been because they would target, for example, a tractor fac- tory which would make it so the Nazis couldn't build engines for their tanks and airplanes. But they didn't hit the ball-bearing factor., w hich would ha\e made it so they couldn't rebuild the tractor factory. If they had gone for the bottlenecks, they would ha\c been more etTecti\e. What 1 want to do in this book is figure out where the bi)ltlenccks arc.

H'hal about on a more local, immediate scale?

If I could do one thing, immediately. I would stop international trade. Most of the countries where people are star\ ing arc food exporters. In India, at least a couple of states that used to be graineries now export dog food and tulips to luirope. So the point is. I would like to see it escalate fast. 1 am saying this in full cognizance of the fact that the repression will be increased exponentially. I wish somebody would ha\ e acted 1 00 years ago.

So tell me about your new book.

o u ■S It's called The Other .Side of Darkness, or maybe The Culture of Make-

o Believe, or maybe The Culture ot Contempt, or maybe Beinsi \ot-llu-

5 man. Bein^ Human. In other words, we don't yet have a title. .\\\ starts

% out as an exploration of hate groups, and then spreads out from there to

" examine how these things arise, and it really goes after the main causes

fNJ of atrocity, w hich are economics and the economic s\ stem. .'\bt>ut half-

way through the book, my publisher said, "Well you've got to talk about the Nazis," and 1 thought, what can I say which hasn't already been said? Then I remembered something a friend said years ago, w hich was that Hitler's big mistake was that he was about 100 years ahead of his time. Assembly-line mass murder is the endpoint of civilization. One of the things I say near the end, is just think about how much Hitler would ha% e accomplished w ith face-recognition softwarc.DNA testing. ..social security numbers. ..what if he had had the capacity to destroy the planet, w hich he did not have, but w hich we do.

The salmon are dying. We're changing the climate. Earthworm populations in the Midwest are disappearing. 1 picture people coming 20. 30 years later, after ci\ ilization collapses, and they'll be reading some old book anywhere in this region, up the coast, and they'll say, "there were so many salmon that people w ere afraid to put their boats in the water for fear they'd capsize.. .and I'm fucking starv ing to death.

We don't have to wait for collapse; we ha\e to actualize it now. That doesn't mean timber sale appeals are worthless. An image 1 use for that a lot is Hammer and .Anvil, a military term describing what Robert E. Lee used at the battle of Chancellorsville, where the anvil is a defensi\ e force, and the hammer is an offensive force. The purpose is to smash the enemy in between. I \ iew timber sale appeals, working at rape crisis centers, and so on as the anvil — the solidity — and attacks on the system through w riting or blow ing up dams or whatever as the hammer.

From working in the forest defense movement, it seems like there is a lot of deceit. There is the Forest Ser\'ice selling off the old-growth for- ests (on public lands) at subsidized prices to the limber corporations. And then this media-sensationalized conflict between environmental- ists and local people. And then the harsh reality ofjust 4 percent of old- growth, ancient farest stands remaining, and an economic .system which victimizes rural, poor, logging and mill towns. What is the solution to this impervious forest dilemma?

I don't think there are solutions. Ci\ ilization creates no-win situations, and the sooner w c realize that, the sooner we can get it out of our minds and hearts and begin the task of dismantling it. It specializes in false promises and destructive bargains. We ha\e been on this continent for less than 500 years, and we ha\e rendered a good portion of the water undrinkable. We are in the process of rendering the air unbreathable for those w ith pollution-induced asthma, cancer, or any other such dis- eases we already ha\c. We sign on the dotted line for aluminum cans and tlnd that salmon are stolen in the bargain. We take jobs in the forest and the forests are destroyed. We turn on the lights and tlnd that we ha\ c been handed poisons that last a thousand human lifetimes. How is it possible to make human and humane choices choices that benefit ourseh es and others as beings when each time we sign a contract we tlnd ourseh es further enshned?

Yes, local people need jobs. But what is physical reality? The old growth is gone. Let's talk about that. Let's at lca.st be honest. 1 don't w ant to hear an\ phon\ jobs-\ ersus-spotted-ow Is arguments... w e ha\ e to talk about automation. ..we ha\e to talk about raw log exports. ..if we're not going to speak honestly about those things. \'\c got nothing to say to you, even if you're some local guy. If you are going to be lK)nest. well, then let's figure out w hat the hell we're going to do about it. 1 totalis support local fanners. 1 support famiK fanners, indepen- dent loggers. ..in their stniggles against the agriculture corporations, but if they are going to abuse the land. I will not support them. All that said. 1 think we need to choose our targets It's clearly a huge waste of time to tight some gu\ who. by hand, clearcuts 200 acres a year.

Do you think it is a viable thing to work with rural people who aiv also being e.xploiled hy corporations - lo.tay, look. Plum Creek Timber Cor- poration is not saving the land, it s not saving ytuir life?

CULIURE

We've got nothing to teach them. They've been put out of business by Plum Creek. They know it already. I am all in favor of local econo- mies, but what local economy ends up meaning in our culture, is cor- porate control. It's all a big excuse. If it's really a local economy, that would be better. But even so we have to remember that our entire eco- nomic system causes people, rewards people, constrains people, and forces people to destroy their own backyards, and then mo\ e on some- where else. 1 w orked with a fanner years ago who said "Cargill gives me two choices, I can cut my own throat or they'll do it for me....'" These people know what's going on. That's why when I talk about violence to family farmers they un- derstand, they've experienced this in their own bodies. They've sat there with a shotgun across their lap and an empty bottle of Jack Daniel's on the floor and thought about whether or not to put the shotgun in their mouth. For many envi- ronmentalists, it's a game.

// s CI luxury loo. A privilege.

We must learn also that resistance is never futile, and that we have no op- tion as human beings but to struggle as though our ives depended upon it

which of course they do

Yes, so many of us talk about how we

feel the death of the salmon in our bones

but 1 don't see me taking out a dam...l

don't see you taking out a dam. 1 have no

patience for mainstream environmentalists who say it's so horrible to

even think about \ iolcnce. 1 mean, what does the mother grizzly do'.'

As you address in Language, do you think society is in a serious state of Post- Traumatic Stress Disorder?

That's the fundamental unstated thesis of Language. We have it. indi- vidually and collectively. In my new book, 1 talk about the rules of a dysfunctional family, which are also the rules of a dysfunctional soci- ety, according to R.D. Laing. Rule A is: Don 't. Rule A 1 is: Rule A does not exist, and Rule A2 is never discuss the existence or nonexistence of Rules A, A I and A2. We can spend all this time talking about every- thing in the world but that which is important, it is simply the case that we aren't seeing the damage.

Or we see it too much; you show someone a forest clear-cut. an animal in a lab, and they get shocked.

That's another level of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

The "the problem is so big. what am I supposed to do? " level.

it is necessary to look at it. and then go through it. The real problem is not so much the sorrow or the pain, it's our avoidance of it.

You talk about civilization a lot and its implications for both society and the environment. What roles do religion and civilization play in the alienation of humans to the land?

ded in the natural world. Let's presume for a second that Christianity or Judeo-Christianity made sense in the Middle East — to move it from there to here, means by definition that it is a religion that is separated from the land. And it is thus not going to articulate and help one to realize a right relationship with the land.

What is the point of civilization? The point of civilization is for the rich to acquire more. ..it is for the comforts and elegancies of the

few. I've been reading some of the main rationales for slavery in pre-Civil War America, and a lot of them were refresh- ingly honest. They say our way of life is based on the comforts and elegancies of the few based on the sweat of those who are less refined than we are. That is the point of civilization. To make it so that the few can stand on the backs of the poor and the non-human, who are also less refined.

It emerges from this damaged mindset we discussed earlier. It is a manifestation of and a reinforcer of the damaged mindset that is not capable of entering fully mutual relationships, and perceives that all relationships are based on power. Civilization is a social orga- nization that is based on the flawed be- lief that all relationships are based on power, and it is a social organization that maximizes the capacity for those on the inside to utilize that pow er for physical comfort. Religion often (although not all religion) is used as a way to get through the misery of this culture. ..because someday you'll be connected. I want to be connected now.

With PTSD. the fundamental fear is relationship. This God is re- ally like an abusive father. 1 love looking at the bible in terms of abu- sive family dynamics; the comparisons are .straight one-to-one. No wonder: they are manifestations on different levels of the same thing. Fear of relationship. Fear of our own feelings. Fear of what it would actually mean if we were to engage another being, human or other. It has been reinforced over time so that we have forgotten that there is e\ en any other way to be.

li'hai do you think is going lo happen in the next 40 or 50 years?

An increase in grinding away at whatever natural and human diversity is left. People will lead increasingly miserable lives, not paying atten- tion as long as they've got a television. I think about all of these people who sit in front of their TVs: they might as well be in SHU (isolation unit at Pelican Bay). Their world consists of the space between the couch and the TV. I do not see us having a transformation to a sustain- able way of living that is either voluntary or that maintains capitalism or industrialism. 1 see the next 100 years being pretty nasty, no matter how you look at it.

IVhat hope do you have for the future? That's kind of a bleak way to look at it.

It seems pretty clear to me that evcr> thing comes from the land. You've heard the argument that since humans are natural, and humans invented chainsaws, then chainsaws are natural'^ I thought about that for years. Because we are imbedded in and part «/ the natural world, anything that helps to understand and reinforce our understanding of our imbeddedness is natural — any institution, any artifact, any religion. And if it doesn't do that, it is unnatural to the degree that it doesn't. A chainsaw is unnatural because it helps us to forget that we are imbed-

I don't think it's my perspective that is bleak. I think that the reality is bleak and it remains bleak whether or not we choose to look at it. I don't take it personally. This is what doesn't paralyze me. My hope is that salmon survive. My hope is that salmon forgive us. My hope is that [gesturing to the sky] this family of brown pelicans survives. ..and I have hope for that. I hope that people survive and that people remem- ber, releam what it means to live on the land. So, my hope is that I have hope in the particular, -ff

en

CULTURE

cuLiuiit:

RESISTING COLONIZATION

photos by Chris Boarts Larson words by Jason Kucsma

This collection of photographs represents the ability of nature to resist the imposition of human "progress." Buildings are overtaken by weeds. Sidewalks erupt from the force of elaborate root systems. Homes become property of the land on which they were developed. In her 1996 book The Culture of Wilderness. Frieda Knobloch reminded us, "What is remarkable about all weeds, human and plant alike, is their persistance in the face of colonization, mechanical and chemical wars, systematic exclusion and policies of eradication." Indeed, we have much in common with our botanical counterparts.

CULIURE

Wild Magic:

a defense of spiritual ecology

by sunfrog

\N hat is spiritual ecology?

We gather in the wild. We invoke energies and invite ancestors to join us. We lionor the forces of nature. We discard clothing and shame. We bum incense and sage. We dance until dawn, touching the flesh of our sisters and brothers and the weedy, fragrant flesh of our earth mother. We are neopagans and naughty C'hris- tians, anarchists and mystics. We are spiritual ecologists.

In her brilliant sur\ey, Rculical Ecolof^y. Carolyn Merchant explains: "The main project of spiritual ecology is to etTect a transforma- tion of values that in turn leads to action to heal the planet." Spiritual ecologists draw in- spiration from Native American conceptions of a sacred, liv ing, maternal planet, the rever- ence of some Christians for "God's creation," and neopagan invocations of archaic nature gods and goddesses. Spiritual ecology privi- leges changes in inner consciousness and be- lieves in the consciousness of plants, animals, and the earth itself. Starhawk is probably the best known proponent of this perspecliv e. put- tnig these ideas into practice in writing, ritual. and direct action. Her book. Fifth Sacred Thing, is a major work of fiction exploring social manifestations of neopagan ecofeminist spiritual ecology, bringing with it significant promises and problems. Due to her outspoken involvement in the antiglobalization move- ment, nonspiritual radicals cannot ignore the presence of anarchist pagans in our midst.

\\ h> docs it need defendiiifi?

Any metaphysical philosophy that ignores ma- terial reality or any spiritual approach to life that refuses plurality and I'ails to address po- litical inequality can quickly give way to au- thoritarian structures and a cullish mentality. From Catholic Workers to African- American Haptists to the American Indian Movement lo the Nation of Islam to contem- porary neopagans. there's always been a spiri- tual and religious presence on the left in America. Non-religious radicals have greeted these groups with a mixture of tactics: they might tolerate them, ignore them, or openly challenge and critique them. Spiritual activ- ists are commonlv callcti simplistic iiiealists

and nai'v c escapists, unwilling to accept the ra- tional, material, economic basis of all social relationships as promoted by anarcho-marxists. However, today, unlike in the civil rights and peace movements of the past where religious people were present in large numbers as key leaders and organizers, spiritual ecologists par- ticipating in groups like Earth First! and the new broad-based anti-capitalist movement must work with some of the fiercest rational- ist and atheist critiques of spirituality around. Fact is. many radicals feel hostile to anything that smells of authoritarian theology — and for good reason.

In light of this tension. I have a few sugges- tions for my fellow spiritual ecologists and those who work with us to consider:

1. We should commit ourselves to anti-au- thoritarian, non-hierarchical decision-making in our collectives; this goes for covens as well as direct action affinity groups.

2. Our practice of spiritual ecology should always be paired with habits of sustainable liv- ing and gestures for social and economic rev o- lution.

3. We should resist the arbitrary and destruc- tive institutionalization of our spirituality and our politics. Both the mystic and the atheist can be guilty of embracing a constricting ide- ology and its tendency to police the beliefs and practices of others.

Going tribal

Manv spiritual ecologists pay respect lo the influences of primitive societies throughout history, most notably those "tribal" teachings found in Native .American cultures and liuro- pean pre-Christian paganism. When these iribal gestures merely recuperate the simplis- tic imagery and iconographv of the "noble sav- age," they arc deeply problematic. .Xt worst, this pseudo-spirilual appropriation beciimes the kind of hippie fakelorc discussed by Michael Niman in People of the Rainbow and exposed as a hodge-podge imitation of authen- tic vision peddled bv new age charlatans and wannabe shamans. Beyond triv lal romanticiz- ing, the notion of the earth as a living being thai pervades nibal societies transhistoricallv

and cross-culturally inspires an ecological sen- sibility that desenes recognition, discussion, and support. Any sensitive and politicized dis- cussion of the effect of Native American ideas on the contemporary counterculture should include an understanding of the historical legacy of colonialism and genocide against Na- tive Americans along with the conlemporarv challenges facing existing indigenous commu- nities. While some hippies and "nevv-agers" approach "tribalism" as a trendy fashion state- ment in thinly veiled cultural thievery, manv others leam from the American Indian example with a sense of reverence and distance. While the distinction between respectful learning and cultural theft tends to be fuzzy and depends on who's speaking, we can be ethically tribal if we understand our own project as a fonn of modem tribalism with all the shortcomings and mixed influences that this implies vv ithout pre- tending to be direct descendents of or spiritual heirs to the Native American tradition.

Clearly aware of the inherent dangers in a glib romanticization of the pristine pa.st or "a pa- tronizing atiempi to appear multicultural," Glenn Morris researches some specific com- munal models ofTered by the over 600 indig- enous nations that existed in 1492 in what is now know n as the United States. Not only does Moms contend that an ecological communal- ism was the pervasive social model for Nativ e Americans, he fimilv asserts that contempo- rarv communities should understand the ex- ample of indigenous historv as a v iable alter- native "to env ironmental destruction, to the in- equality created by capitalist competition, and to the continuing fragmentation of human be- ings in an expanding industrial milieu." Fur- themiore. the popularity of books like Black Elk Speaks and Lame Deer: Seeker of I Isions among hippies and the rise of radical anthro- pologv that highlights the cooperative nature o( many primitive societies extends the dis- course on primitivism and tribalism beyond trite apologies fueled by an "imperialist nos- talgia" for the past our Western Luropean an- cestors helped erase.

Spiritual activism

Grounded in a vision that embraces the

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mterconnectedness of all things, neopaganism should not be separated from activism. Accord- ing to Margot Adler. the "Neo-Pagan mo\ e- ment" is based on "the values of spontaneity, nonauthoritarianism. anarchism, pluralism, polytheism, animism, sensuality, passion, a belief in the goodness of pleasure, in religious ecstasy, and in the goodness of this world."

NILD MAGIC:

The manner in which my eco- logical values are bolstered by an evolving mystical phi- losophy and ac- tive participa- tion in spiritual practices has not blinded me to the political and economic fac- tors that deter- mine whether the world we create in this new century will be able to sustain a healthy life for all the earth's crea- tures. The po- tentially debilitating dichotomy between spiri- tual and social ecology is most problematic when either perspective exists in a vacuum. For me, the potential realization of social and economic transformation is supported by ev- eryday ntuals that honor my place as a human in the web of all life. Some of the most power- ful collective actions for defending the planet and preserving community that I have partici- pated in possess a distinctly spiritual compo- nent.

Although difficult to prove, I firmly contend that the use of spiritual techniquesseincluding song, dance, art, poetry, sexuality, prayer, and ritualeein social movements produces a level of solidarity among the participants that can- not be achieved through the mere articulation of a rationalist economic agenda or social analysis. Furthermore, the kind of "deep" thinking and feeling of communion with the natural world that spiritual ecology encourages can effectively dissolve the crippling philo- sophical dualities between mind and body or humanity and nature that feed and provide jus- tification for the political and economic domi- nation of the natural world perpetuated by in- dustrial capitalism. Because social ecology. like the Western intellectual tradition that spawned it. tends to privilege analysis over experience and thought over feeling, it can

learn from a spiritual ecologv' that honors our perceptual awe at the mysteries of the infinite univ erse. For spiritual ecology to work within a larger movement that includes the goals of political transformation promoted by social ecologists. it must be by principle inclusive, non-dogmatic, and anti-authoritarian. It can be argued that people who hav e been swayed by ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ the transfor-

mative power

of a spiritual ex- perience are particularly sus- ceptible to un- ethical adher- ence to the ma- nipulative tac- tics of a leader or guru. Thus. spiritual ecol- ogy without a critique of povv er and au- thority is poten- tially danger- ous.

Going wild

Radical spiri- tual ecology is the opposite of domestication. The conver- gence of internal wildness and expansive wil- derness begins with the recognition of how all life fonns hav e been domesticated by the logic of repression inherent in the production-con- sumption grid of contemporary capitalism: resistance to this domestication can be a form of "going wild. ".Additionally, the small slices of land that remain relatively wildaeremote for- ests, streams, mountains, and meadowsaeoffer a tentative glimpse of what the entire world once looked like and constitute a hopeful re- minder that industrialism has not yet succeeded in destroying everything beautiful and green. Furthermore, human "wildness" emerges within artistic endeavors, erotic relationships, and the gathering of wild plants along with cel- ebrations and rituals that honor seasonal cycles, plantings, harvests, and full moons. Yet. after centuries of indoctrination in the alienated eth- ics of political and economic domination, a return of human communities to the primal possibilities of genuinely liberatory and gen- tly ecological living may appear at best unrealisticasand at worstKridiculously roman- tic. Nonetheless, numerous indiv iduals. fami- lies, collectives, and tribes participate daily in the resurgence of wild living through the col- lective defense and preserv ation of wilderness and the personal or communal practice of cul- tivating wildness in a wholly spiritual, intel- lectual, sexual, political, and poetic manner.

While the wild prosperity of the woods and the fields opposes the kind of packaged con- venience we usually associate with wealth, conscious eco-mystics can base rural renewal on abundance and sensitivity not austerity and scarcity. An ethical rejection of ecologically harmful practices does not translate into the wholesale sacrifice of simple pleasure and shared prodigality. The earth's fluid fertility and the tribal interdependence of various life- forms joyfully infect the pioneer patient enough to learn feral yet cooperative rhythms. Thus, the truly radical response to the diabolic decimation of the planet is neither materially ascetic or socially anorexic but rather cre- atively dynamic as we build what David Watson calls "the real adventure of living, of singing, of dreaming." employing a "different language, spangled with etemity" to create a " festival of the oppressed capable of bursting its limits and calling a new culture into being."

Ritual and everyday life

My expenence of spintual ecology as a founder of the Wild Earthy Neopagan Anarchist Polysexuals (WE NAP) has not been particu- larly "religious" in any traditional sense of the word. We share no guiding doctrine or dogma; some of our members or friends are not par- ticularly "spiritual" at all, or they practice a sort of "mystic atheism." WTiile I have orga- nized or participated in explicitly neopagan riuials on the "high" holidays of Beltane (May- day) and Samhain (Halloween). Lammas and Brigid's Day. along with winter and summer solstices, fall and spring equinoxes, and full moons, these practices deviate from orthodox paganism, draw from a variety of traditions, and possess a unique character indigenous to our own collective experience. Rather than rec- ognize "ritual" as something separate and dis- crete from the rest of everyday experience, I try to imbue everything I do from washing dishes to writing for 'zines to harv esting black- berries to making love to cooking dinner to emptying the compost with a sense of ritual. Writing about the spiritual practices at an early 1970s commune in Oregon. Elaine Sundancer explains, "The energy that vibrates among us is the thing that matters, not the particular fonn it takes." If that "energy" encourages personal growth, communal responsibility, and respect for the land, it can be an integral part of (re)creating an environinentally stable and po- litically liberated culture that coexists with and celebrates the beauty of the wild earth.

When I discuss the philosophical conscious- g

ness of spiritual ecology (and its overlapping g-

solidarity with neoprimitivism), I argue that a o

radical reorientation of ethical values supports o

resistance to megatcchnic industrial civiliza- 3

tion and its monotheistic hierarchical religions. -

By moving from a critique and protest of the to

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toxic status quo to envisioning the creation of viable green alternatis es. I belie\e the ecologi- cal basis of my spiritual path seeks solutions to contemporary crises on theoretical, spiritual, and practical levels. Because the prevalent con- sensus of both industrial capitalism and dual- istic theology posits humanity's dommation overxrather than communion u ithanhe natu- ral world, the dream of a healthy, wild planet can never be fully achieved without a com- plete break from the exploitive practices fos- tered by these ascendant belief systems. By refusing to confme my arguments to an ideo- logical absolutism, I can accept technological gains that do not hami the earth and consider an anticapitalist economic \ ieu and a libertar- ian social politics alongside a shift in con- sciousness. This can further an inclusive, non- dogmatic approach to radical ecology.

In my ecological mysticism, 1 seek not the mystification of reality in the authoritarian murkiness of religion but instead the intensi- fication of joy and wonder through the imma- nent majesty found on mother earth, -a-

Author's note: Many of the ideas in this essay ha\e been excerpted from ""Wild Earth," a chapter from my book Utopian Prospects, Communal Projects, to be published sometime in 2002 by Autonomedia. WE NAP publishes a quarterly /ine called Black Sun (sample cop- ies are S?> and 1-ycar subscriptions are Si 2, available by writing to PO Box 6, Liberty, TN 37095)

For further reading, please consult:

Adler. Margot. Drawing Down the Moon:

Witches, Druids, Goddess-Worshippers, and

Other Pagans in

America Today. New York: Viking, 1979.

Mercahnt, Carolyn. Radical Ecology: The

Search for a Livable World. New York:

Routledge, 1992.

Morris, Glenn. "For the next Seven (ienera-

tions: Indigenous Americans and

Communalism." Communities Directory: A

Guide to Cooperative Living. Langley:

Fellowship for Intentional Community, 1995.

158-64.

Niman, Michael I. People oj the Rainbow: A

Nomadic Utopia. Knoxville: U of Tennessee

P. 1997.

All books by Gary Snyder

All books by Starhawk

Sundancer, Elaine. Celery Wine: Story of a ° Countiy Commune. Yellow Springs: Cominu- I nity, 1973.

o Watson, David, .{gainst the Megamachine: 5 Essays on Empire and lis Enemies. New York : % Autonomedia. 1998.

GO GUERRILLA!

I

Ever fee! like activism is too dry and tire- some? Like you'll expire completely if forced through another year of insipid teach-ins and panel discussions' Enter Go Guerrilla, a loosely organized, umbrella collective that started out of Buffalo, New York. Members take their individual passions -w/hether that is painting, acting, cook- ing, dancing, writing or making films - and weave those passions into a larger form that examines our social and political environment. Go Guerrilla states their goal is not to save the world but to have fun while trying.

Within a year of its inception. Go Guerrilla organized 15 multimedia events, published a magazine, made t-shirts and stickers, hosted art and music shows, traveled to D.C. and Philadel- phia, held meetings/idea art jams, staged pro- tests, and formed the Buffalo Critical Mass.

But Go Guerrilla is not just a collective lim- ited to Buffalo. New York. Go Guerrilla is a feel- ing, an urgency, an action verb. To Go Guerrilla means to transform your political cause into a spectacle that is visible and appealing, silly and spontaneous, accessible and inviting.

At the core of the Go Guerrilla philosophy is empowerment through self-expression. Locate your creative impulse and use it to amplify your voice. Layer that voice with other loud and diver- gent voices and the result is more powerful, col- orful and, ultimately, effective. These voices come from students, wage slaves and common citizens who decided to rise up against the monotonous cycle of working to consume and consuming to work. Multimedia events and actions are designed to bring people together to explore and question this mechanization of life. Through this process, people realize their ability to increase their op- tions and to understand their capabilities, both of which can lead to social change.

Besides organizing politically charged mul- timedia events. Go Guerrilla affiliates are also cul- ture jammers who engage in creative displays of media subversion. Last year, a handful of Buf- falo folks staged the impressive Rust Belt Hoax during which a small group of suit-wearing pro- testers paraded in front of an independent book- store carrying signs that read "The Organization of Corporations Against Cooperation" and "Cor- porate America Still Rules." The protesters argued there was a cooperative bias against big busi- ness and corporate chains would bring "jobs ga- lore" to the area. All three TV stations and the print media ate it up, covering the mock protest on the nightly news cast without checking any facts. Bnan Lampkin, the architect of the hoax and owner of the bookstore, came clean the next day. a victor on two fronts: highlighting media negligence and generating dialogue about the potential of corporate chains infiltrating an area of Buffalo that remains unscathed by Starbucks and The Gap

The New York-based Surveillance Camera Players are another group exhibitmg Go Guerrilla tendencies. The SCP are a guernlla theater col- lective that performs short skits in front of sur-

veillance cameras. They speak through messages printed on poster-board that question not only the surveillants but the unwitting spectators. "You are being watched for your own safety" reads one of the signs. The SCPs believe that surveillance cameras are more than just an invasion of pri- vacy, but the prejudicial products of imperfect capitalism. In an article written by the SCPs' Billy Bored, issues of transparency and opacity are explored in depth. Bored debunks the myth of re- ciprocal transparency (society benefits from the safety transparency provides) and the inherent goodness in all things light/transparent, badness in all things dark/opaque. He covers the hypoc- risy of governments imposing transparency on trade partners while keeping trade negotiations secret from the public and Bored talks at length about how society has been convinced to volun- tarily make themselves more transparent, evi- denced through the sweeping addiction to real- ity-based TV and the media-made desire that fame is everything. As stadiums install state-of- the-art face recognition devices and companies track Internet surfing, the SCPs ask us to con- sider the pnce of transparency: they maintain it i will be the mass destruction of social life.

A third Go Guerrilla-like provocateur is Chns - Wilcha, a filmmaker, wage slave and member of rtmark.com, a Web-based corporate jamming collective. Wilcha received several awards and in- ternational attention from his 1999 film "The Target Shoots First," a documentary chronicling the uncertain path from college to corporation. The film critiques education, work, corporations, pop culture and punk rock. Instead of merely swal- lowing the daily dose of wage slavery at Colum- bia House Records. Wilcha armed himself with a camcorder to document and study the anatomy of office parties, strategy meetings and CEOs. Go Guerrilla members praise "The Target Shoots First" as a fine work of irony, humor and human- ism. In a Go Guerrilla interview. Wilcha reveals he is not ashamed of or depressed about working in the corporate world. Instead, he feels fated to make many works about work.

To date, the Go Guerrilla collective has put out two magazines and a video which showcase those directly involved in the Buffalo group and others - like the Surveillance Camera Players and Chns Wilcha - who independently obsen/e guer- nlla-leaning philosophies. Both magazines (Vol. 1. Winter 2000 and Vol. 2, Wmter 2001) provide diverse and well-written content (interviews, ar- ticles, essays and reviews). The video does well to expose Go Guerrilla in action; however, poor sound, recording and editing make if a little te- dious to watch. If you can get past that, the video serves to inspire and promote the idea that no matter where we are or what our talents may be. we can all Go Guernlla! For copies of the maga- zine send a couple of dollars and a stamp to P.O. Box 995. Buffalo. NY 14213. The video. Go Guer- rilla in Your Living Room, is $10. You can also email goguerrilla@disinfo.net.

-Catherine Komp

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In Search of Jesus

The American Passion Play • Karen Switzer

My plan, at one time, was to tra\ el across the country attending outdoor plays based on the life of Jesus Christ.

To answer your question right off: no, I am not a Christian. In fact. I don't think I've ever been one. .'\lthough I can remember be- lieving in God in elementarv' school. I think that by the time I even comprehended what "Jesus the Son of God died for your sins" meant. I had already become an atheist. And that was at age eleven.

All this in mind, you may be wondering why I would want to travel around the countr> watching outdoor Christian drama. You can thank the Ohio Tourism Board for sending me my first passion play brochure over a year ago and a Midwestern friend of mine for coming up with the idea for a cross-country trip.

While planning a bike trip across Ohio last year. I received a bundle of brochures from the Ohio Tourism Board and discovered that the Living Word Passion Play just outside Cambridge, Ohio fell right on my route. The gory photograph in the brochure of a reenact- ment of the Crucifixion was the selling point, so as I hiked 200 miles across the Buckeye State last summer, I made it a point to stay the night in Cambridge and see the play.

The woman introducing the play that evening made the announcement that this play was one of only eight outdoor passion plays currently in production in the United States. That night, after the show, I called my Ohioan friend to tell him all this.

"Eight plays?" he said. "Oh, we gotta see the other seven!" We spent the next few months, in our separate states, conspiring to cross the continent together, touring Jesus plays. That was a year ago. though. Situations change, and it seems unlikely that the grandi- ose cross-country passion play tour v\ ill hap- pen any time soon, at least by us. So, I'll docu- ment here the two plays I did manage to see — keep in mind that this is observation from without, told from someone on the far periph- ery of Christian culture.

Part I: The Living Word Passion Play, Cam- bridge, Ohio

As I mentioned, I was biking across Ohio when I visited this particular play. Specifically, I had packed all my supplies into a milkcrate, strapped it to the back of someone's old, rusty lO-speed, and hiked southeast from Bowling Green to Bamesville. I had taken mostly small.

rural highways, alone in a foreign landscape (to a native Californian, "the middle of Ohio" may just as well be "in another countr\"). I sprang for a motel room in Cambridge that day and set out on the county road to the site of the play. Oh and I discovered that the advertised "beautiful, rural setting" more or less trans- lated (native Californian or not) into "in the middle of nowhere."

The setting was nice enough, surrounded by trees in a little valley. The amphitheater seated about a thousand, and I'd say there were a few hundred in attendance the evening I went. My advance ticket purchase secured me a space in the front row. heretically incognito, in front of a group of ladies who had traveled

all the way from New Jersey for the play and a man from Cambridge who attends the play every weekend. A few youth groups showed up, giggling and slyly checking each other out. I had been biking alone for days but couldn't properly socialize. I sketched the entire set in- stead.

Though technically a passion play cov- ers the events of Jesus's life from Last Supper through the Crucifixion, the plays I researched seem to include much of Jesus's adult life and span through the Resurrection and Ascension (how could you not?!). One goal is to simply teach the life of Jesus through drama, but the main idea is that the audience really sees how excruciatingly Christ suffered in his last days,

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giving insight into the Scriptures by acting them out. It is one thing to plow through the mire that is the New Testament. It's another thing entirely — trust me — to see an actor, spattered in red paint, squirt fake blood out of his hands as they're seemingly driven through with railroad spikes.

The Li\ ing Word play began its stor^ with the Sermon on the Mount. This production fo- cused on the teachings of Christ more than his miracles. It's Christ-as-nice-guy-rabbi rather than Christ-as-holy-wizard. The directors took all the best soundbites of Christ's teachings and the actor rattled them off one after another while robed extras stared up at him, making the experience kind of like a "Best of Christ's One-Liners, Volume One."

Actually, the costumes in this produc- tion were a strong point. The Romans had flashy uniforms, and everyone else wore taste- ful, pastel-colored robes. The Prince of Light, of course, wore white, and .kidas wore some- thing dark and distinctive. One interesting policy of the Living Word production is that once you have seen tiie pla\, \ou can attend any future date and if you bring your own san- dals, you will be loaned a robe and will be an extra in the performance. The producers bill this as a marvelous way to get more deeply involved with the story of Jesus, and entire families — children and infants included participate.

The props and scenery m this priHluclion were also impresM\ e. ( )ne highlight u as u hen a Roman centurion rode a chariot across the set and up the hill leading out of the amphi-

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theater. Also, Christ actually rode into "Jerusa- lem" on the back of a donkey. The extras waved real palm fronds, of course.

The play included one of my faxorite scenes from the New Testament, the "den of thieves" scene, in which Jesus overturns the currency exchange tables in the temple. Granted. Christ's not dissing capitalism out- right, just within the House of God, but there's still something satisfying about seeing the Prince of Peace engaging in property destruc- tion.

The part of the drama that anno\ ed me the most was all that stuff while he's in Ro- man custody, resigned to his fate. Long peri- ods of time were spent with people (namcK' Pilate and Herod) trying to get him to talk, but he wouldn't. Even in my favorite passion pla\. Jcstis Christ Superstar. Jesus comes ofT as a delirious eight-year old in a tantrum. Flogging's a bummer for sure, but there must be some better way to dramatize it.

Suffering always gets worse before it gets better in these matters, and such is the case w ilh Our Lord & Sa\ ior. The Romans stripped him dow n to his underpants and roughed him up. Here the special ctTects expert at the Li\ - ing Word was quite clever. When the soldiers turn the Hogged Jesus around for the audience to see the physical manifestation ol his sutVer- ing, they somehow fasten on him a false back made of tom-up. "blood"-stained fabric.

Hie sutTcring continued still more. Sen- tenced lo death b\ his own people, Jesus is forced lo drag an actual wooden cross across the set and up ihe hill leading out of the am-

phitheater. The crucifixion itself was per- formed atop the hill, about 100 feet from my front-row seat. B\ this time, the sun had prettv much set. 1 was disappointed that the crucifix- ion was so far away, although looking back. I can appreciate the dramatic factor and the spe- cial etTects concerns.

The crucifixion scene was alright, with fake thunder and lightning. This was the stutT I had come for — disrespectful or not. I had come in search of kitsch. Here, the Resurrec- tion scene was straightforward — a clean and rested Jesus mysteriously lea\ es his tomb and hangs out w ith his posse for a last-minute pep talk. This was a touching scene because this actor's particular depiction of Jesus empha- sized his friendliness, and the scene after the Resurrection is when Jesus 's \ irtues as a friend to his apostles are most notable. Also, the suf- fering is over at this point. Fivervone breathes a sigh of relief: all Jesus has to do now is float into Heaxen. and that's the ea.sy part.

Well, it's an easy thing for the Son of God to do. but not so easy for a mortal actor play- iiii; the Son of God. I had been expecting them to pull olV something spectacular with wires and pulleys lifting the Sa\ ior into his Father's Kingdom. 1 was rather disappointed when all the> did was ha\e Jesus kneel down on a rock w ith all his apostles standing around him. and then when he said his final goodbyes and pointed his hand toward the sky. he slowly stood up while the apostles squatted down. A low -tech dramatic solution I guess, but it still seemed like kind of a rip-olTio me.

At the close of the performance, the

woman who introduced the play informed the audience that min- isters would be waiting by the cross to talk to anyone \\ ho needed prayer. I, however, needed to bike that tiny (and now pitch-black) road back into town. What had been a quaint two-lane road in that early summer e\ ening turned into a perilous path after sun- set. As 1 walked my bike out of the parking lot and down the steep gravel driveway, I stuck my thumb out hitchhiker-style and called out to everyone who drove by with a window rolled down, "Can 1 get a ride just back into town?" Dozens of cars, trucks, and vans (some with bike racks even) passed me on the way. Some people averted their eyes; some stared as they went by. So much for Christian charity. I braved the dark, shoulderless road back into Cambridge. Almost as if by miracle, I made it.

Part II: The Life of Christ Passion Play, Townsend, Tennessee

The play I saw this spring in Tennessee was also at a site down a winding country road and come to think of it. 1 hiked there too. My friend since pre-school now lives in Kno.xville. and nearby, nestled in the Great Smoky Mountains, is a passion play I had found through my research on the subject. So, I spent my last night in Tennessee (after having sweated through the worst hangover of my life, ironically enough) taking a nice countn," ride out to a "rural setting" and hanging out with a bunch of hardcore Christians. Talk about Daniel in the lion's den! At least I didn't have to worrv about someone stealing my friend's bike.

This play had substantial merchandise: t-shirts ("a great con- versation-starter" they said), booklets, and a video of a past per- formance. However, because the ticket price and the merch was pretty pricey, my budget only allowed me a ticket in and a "Jesus Saves" commemorative soda bottle at the concession stand. Yup, I was still on the hunt for kitsch.

As in Ohio, my advance ticket purchase gave me a front row seat, although in this amphitheater that could seat a thou- sand or more, only twenty people showed up. The emcee of the evening (who played both Pilate and Peter ami was the son of the actor playing Jesus) was not dismayed by this low turn-out. In fact, he said it would give us all an opportunity to get to know each other better and began asking us all questions. Great. I thought, not exactly the anonymity 1 was looking for. He was curious as to what denominations the audience represented; he asked for a show of hands as he read the laundry list of Christian denominations, beginning with his own, the Baptists, then Pen-

I~ tecostal. then in descending order until finally reaching Catho- _ lies. I was concerned about being singled out as the representa- tive of the "none of the above" club, but nobody said anything. Then the young man asked everyone to introduce themselves and say where they're from. Since I hailed from far-off California, a group "Ooooh!" washed over the audience like a wave over sand. "Oh, the Lord brought you a long way to us. didn't he?" he asked rhetorically. I then tried to explain to the group my intentions to travel across the country v\atching passion plays, w ithout letting on that 1 was quite honestly fctishizing Midwestern Southern Bible plays. In essence, 1 was doing cultural research, but no one ever likes their culture documented by an outsider, and rightly so. I don't remember how I ended up wording it, but the emcee smiled and asked. "You're lost out here, aren't you?" I had just spent a week in suburban Tennessee, way out of my element, so I spoke truthfully when I answered, "Yeah, you could say I'm pretty lost." We shared some passion play information and then he mercifully moved on to the next person, (I'm not kidding) his Uncle Billy-Bob. *

Peaches, meet Mystic

"There's Only One Peach With the Hole In the Middle" meets "Girlfriend Sistagirl. You a Precious Queen In a Twisted World"

Lying in bed looking at the tight pink mmi-shorts barely concealing Peaches' crotch, I hear the opening beats of the first song "Fuck the Pain Away." Suddenly, I want to be 21 again, drunk and grinding in a queer club with some hot dyke. Then the opening lyrics hit me with a catchy eroticism, "sucking on my titties like you wanted me, callin' me." Little did I know that for the next month the same lyrics would be circling continually in my head overriding all the elevator musics of the world and causing some embarrassment when I'd repeat them out loud in public.

Peaches is "only Double AA, but thinking Triple X" and

not too subtle with the club dance beats and sexual lyrics.

Somehow she pushes it further than any Madonna could ever

conceive and forces the sex goddess within to emerge.

Suddenly I'm the cocky one singing along, "motherfuckers

want to get with me. lay with me, love with me, alright." This

album IS suggested for play at your next party when people are on alcoholic drink #3. I

have the feeling it will definitely make things a little more raunchy and perhaps over

the top. And I realize it's probably not appropriate to be playing her CD in my office at

the university. So. I save Peaches first album, "The Teaches of Peaches" for those

after-hours work nights. But maybe I should ask, "Who's gonna motherfuckin' stop

me?"* (all above quotes are lyrics of Peaches),

If your game is to be less obvious and you want some of the same effects of Peaches' eroticism; I suggest the less obvious lyrical rhymes of Mystic's new album "Cuts for luck and scars for freedom" which is now out on Good Vibe Recording. You might have heard Mystic's "The Life" on Blu Magazine's Issue No. 12 CD compilation. She weaves tough girl raps with beautiful harmonies and pushes political lyrics with tight beats and lyncal flows accessible to most audiences.

Mystic challenges the consumenst images perpetuated through mainstream rap music in "Ghetto Birds" and asks if the people are ready for battle, "you got mountain of things (get money), they not high enough to save you when the troops come runnin'. n' your shiny new hummer that ain't strong enough to withstand the bombs they gon drop on us." She uses her lyrics to talk about domestic violence, drugs on the street, violence, the police, and her own life stor^,

"It's a Monday finally found the perfect beat to speak my peace on how I came to be. the way I was raised, how I was born, why I smile so sad and have eyes of the storm; time passed to 1973 and you begged my mom to create me, first she said no but she loved you too much, 1974 had a child to touch but you was into other things that rip life's seams, liquor, drugs, other women, destroyin' dreams, but you know how women be, she tned to hold on for the sake of y'all love and y'all beautiful bond."

Peaches and Mystic are both amazing in their own ways. Peaches has the club beats and flippant sexy lyrics, while Mystic has the hip-hop beat with sexy lyrics on one song and sad real stories of life on the next. I'll end this article with a battle of the sexy lyrical compositions.

Peaches says, "you like it when I like you less, no caress, just undress. You like it when we play hardcore, the panty war, then you get pussy galore. You like it when I turn your back, give you no slack, the slap attack. You like it when we leave parts on when we're getting it on. And on and on and on."

Then Mystic rhymes her b-girl ballad. "I admit I was nervous cuz things get changed, something about my lifestyle makes love so strange, so many angles and tangled components, everybody wanna touch just for the moment, but you put a new hue in my blue, added a perspective in my concrete views, 'bout tossin' caution into the breeze, followin' emotion like streams to the seas, top priority believe you me. like love -- how you feel' You alright? Watchu need?. It's more than your lips on the nap of my neck, |- or your hands on my breast with your leg on my thigh, or the look in your eyes as you S slide inside, it's the way you make me wanna live instead of die." —

Peaches, The Teaches of Peaches, 2000, Kitty-yo, www.kitty-yo.de Mystic, Cuts for Luck and Scars for Freedom, 2001, Goodvibe Recordings, oo www.goodvibemusic.com **^

-Ailecia Ruscin „,,, _.,, -

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1 . analysis

WARD CHURCHILL DOING TIME: THE POLITICS OF IMPRISONMENT'

G7020 CD OUT NOW!

"We don't have to worry about whether we will have a political police either in the United States or Canada. We've had them for a long time ... It's not a question of how to prevent it, it's a question of how to deal with it since it is an existent reality." -- Ward Churchill, from the CD.

The U.S. government has used all means to subvert and neutralize movements for social change. This lecture focuses on the FBI's counter intelligence programs, their use in undermining dissent and the criminal justice system s role as an agent of social control.

Ward Churchill is co-director of the American Indian Movement of Colorado, Vice Chairperson of the American Anti-Defamation Council, and a National Spokesperson for the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee.

2. action

BAKUNIN'S BUM FIGHT TO WIN!'

G7021 CD OUT OCTOBER 9TH A Benefit for the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty

This album takes a passionate, inspirational speech from two OCAP anti-poverty activists (Sean Brandt & Sue Collis) and edits it into 11 spoken word pieces with radical beats & strings by "Bakunin's Bum" - 1 Speed Bike (from godspeed you black emperor! & exhaust) and Norman Nawrocki (from Rhythm Activism & Da Zoquei). The result: a powerful. 69 minute mix of music & ideas about how to step up local resistance to the effects of globalized misery.

The words from the OCAP activists offer a fresh perspective on how to combat growing poverty in the face of abundance: about how to confront & challenge an insensitive, uncaring, police-dependent. State apparatus; and about how to work with others, in community organizations, using "direct action" approaches, un- compromisingly, to "fight to win".

CDs are $12 ppd. Write to G7 Welcoming Committee Records | PO Box 27006, C - 360 Main Street | Winnipeg, MB | R3C 4T3 | Canada Full catalogue of radical music and spoken word and secure online ordering at http://v/ww.g7welcomingcommittee,com

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Plan Puebia Panama:

The inhabitants of San Antonio Tutla haven't heard much about the World Bank. In their small town, made up of thatch and mud huts, two basketball courts and a smattering of rectangular concrete structures nestled in the tropical mountains of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec in Oaxaca. Mexico, life goes on much as it has for decades. e\en centuries. The residents of San .Antonio, indigenous Mixe Indians, make their living off farming oranges, com and other crops in the wet, hilly area. Chickens and turkeys meander freely between homes and young ciiiklren ride bareback on horses along the dirt road through town. Though most of the residents are Catholic, they still practice original Mixe traditions.

Though terms like World Bank. N.AFTA and, most recently. Plan Puebia Panama ( PPP) are only mysterious, abstract terms to them, they are fully aware of the concrete effect that globalization and free trade have had on their li\es. They note that oranges, corn anil coll'ee prices arc steadily dropping, and even so it is harder and harder for them to make sales be- cause Mexicans can buy com imported from Iowa more cheapls than corn grown right around the comer, fhe go% eminent assistance

program for farmers know n as Procampo has not been a big help to them, members of the Council of Elders note, because men are re- quired to pick up their checks in the city, spend- ing a full workdaN and no small amount of money on transportation to the railroad town of Matias Romero - about a two-hour drive away o\erdirt roads. Once in town, one of the elders noted in Mixe. the men arc tempted to spend their checks in bars.

The residents of Playa Cangrejo, an idyllic fishing village and local vacation spot on the Pacific coast not far from San .Anto- nio, also ha\e seen life changing because of globalization. Isaias "Chayon" Seferino Martinez used to make his li\ ing as a fisher- man, going out in the morning and evening in a small boat with an outboard motor to catch fish in nets.

"lie lo\es the sea," said his wife. Julia luentes .Avendano. who runs Palapa 1:1 Chayon, one of a string of thatched roof res- taurants that line the beach, serving residents of the area and nearby cities w ho come to eat fresh seafood and sleep in hammocks on the beautiful beach for short vacations "He misses it."

Fishing and the restaurant stopped bring- ing in enough money and now Martinez gets up at 5 a.m. ever\ moming for a long taxi and bus ride to Juchitan w here he w orks in an elec- tronics store. He often stays overnight in Juchitan for days at a time while he"s w orking there, or if he retums home it is not until 10 at night. onl\ to leave at 5 a.m. again.

The area was devastated in Hurricane Paulina four years ago, .Av endano said, and the government did nothing to help them rebuild. Tourists hav e been div erted to the better-knowti beaches of Huatulco further west, an area for- merly populated bv indigenous locals who w ere mov ed off their land to make w ay for a Cancun-like resort area. Local tourism has picked up recently at Playa Cangrejo. .Avendano notes, but it is harder to feed the tourists because the fish have been getting smaller and smaller otT the beach, possibly because of weather changes and also because of contamination from the Pemex oil refiner- ies at Salina Cniz. a port citv located about 20 miles awav.

"This IS an example of public spaces fighting to surv ive against privatization." said C arlos Beas, a leader of the indmenous rights

IN TH^J"^

Mexico's Latest Assault on the Environment and Indigenous

by Karl Lydersen

photos by Kari Lydersen & Allan Gomez

group UCIZONI. "They are being squeezed between Pemex on one side and the tourist in- dustry on the other side."

Local en\ ironmentalists and risiiermen say the refinery has had a definite negative effeet on the coastline and the marine life in the area. Despite the fact that Oaxaca pro- duces a huge percent of the country's oil. gasoline prices are high in the area, equiva- lent to prices in the U.S.

Pemex, Mexico's nationalized oil in- dustry, was once heavily subsidized to keep gasoline prices low. but in the early 8()'s the government began to change its policy to make Pemex a profit industry and to do this it began selling concessions to foreign mul- tinational oil companies to do exploration throughout Mexico.

"When they built the refinery, they said it would create jobs," Mart inez said of the refinery which was built in 1975. "But it has created unemployment. You can't do agriculture in the area anymore because Pemex is diverting 90 percent of the (fresh) water. You can't fish because it is polluting the water. There used to be about 100 fish- ermen in our area, now there are only 30.

They are leaving for jobs in the north and in the U.S."

The Man with the Plan

The increasing economic squeeze on in- digenous and native people like the residents of Playa Cangrejo and San .Antonio has been an ongoing story over the last few decades of Mexico's history as globalization and free trade have moved forward at a steady pace. How- ever, the delicate rain forests, coastal regions and the indigenous populations of the Isthmus of Tehauntepec are at a critical juncture right now. hanging on a precipice of an unprec- edented, sweeping free trade project that - if it goes through - could destroy countless eco- logical habitats and indigenous cultures for- ever.

This project is the Plan Puebla Panama, a pet cause of President Vicente Fox which has been one of his main focuses since he took office in December. The PPP is a plan of tre- mendous scope that would basically create a dry canal for international trade through all of Central America and southern Mexico, rang- ing - as the name suggests - from Panama all

the way up to the state of Puebla in central Mexico and beyond. The canal would be lined with maquilas and mass-scale, industrial shrimp and eucalyptus fanns, petrochemical operations and mineral excavation, exploiting the area's rich natural resources and the po- tential cheap labor available throughout Mexico's small towns and indigenous com- munities. The canal would pro\ ide immedi- ate transport for eucalyptus lumber - a non- indigenous weed of a tree known for wiping out native ecosystems - and mass-produced shrimp and maquila goods. The shrimp farms would largely be cultivating non-nati\e spe- cies of shrimp from the Philippines and other areas, potentially driving local shrimp fisher- men out of business and infecting local popu- lations with foreign bacteria.

Ground Zero

While the PPP as Fox has dreamed it up encompasses much of Mexico and Central America, the Isthmus of Tehuantepec is ground zero. The isthmus, the narrowest part of Mexico with the state of Oaxaca on the south side and Veracruz on the north side, has

I iUU

UCIZONI Activists Teodosio Angel Molina and Carlos Beas

been a trade route since before the Spanish con- quest. The isthmus was a central part of the 1976-1982 Jose Lopez-Portillo

administration'sAlpha Omega plan for a trade corridor. While that plan never materialized, former president Ernesto Zedillo (of the PRI party) brought the idea back to life with his Megaproject plan for shrimp and eucalyptus plantations and a dry canal through the isth- mus. While some of the road building, land acquisition and industrial farming projects outlined in the Megaproject did lake place, for the most part it also stagnated, but many think that Fox's PPP, the latest incarnation of the dr\' canal idea, is close to becoming reality.

"Fox's PPP probably will be more suc- cessful in generating business interest in eight months than the PRI's Megaproject was in five years." said Wendy Call, a journalist working in Matias Romero on a fellowship from the Institute of Current World Affairs. "Fox has much more success with the World Bank and IMF than Zedillo did. He is being heralded as the man who will bring global capitalism to Mexico."

Call said that the main factors driving Fox's PPP include his determination to facili- tate the success of the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FT.A.'X): pressure from the I'.S. to decrease Mexican migration, which would be achieved by jobs created along the dry canal; and the o\erall consolidation of power over ° land and people in the south of Mexico, in-

■o eluding the effect this would ha\e on the

■ — . *-

o Zapatistas in Chiapas. She noted that the plan

5 includes related projects throughout Central

i America specifically in Honduras, (iuatc-

" inala and Nicaragua largely designed forihe

<^ benefit of Mexico.

Oaxaca - and the isthmus specifically - is one of the poorest states in Mexico and also the state with one of the highest indigenous populations. There are at least 16 indigenous groups in Oaxaca. including the Mixe, Mixteca. Zapotec and some groups of African descent. It is also one of the areas richest in biodi\crsity. The Chimalapas jungle on the isthmus is judged to be even richer in biodiversity and with more \ irgin forest than the famous Lacondon jungle in Chiapas. 0\er 70 percent of the people in Oaxaca li\e in ex- treme poverty, according to the organization CAMPO. and 30 percent of the total popula- tion is indigenous people w ith the vast major- ity of them being \ery poor.

While rclati\ely few people in Mexico have heard of the PPP or know any details about it. it has become a hot topic in the inter- national in\estment scene. Call noted that at the June 15 "Concertacion Tuxtla" summit meeting of Central American presidents and Fox in San Salvador, the Inter-American De- velopment Bank announced its commitment to leading liie search tor funding for the project from the World Bank, the International Mon- etary Fund, national banks, and private cor- porations and investors. She said that specific funding is slated to be announced in Septem- ber

Though the PPP is outlined in a 300-some page report on the Mexican go\ eniment's Web page, the go\ernmenl has been rclati\el> mum about the plan w ithin the country.

"A lot of people don't ha\ e an\ idea w hat the PPP is," said Elba Flores Nunez of the Red de Derechos Ilumanos de Tepeyac (Tepeyac Human Rights Network). "Stale and federal government ofllcials say wc don't know w hat

you're talking about, the project doesn't ex- ist, but journalists from other countries tell us they'd posed as investors to meet with gov- ernment officials and were given all sorts of information about the project. If this is sup- posed to be beneficial, w hy aren't they inform- ing the population about what it is?"

Another Piece in the Puzzle

The PPP is another piece in the puzzle that includes NAFTA, the FTAA (the in- the-w orks trade agreement that would es- sentially expand NAFTA to all of the Western Hemisphere) and the controversial indigenous rights law passed by Fox and the Mexican Congress this spring. All of these policies and plans basically accelerate the trend of land privatization and multinational invest- ment and exploitation of land and labor in Mexico and Central America, and the atten- dant destruction of natural habitats and dis- placement of indigenous peoples.

"The government hasn't been giving people the titles to their land so that it will make it easier for them to take it away for the high- ways they are building." Flores said. "Com- munities are also being asked to donate some of their land, being told the highway will ben- efit them. People were thinking they could put up little stores by the highway and sell torti- llas, walk their donkeys along the road. They don't realize this is a super-highway and the\ 'II have no access to it."

Teodosio Angel Molina of UCIZONI notes that it is the gov emment's longstanding paternalistic relationship with indigenous people that makes something like the PPP pos- sible. By this he means, roughly, the government's process of doling out or taking away land and favors from indigenous com- munities on a whim, playing communities against each other and keeping them ultimately all dependent on the gov emment for surv iv al. .'\ clear example of this is in Chimalapas. w here territorv disputes between indigenous groups hav e festered since the Spanish entered the area to cut cedar in the 1600s. Over the past 40 years, the government has continued to play people off each other in numerous territory confiicts between indigenous communities, and between indigenous people and mestizo cattle fanners, all complicated by an ongoing border dispute between Oaxaca and Chiapas.

Divide and Conquer

As of now. much of the land in the PPP proposed area still belongs to indigenous people and is protected by Constitutional guar- antees. The goal of the government is now to wrest this land from communal, indigenous hands and put it into the hands of indiv iduals. w ho then can be forced or persuaded to sell to

PJLIIIC!

r^T I ■ THE PANAMA CANAL ■ '"W^

^J •0^ h""^ rJEJ,TIETK CENTURY SATE 70 THE *

■SINGAPORE-

TOMORROWS GATE TO UORU) POLITICS IMA FACIFi: A.&E I

the government or multinational corporations. Often the intermediate step in this process is to turn the land over to ejidos, collectively- run lands that are closer to individual control than the communal lands. The "indigenous rights" law passed in April, which drew wide- spread protest from indigenous people throughout the country, failed to provide any meanmgful protections for this land. In fact, the national law is a par- ticular set- back to O a .X a c a ' s state indig- enous law, passed in 1995 after intense lob- bying by in- d i g e n 0 u s rights groups, which pro- vided more protections for indigenous people but can be superseded by the national law.

"The goal of the government is to create division among the communities so that the government can come in as the savior," said Cesar Morales Rodriguez of CAMPO.

While organizing resistance to the PPP has been a somewhat slow and difficult pro- cess because of lack of available information, transportation, communication barriers and pressing local conflicts, UCTZONI and other groups have been fostering a growing aware- ness of and movement against the plan. And right from the start, the resistance to the plan and to globalization as a whole has been met with extreme repression. UCIZONl members have received serious death threats and one was actually murdered near San Antonio Tutla.

"When the people defend their land, there is repression," said Sofia Robles of the indig- enous group Servicios al Pueblo Mixe. "They are jailed and attacked. The government is try- ing to destroy their organizing structures and every day the communities are losing more and more territory."

The falling crop prices caused by NAFTA have also aided the government in their cam- paign of displacement as farmers who can no longer make a living on the land are forced to migrate to cities in Mexico and the U.S. look- ing for work.

Death Knell of the Chlmalapas

Of all the potentially devastating effects of the PPP, partial destruction of the Chimalapas rain forest and the indigenous communities that live there may be the most tragic and globally harmful. Angel noted that just one example of the likely attacks on the

forest would be the resumption of a World Bank project, introduced but derailed in the 1980s, to build a four-lane highway cutting through the jungle, and of course the project would open the jungle to sacking by the U.S.. Canadian. Chilean and other lumber compa- nies that are already invading the Lacondon and other areas.

The government has proposed creating a protected bio- sphere in the Chimalapas, but this move could actually fit into their ov erall plan of privatization and displace- ment. The Biosphere as the govern- ment has pro- posed it. An- gel reports, would be planned and controlled by outside academics and officials without anv' input from local populations, and the sole focus vv ould be on the preservation of flora and fauna, not in- digenous rights or cultures. In this way, the reserve could actually serve as a tool to fur- ther displace indigenous people from the

■5UE2 •

YEiTERBAVS GATE TO yOHLII POWER IM THE ATLANTTC AtE

jungle. UCIZONl and other organizations have made a counter-proposal for a Campesino Re- serve, which would protect indigenous people as well as plants and animals, and which would be managed by local communal processes.

But the government has refused to accept the Campesino Reserve plan, according to Angel, "because that would be one step toward autonomy, and that would set a dangerous pre- cedent."

Beas places the blame for the PPP not only on Fox but on the whole global military industrial complex.

"This is part of a very aggressive process, the same process that gives us Plan Colombia, that gives us new U.S. military bases in Ecua- dor, that gives us bombing exercises in Vieques." he said. "We are up against a mon- ster that is putting the very life of our planet in danger." ir

Note: All quotes in this story were translated from Spanish.

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Oil and War

In the heat of the city day, the long parade passes slowly. One by one, single file, these units are strung to- gether by a unified motivation of deter- mined destination. Rolling by in oppo- site directions, some follow north, oth- ers south. Although they do pass hcad- to-head, these long chains of pistons and gears are not opposed at all. In fact, they are in perfect unity. Contained in a vast, cohesive machine, churning and chug- ging and coughing and purring to the sound of the drip drip, the echo that rings across land and sea, desert and mountain. Out of the earth comes this dark, viscous substance - the fundamen- tal liquid in a relentless drive toward a mythical progress.

Travelling and movement. Point A to point B. and back again. Single silhouettes patched against leather and vinyl. Molded glass and twisted steel. Unity toward progress, unity in individualism. Striv- ing to reach happiness with hands clenched on a plastic wheel. Driv- ing. The mind is bubble-headed, closed-eyed, isolationist.

WASHINGTON. July 30. 2001 - In his first six months in office. Presi- dent Bush has abandoned a treaty on fighting global warming, rejected protocols enforcing a ban on germ warfare, demanded amendments to an accord on illegal sales of small amis, threatened to skip an interna- tional conference on racism and vowed to v\ ithdraw from a landmark pact limiting ballistic missile defenses.

The reaction from Berlin to Beijing has been one of concern that an .American president vv ho walks away from so many treaties might be one who wants to walk away from the world - or, at the least, one who will demand that the world live by terms dictated by America alone (New York Times).

Time passes and words fall by the wayside. The parade contin- ues to pass and the drip, drip rev erberates toward a promised infinity. But in truth, this supply can hold no infinity. It is contained, finite, ending. As we walked, we joked about the end. The dav when the last drip would fall, the last chug and then quiet. The last car in the last parade slops silent, lallen by the wayside, like words, crumpled masses of metal. Radios dead, curved wire, batteries dead. A fuel that filled the world now drained to the last drizzle. .Mas. this is a playful and dreary dream, a fantasy likely not to find a home w ithin our life spans.

The civil war in Sudan is nearly two decades old. It has raged on, government against rebels, Muslim against non-Muslim, the north against the .south, the Middle Hast against Africa, for this long. In the south of the country, the Sudan People's liberation .Xrmy (SPL.A) continues their fight against the Sudanese uovemmcnt annv, which is

POLITICS

Fragments of the Long Line from Combat to Car

by Hal Hixson

illustration by Andrew Wa hi

based in the northern capital of Kartoum. Indeed, the war has gone on for nearly two decades, but it is only in the last iw o years that the balance of power has en- dured a drastic shifi.

Sunday. February 22. 1998

Sudan Signs Oil Pipeline .Agreement

Sudan has signed an agree- ment worth six-hundred-million dollars w ith four international companies to con- struct an oil pipeline. Sudanese televi- sion said the President. Umar al-Bashir. was present at the signing ceremony, which took place on Saturdav. British. Chinese and .Argentinean companies will supply equipment and help to lay the pipeline, w hich will be one-thousand-si.\-hundred kilometers long and run from the llegleg oil field in the west of the country to Port Sudan on the Red Sea. It's hoped that the pipeline will be completed by mid- 1999 and will enable the export of a-hundred-and-fifty-thousand bar- rels of oil per day (BBC).

drip, drip = One-hundred-and-fifty-thousand barrels of oil per day = drip. drip. Myriad liquid fragments toward destruction and turmoil.

Thursday. 15 March. 2001 Oil Linked to Sudan .Abuses

Sudan began exporting oil in 1999. and relief workers say that since then it has fuelled Africa's longest-running civ il war. The gov- cmmcnt had doubled its militarv budget since oil came on stream, the chanty |Christian .Aid) said, showing there was a direct correlation between oil revenue and the ability to wage war. It also says infra- structure designed for the oil industry is being used by government forces fighting in the area.

Mr. Curtis [Christian .Aid's policv director] said oil companies from Malaysia. China. Canada and Sweden operated in Sudan. .And he accu.sed oil giants BP. Shell and ExxonMobil of indirect involvement through their investment in two subsidiaries of China's state oil com- panv. PctroChina and Sinopec. However, the multinationals maintain that their funds are ring-fenced and can not be used for investment in Sudan (BBC).

Strong words, but rarelv heard or considered in a land of cool tech- nological comfort. Not much more than a faint and distant whisper from a dark and strange land a sound that is easilv lost in a climate filled with mechanical honks and electronic whirrs, techno-dings and cellular buzzes.

.And so. the heal of the citv reigns down, driving thousands of hands to luni themiostat dials, to dodge into the crisp, shadow y insides of home and automobile and ofilce. Some spend days w ilhoul accumulaiing more

than a few dozen breaths of tnie. unfiltered outside air. A continued reclusion into an environment of complete human fabrication.

Again... we joked of attempts to cool the world. Of ice-cold air pouring out of restaurant storefronts - huge window/doors agape to reveal diners enjoying the beauty of the day without the painful annoy- ance of the heat generated by the sun - finally, open air that is twenty degrees cooler than reality. And the painful disappointment and anger in the bitter realization that this is all just a vicious cycle. .A crumbling en\ ironmcnt feeding a drive toward behavior that will simply continue the crumble. More heat = more energy spent cooling = more heat. Engine, generator, pollution, exhaust, heat. Pieces of a puzzle that forms a picture of waste. Instruments that blare their parts in the great cacophony.

Human sv\eat. drip. drip. Human blood.

Screams and cries rose aroimd the wcirld on the da\' that Ogoni activist Ken Saro-Wiwa was murdered. By the mid-1990"s. the struggle of the Ogoni people in the Delta region of Nigeria had boiled to a head. Saro-Wiwa had led his people for years against the environmental and economic devastation caused by the exploits of the Shell corporation and the Nigerian government. But his days of activism were called to an end in Nov ember of 1995. when he and eight other prominent Ogoni were executed by the Nigerian government (then led by Sani Abacha) on a fabricated murder charge.

Everything he did vv as measured against the end game of securing a better future for our people. He spent most of his working life cam- paigning for a fairer share of the USS30 billion dollars of oil revenue that had been extracted from Ogoni since 1958. and protesting against the ecological damage wrought by the unchecked practices of the oil companies operating on our lands (BBC - Ken Wiwa - "Burying My Father").

And then the end. Spheres of power and intlucncc and money. ..and dil. the life's blood of the modern world. In the space

between bullets and gas tanks, a dollar floats down and rests. It has only moments to balance before it is whisked away through the av- enues of the vast global economies that shape our existence. Of course, currency itself holds no inherent meaning - but it's symbolic presence is one of the heaviest and most pow erful that we know. And the impli- cations of its movements are certainly not innocuous. It holds great depth and meaning in its travels - in its ability to motivate or repress, to lift or cmsh. Dollars drip, drip into the ocean of wealth that turns the w orld.

Thursday. 3 May. 2001 Shell Posts Record Profits

The oil giant Royal Dutch Shell has reported a 23% rise in net profit to $3.86bn (£2.69bn) for the first three months of 2001 (BBC).

Hold now. . .back to the city and the parade. Cars move along slow ly and methodically like the drip. drip. Long tendrils pulling the hearts and minds of the West. Minds and hearts now focused on and frus- trated with the red tail-lamps in front of them. But ask only for a seed of mindful thought - a seed that will grow and break through the mo- notony of modem life and encompass the stmggles and horrors that our actions create. Let minds transcend locales, rise up and see the world as a whole and then descend to a microscopic level, not here but abroad. Across a sea of dust, in a puddle where two liquids swirl and mix. there lies the red and the black, the two substances that drive war in one land and comfort in another. Let minds see these connections and catastrophes, the way in which these two colors are joined. But above all, let each individual mind see its role in the world and the power that it holds to stop the flow and halt the relentless drip. drip. -^

H'ork Ciicd

Sliankcr. Tlioni "W'liilc House Says ihc U.S. Is Nol a Loiwr. Jii.kI Clioo.sy. " Tlie

\i'w York Times. .July M . 2IKII.

.ill iil/icr c/iiolanoiis taken /roiii the BBC Online \e\\s tiel!i\e (www.hhe.co.uk)

AN EXPERIMENT *N SUSTAINAB«UTY.

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33

Peaks

by Thatcher Collins

POLIIICS

Within the last two years. British Columbia's indigenous communities have started one of the most effective economic justice campaigns in Canada's history, led by their elders and their youth. By reclaiming land, occupying offices, blocking construction sites and bringing cases to court, they are getting media attention, raising de\ elopment costs and forcing the B.C. go\ emment to the negotiation table. British Columbia's economic development continues to use indigenous people and their land at every stage for nearly e\ery major industry.

In 1 S 1 2. the Astonan & Northw est Company put fur trading posts in Kamloops and then merged u ith the Hudson Ba\ Company in 1821. .lames Douglas worked for the Hudson Bay Company (HB.C); he was captured by the Carrier Nation and released after negotiation. The Hudson Bay Company also negotiated the acquisition of furs from indigenous people and their land. Indigenous people were important enough to the HB.C. that the company started inoculating them against smallpox in the 1 830s. Douglas moved up to Chief Trader of the HB.C. in 1834, then to Governor of Vancouver Island in 1851 and then to Go\ emor of mainland colonial British Columbia in 1 858. Douglas w as responsible for B.C."s only treaties uith \'ancouver Island Nations during this period. He was genuinely worried of a war with local tribes (given his capture) because the colony's biggest industry at the time was fur trading. He asked the British Crow n for mone> to buy naii\e land rights but his request was denied. Instead, he simply negotiated simple pacts (not treaties or settlements) with tribes in mainland B.C. that were somewhat reasonable in comparison with other parts of North America. Chief Neskonlith of the Sewcwepemc (often anglicized as Shuswap) Nation ensured enough land for independent subsistence, called the 18(i2 Neskonlith-Douglas Reser\e.

During Douglas" tenure as go\ emor through 1 864. B.C.'s econonn went through a radical transformation. HB.C. bought coal in 1855. Commercial fishing started in the 186()s. and logging dominated the B.C. economy by 1^00. Of these ad\ancemenls. perhaps the most important was the beginning of a series of gold rushes at\er the California Gold Rush. Gold was lea\ ing B.C. down the Columbia Ri\ er. destined for the US - untaxed. In response. B.C. created its own trade route from the Kast using the Thompson Ri\er which flowed right through the Neskonlith-Douglas Resen e and past Kamloops. The fur industrv relied on native human capital (knowledge and skill) for success as w ell as the natural resource of animal fur. but (he gold. coal, forest and fishing industries needed little or no name human capital, only their natural capital (natural resources). An Indian strike or boscott could only hurt the fur industry. This lowered the value of a content Indian population dramatically.

In I8M. Chief Commissioner of Lands and Works .loseph Tnitch canceled all of the Douglas Reser\es. unilateralK sei/ing most of the land. At the same time, white settlers seized agricultural and grazing land from tribes forcinu them to clear timbered land and live in

increasingly separated marginal pockets. The Neskonlith-Douglas reserve became several small bands (Neskonlith, Little Shuswap and Adams Lake), that are separated by the white settler town of Chase.

Systematic oppression increased significantly as land became more crucial to colonial economic development. Catholic residential schooling started in Kamloops in 1 890 when police came door to door with the priest, forcing Indian children to leave their homes, leave their language and leave their culture. Residential schooling ended in Kamloops in 1978, and many of today's Secwepemc elders went to school there. The indigenous presence in the fishing market was a threat and the B.C. government banned commercial fishing by Indians from 1871 through 1927, which included the destruction of Indian fishing devices by federal officials in 1897 and 1912.

New indigenous groups and organizations actively fought the taking of land and fishing rights in B.C.: the 1906 Assembly of coastal and ulterior Indian people at Cowichan, the Indian Rights Association (1909). the Interior Alliance ( 1 909). the Friends of the Indians (1 9 1 0 ) and the Allied Indian Tribes of British Columbia (1916). These groups petitioned government agencies and politicians and rejected their unfair proposals. William Parish, Chief of the Neskonlith Band, went to England in 1 926 with other B.C. chiefs to petition the Queen on land issues. Soon after, the 1927 Indian Act prohibited meeting or raising money to pursue land claims; lawyers representing Indians on land issues faced disbarment.

As most of the indigenous rights organizations fell apart, some people took the movement underground vsith the 1931 Native Brotherhood. They led protests over fishing, land and the loss of culture during a time when the native population in B.C. hit its low point. The Native Brotherhood sang "Onward Christian Soldiers" at their meetings to disguise them as religious gatherings (they still sing it as a reminder of their oppression). Chief Frank Calder of the Nisga'a Nation was elected to the B.C. Legislature in 1 949. Even though the ban officially ended in 1951. organizing was minimal until 1969 when the Minister of Indian Affairs, Jean Chretien (the current Prime Minister) drafted a white paper proposing an end to all Indian reserves, Indian land claims and Indian sovereignty. The Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs raised enough support to have the white paper rejected. Neskonlith Chief George Manuel, as president of the Union (a democratic institution with broad equal representation and less hierarchy), formed the World Council of Indigenous Peoples in 1 975. which earned him three Nobel Peace Prize nominations.

Two hundred years of complex and unresolved legal battles and negotiations hit a wall in 1 990 after the Oka Crisis in Quebec, where a golf course built on a reserved Mohawk burial ground was occupied by the Mohawk nation. The Canadian government's response was a military siege; the white people's response was a series of riots of up to 7,000 people, with riot police being hit by firebombs from white rioters. Since then, negotiations have been on hold but a landmark December llth. 1997 Supreme Court case. Delgamuuk'w vs. Regina. put indigenous Canadians on perhaps the best legal footing since the seizure of the Douglas reserves. The B.C. Treaty Process, the only process the B.C. government considers valid, requires foregoing all Aboriginal Title and Land rights as a precondition of the process. Delgamuuk'w requires "good faith and give and take on all sides," including the provincial side.

The Native Youth Movement formed in Winnipeg during the same time as the Oka crisis. With support and direction from elders, they

have taken to a new set of tactics. Instead of waiting for governments to grant their land to them (as it is being logged and developed), they are taking the land and waiting for the government to take it back, thus forcing a court battle with the intention of using Delgamuuk'w and the established right of native people to preempt unused Crown land, a right reacknowledged in 1953.

After over 120 years of over fishing by white people, the B.C. government banned fishing in the Eraser River for fish conservation. This prevented the Cheam people from using their right to fish and hunt grounds on or near traditional land. The Cheam asked, "conservation for whom?" Starting April 14. 2000, they disobeyed the laws and continued to fish, forcing an agreement allowing them to fish. In the process, members of the Native Youth Movement (NYM) reoccupied several islands in the Eraser River, giving them to the Cheam. Similarly, Westbank Nations started to har\'est trees in 1999 without paying stumpage fees to B.C..

The tourism industry is beginning to expand based on the success of the Whistler Ski Resort and Municipality, built on unceded indigenous land. Olympic Gold Medalist Nancy Greene Raine and her developer husband. Al Raine. received government pemiission to build a $55 million dollar ski resort at Sutikalh (a.k.a. Melvin Creek). Women leaders of the St'at'imc Nation initiated an occupation of the proposed resort site by members of the Native Youth Movement on May 2nd, 2000. The site is still occupied. Nancy Raine says she won't develop v\ ithout consent from the local native people, yet the government has not gi\en up. They allov\ed parts of the same area to be logged. The occupants of the Sutikalh camp began blocking the logging trucks. The trucks stopped coming for a while, but then on July 5th, 2001, the logging resumed with Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) support. The RCMP asked the blockaders to move off the road then, after they moved, arrested seven people.

Another ski resort. Sun Peaks, is already half-built and located on the 1862 Neskonlith-Douglas Reserve. The govcmmcnt's system is to lease mountain and hillside land for ski runs and then grant tenure (which is near ownership) for the valley land below, thus giving the government a stake in the success of the ski resort and the ability to raise the rent. Sun Peaks is actually a town, with its own municipal government, RCMP post and other services. Its proposed site is larger than all the land officially held by the three bands of the area is. During the planning stage. Sun Peaks tried to negotiate with local tribes (not just the three bands of the 1862 Neskonlith-Douglas Reserve) but with the development of the resort a foregone conclusion. Chief Art Manuel of

ECONOMICS

the Neskonlith Band petitioned for the resort to not be built, while Chief

Felix Amousc of the Little Shuswap Band took a concession from Sun

Peaks to build and operate employee housing at the resort.

Sun Peaks' next ski run is set for Morrisey Mountain which prompted

a protest on March lOth. 2001 by Secwepemc people during

MuchMusic's SnowJob TV special. Sun Peaks then added "First Nation

Attractions" to their tourism melange, including a Secwepemc Medicine

Trail, a Secwepemc retail store and cultural performances.

Sun Peaks' development strategy is similar to the early settlers' strategy

of seizing adjacent land bit by bit. using the needs of the already seized

property to justify more seizure. The overcrowded band reserves are

unable to get more Crown land because the province insists that they

enter the humiliating treaty process first. The Neskonlith-Douglas

reserve has already been clear-cut and the Secwepemc people still use

the area for subsistence: animals, fish, medicine, roots and berries. The Native Youth Movement started a Secwepemc chapter,

inspired by the Sutikalh occupation.

They placed a ca?np outside of the

entrance to Sun I'eaks on unused

government land, called the

"Skweltwek'welt Protection

Centre" and handed out leatlets,

reminding the residents of Sun

Peaks that the land.

Skweltwek'welt, was stolen.

Everyone who comes to Sun Peaks

drives by the signs, tents and fiags.

Another part of Sun Peaks"

expansion included ringing

McGilvery Lake w ith town homes.

That expansion would pollute the

water more than the other

expansions because the drinking

water for the bands comes in part

from that lake. So on May 24th.

2001. the Native Youth Movement

began their three day occupation of

the government's British Columbia

Assets and Land Corporation

(B.C.AL) office in Kamloops. The

office is responsible for

administering logging and

development rights on Crown land.

including and especially the

expansion by Sun Peaks into

McGilvery Lake.

On the second day. the RCMP

delayed the use of a court order to

remove the protest from the B.C.AL

office, seized the clothes and bedding of the occupants, locked them

inside and turned up the air conditioner. That tactic didn't work, and

the RCMP still had to physicallv remove and arrest all 1 6 of them from

ihe olTice the next day. .Amanda Sopcr. one of the Secwepemc Native

Youth movement spokespeople. said. "Its up to us the young people ...

to take a stand. Fifty percent of the aborignial population in Canada is

youth. So we're the future leaders. We're the majority of the

demographics ... it's up to us to make thai change and challenge the ° system."

■S Immediately after lea\ ing jail, the same group of indigenous youth

o and elders began to reoccupy McCiilvery Lake. A tour company was 5 forced lo not use the lake and mo>c|uilo sprav ing lor the lake was axed. % A rotating group of 4.'^ people built a traditii>nal summer home for the " site. Another summer home v\ as placed on a construction road and later »« destroyed by Sun Peaks. Periodicallv. the Secwepemc Native ^'outh

Movement protested at the Sun Peaks Day lodge; a few NYM members from the US have joined the occupation in solidarity. In the tradition of (Jka. Wounded Knee and Chiapas, they wear camouflage and bandanas and they play drums. This occupation and the protests scared the white residents of Sun Peaks who have since been meeting about the occupation. While the local media reports that the tourism industry in the area will suffer (perhaps due to the province-wide coverage on TV?). Sun Peaks reports high occupancy rates and their best season to date. During one of the N>'M's routine dav lodge protests on June 24. a drunk angry white male approached the protest. He said he wouldn't hit a women, so the two spokespeople (both women) moved to the front to prevent a conflict, their lawyers standing next to them. Eventually, he hit one of the spokespeople. Nicole Manuel, in the face, with his fist. One of the lawyers struck back, and the white man fell to the ground.

A little later, Nicole Manuel said, "I went back actually to see if he was all right, because he was bleeding otThis head. 1 pulled down my mask and 1 just wanted to ask him w hy he had hit me. He basically just still had hate him for me and he said. "Because 1 fuckin" hate you fuckin" Indians. ■ He just looked at me."

Todd Lamirande of the .Aboriginal Television Network. V ideotaped much of this protest ( but was unable to film the whole confrontation). On his way home from the protest, he was stopped by the RCMP. Thev impounded his car. brought him to jail, obtained a warrant for the unbroadcast tapes, got the tapes from the car and set Lamirande free w iihout charges. The RCMP used those tapes (which included other protests) to get arrest warrants for six of the native youth at that protest, including Nicole Manuel. Thirty-five RCMP arrested three of them at the McGih ery Lake camp on June 26 and two more turned themselves in. The man w ho assaulted Nicole Manuel turned himself in as well.

In response to that protest, an arsonist burned down the (nearly finished, vet unoccupied) protest cabin on the road to McCiilverv Lake. \\ hite residents of Sun Peaks had been threatening to take action if the RCMP did not and apparently this was their first step. These events caught the attention of the new Liberal Party provincial government, encouraged bv Sun Peaks, who hope to draft legislation and start talks toward ending the confiict.

Sun Peaks drew a line in the sand regarding the continuously occupied Protection Centre at the entrance to Sun Peaks. Thev wanted the camp removed and the site unoccupied by Friday. Julv (1. C hief.Xrt Manuel and Secwepemc elders, along with the Native \'outh Movement, called for a rally on that day. During that rally. Sun Peaks logged the adjacent land (making room for more development) The rallv pailicipanis suspected Sun Peaks of Irving to bait rally participants into blocking the logging trucks which would have allowed the RCMP to take immediate action. It was only the day before that NYM protesters near Sutikalh were set up

PJLlllCS-

by the RCMP for blocking logging trucks.

During that rally, I saw a dozen trucks and SUVs drive by with middle-aged white men armed with video cameras and angry shouts: "Go home!" I raised my camera to photograph one of them and the driver sped off A local pri\ ate security and detection agenc\' kept a man posted at the rally, writing down the license plate numbers of all the cars and keeping a log of events. One of the houses on the adjacent hill served as an RCMP station, again with more \ideotaping.

After a big media blitz (with the ubiquitous images of drumming Indians and journalist voiceovers - and little else), nothing happened. As promised. Sun Peaks applied the next Monday for a court order to remo\ e the Protection Centre. At the beginning of the occupation, it was unused government land yet it was later granted to Sun Peaks by B.C.AL. Native land preemption rights conflicted with the new Sun Peaks land grant and delayed the issue of the court order to remove the protest camp. Unlike the B.C.AL office occupation in Kamloops where a court-ordered remov al v\ as easy, ev er\ court order on unused Crow n land faces complex legal action and the ability of the protesters to appeal. After the RCMP arrested four people on July 23 at the Protection Centre, the protest camp moved to new. unused government land down the road and now the process starts all over again.

Occupations are extremely important from a legal perspectiv e. in part because the validity of land claims within the Dclgamuuk'w decision's framework rests on the fact that B.C.'s crown land is unceded. unconquered. still used and still occupied by indigenous people. If the government ever comes to the negotiation table, occupations w ill be part of what establishes "used" land but ev er\ one in the area uses the watershed and the trees.

Chief Art Manuel through the Interior .Mliance is spearheading another legal challenge in the lumber industry. Along with the Canadian Grand Council of the Cree (in conjunction with U.S. environmental groups, on top of the U.S. lumber industry's complaint), they asked the U.S. government to apply a tariffon Canadian softwood lumber because if indigenous people had any of the legally promised sovereign control over crown land, they could restrict supply (which raises the price) or require compensation (also raising the price); the lack of that control is a subsidy on Canadian softwood lumber, according to the petition.

Delgamuuk'vv may come into play in the forthcoming Canadian challenges against the 19.31% tariff in U.S. courts, NAFTA and the WTO. That depends on whether the U.S. thinks that helping winning the softwood lumber dispute is worth empowering Canada's indigenous people. That seems unlikely, giv en a new direct action campaign in the northeast comer of B.C. where on August 8th. members of the Halfway River Nation began blocking the construction of a natural gas pipeline through traditional hunting grounds. New natural gas discoveries in the area have set ofTa small natural gas boom and the power-strapped U.S. West Coast power grid's main long run solution is more natural gas plants.

Currently, two thirds of B.C.'s natural gas goes to the U.S. With the Canadian dollar so weak in comparison to the U.S. dollar, large exports are important for getting enough currency to allow U.S. imports. B.C.'s indigenous people are challenging three of their biggest U.S. currency sources: forest products, energy and tourism. The Indigenous Environmental Network held its annual conference in Penticton, B.C., in July, where oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was a major topic. The Native Youth Movement held workshops on decolonization and direct action. The Gwit'chin people (who straddle the Alaska- Yukon border) plan direct action to stop the drilling. Setting large developments aside still leaves the issues of poverty and pollution in indigenous communities; the loss of land requires indigenous people to rely less on themselves and more on the B.C. economy, which can be quite racist, discriminatory and contrarv' to their values toward their cnvironinent. -^

Insiders' Art: The Context Col- lection by Artists in Prison IS a book filled with the art and words of over 100 prisoners. It is an im- pressive collection of thoughtful work, skillfully executed with pen- cil and ink. on envelopes and handkerchiefs. Like many artists, these men and women create as a vehicle for expression, as a way to exercise their passions. But prison artists also create to record their struggles - struggles inside an unjust, debili- tating system that seeks to strip away all expression, passion, and creativity. Insiders' Art came together sort of by accident. The group of volunteers running the Philadelphia-based Books Through Bars (BTB) project wanted to do something with the many pieces of art sent as thank-you gifts from prison- ers who received literature. By compiling an art collection to be shown in pub- lic venues, printed on post-cards, and published in a book, BTB extends their program of education to a realm outside of prisons. In this manner, not only do prisoners have the opportunity to share their story but that story may help to shatter misconceptions about prisoners and the prison system. Recurring im- ages and themes school the 'outsider' on everything from day to day life, eco- nomics of the prison system, the death penalty, women and political prisoners, faith, and culture. Artwork is accompanied by written contributions that speak of artistic influences, personal reflections, memories from childhood, and the dehumanizing conditions inside U.S. prisons. The editors supply brief introduc- tions to each section that include statistics on everything from the lack of rehabilitation programs, to abuses by prison guards and officials, to the in- crease in prison labor used by companies like Starbucks and TWA.

Insiders' Art will capture your attention both emotionally and intellectu- ally. This book opens a window into the inhumane reality of the prison system that many ignore or justify as America's only solution to crime. One can't ad- mire the beautiful, poignant works without being led to question the iniquitous factors that have led the U.S. to boast the world's highest incarceration rates. The Contexts project and BTB hope that this questioning will bring people to- gether in dialogue, provoke activity and participation, and eventually lead to prison reform and social change.

Insiders'Art: TtieContextCollectionbyArtlstsinPrison , Edited byJill Benowitz, Tim Dunn and Barbara Hirshkowitz. Published by the Contexts Project of Books Through Bars, 4722 Baltimore Avenue, Philadelphia, PA. 19143 or email contexts@booksthroughbars.org: 80 Pages. $14.95. -Catherine Komp

Dark Days is arresting. 1 watched this film last night and will probably watch it again in the next couple of days. I can't get the images and narrative out of my mind. For those who don't know. Dark Days is an 88- minute documentary about people living in the tunnels beneath New York City. Director Marc Singer spent two years under New York City living in the tunnels with the subjects of his film. In fact, the "production crew" of the film usually consisted of people living in the tunnels with him. The resolve of the subjects in their mtention to carve out comfortable niches for themselves in the tunnels be- neath the city IS amazing. The stories you hear from the people about how they came to live in the tunnels as well as the theories behind why they intend to stay there are tragically complex. I found myself laughing at some and shrugging my shoul- ders at others; amazed throughout at the resilience of the people living in make- shift homes next to the train tracks below the city. In addition to captivating hour spent with people below the city, one of the most interesting aspects of the film is watching the transition they make from their underground dwellings to their above-ground apartments arranged for by AMTRAK after much protest of their removal from the tunnels. With a soundtrack by DJ Shadow and three awards from Sundance in 2000, Dark Days is undoubtedly one documentary you should see this year.

VHS: $24.99; DVD (contains 50 minute of additional features): $14.95 www.palmpictures.com

-jason kucsma POLITIC^

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ABane»trh?tX:ARB BodeoniaarB Reject

Atom and His Package Redefining Music Atom IS a young man from Philadelphia. The package is his sequencer; the little electronic machine that provides the structure for incredibly clever, insightful and unavoidably danceable songs lil(e you've never heard before Even as I write this. I know many of you are familiar with the work of Atom and His Package With three full-length recordings (four including this one) and over 20 cross-countiv tours in his corner, chances are you know someone who is a fan This new release only furthers Atom's work as an artist, critic, satirist, commentator and documentarian of pop culture and independent music scenes. Included on this 15-song CD are three covers of Mountain Goats' originals, a cover of Madonna's "Open Your Heart" and my self- explanatory favorite. "If You Own the Washington Redskins. You're a Cock." This release, contrary to its title, does not redefine music, but rather reinforces the importance of the music he redefined over three years ago when Atom met The Package and brought us new expectations for what music could offer.

$7/LP; $10/C0

Hopeless Records. PO Box 7495. Van Nuys. CA

91409-7495

www, hopelessrecords.com

Amor Y Lucha

Working from the rich tradition of independent art. politics and culture in Washington O.C. Amor Y Lucha IS a new record label dedicated to bringing independent political artists and bands to an audience in North America, The idea is that global capitalism affects us all and that we can learn from and work with each other to develop alternatives to corporate exploitation and the resulting economic inequality— and a love for music is one thing that we all have in common. The first two releases on Amor Y Lucha include a split 7" between Homage to Catalonia and Redencion 9-11 (the former is a solo acoustic project done by Kadd Stephens and the latter is a Chilean hardcore band) and a full- length CD by Homage to Catalonia. Both releases are beautifully packaged in hand-constructed sleeves bound together with hemp twine and hand-screened graphics. This is definitely a great introduction to what will hopefully be a longstanding contributor to politically progressive art and music.

7'7$4 ppd: CD/$8 ppd at:

Amor Y Lucha 2012 1/2 Pierce Mill Road NW.

Washington. DC 20010 USA

www idealpolitikorg/amorylucha

With Literacy and Justice for All: A Benefit for DC Area Boolts to Prisons Project

The DC Area Books to Prisons Project was created to "facilitate and support positive efforts to educate those behind bars " Books to Prisons is one of many nationwide projects to recognize the need for rethinking how the US justice system deals with crime It does so by providing tree reading matenals to prisoners while also working with projects aimed at reversing the trend that has seen an increase in incarceration spending and a decrease in education funding— a seemingly counterintuitive trend This CD compiles independent political artists ranging in styles from hardcore to punk to acoustic and anything in between organized together to support the Books to Prisons Project Included on this compilation are previously-unreieased tracks from The Assistant. Zegota. Rouge. Marion Delgado. Virgina Black Lung. Homage to Catalonia. Thursday, Andrea Lisi and others This

is definitely a worthwhile project and notable collection of artists.

CD/$10ppd

Exotic Fever Records. PO Box 297. College Park.

MO 20741

vww exoticfevercom

Nakatomi Plaza Private Property Its all too rare that an unknown release shows up in our mailbox that grabs my attention This IS due, in part, to the fact that I like a lot of different types of music and usually keep up with the stuff that I know I like. So when Nakatomi Plaza arrived. I was skeptical. Who the hell are these kids and why should I like "em' Within seconds of the first song. I knew they were punk/hardcore in the way that I like my punk/hardcore served; intense, poppy (at times), political and with a healthy sense of humor and satire. Combining the raw ugliness of the hardcore sound born out of the Angelhair/ Heroin/Antioch Arrow-esque scenes and the vocal harmonies and anthemic energy of Strike Anywhere with the poppiness of some of the new biggest things (i.e. Get Up Kids). Nakatomi Plaza piece together a full-length effort of personal/ political epics that make for an amazing first effort. I'm looking forward to hearing more from them in the future.

$7/CD

Nakatomi Plaza, c/o BD Records. PO Box 860.

NY. NY 10268-0860

www.bd-records.com/nakatomi

The Faint Danse Macabre I've been waiting for this CD to come out for a long time. About a year and a half ago, I stumbled onto The Faint's Blank Wave Arcade and was amazed by their ability to write convincing new wave jams that didn't sound contrived. After going back and listening to their first full-length, it seemed a logical progression that their sound (which had previously featured a more prominent "indie rock " type of sound, if there is such a thing) would begin to incorporate more of the electronic elements into their sound. If Blank Wave Arcade was. indeed, a transition album, then Danse Macabre is evidence that The Faint have gone headlong into a dark new wave void and show no signs of re-emerging. Gone are the hints of indie/punk rock influence. Instead. The Faint are completely immersed in the colorless (but not motionless) void of gothic new wave.

Saddle Creek Records. PO Box 8554. Omaha, NE 68108-8554 www saddle-creek com

Milemarter Anaesttiaetic Quite recently, our great president GW Bush issued an edict that either "you're with us, or you re with the terrorists " in reference to the attacks on this "'beacon of freedom and democracy." Where was the gray area that allows you to think things through? To agree with some things and disagree with others? Recognizing the lunacy and counterproductivity of such reductive thinking. I vrondered if I had ever been guilty of the same flawed logic in my relatively short life' And then I remembered that I had. just SIX months ago. said that "either you love Milemarker or you hate them, theres no 'in between " Based on my admittedly unscientific research, this is what I had surmised Mention Milemarker and people either said. "Gross, I hate them'' or "Hell. yeah. I saw them tvra months ago at the . and they were amazing."

However, after listening to Anaestlietic. I've thought about them a bit and I'm ready to retract my flawed hypothesis. Truth is. Milemarker have written some amazing songs in their short, but prolific, lifespan. They've also written some pretty horrible ones. I've often rationalized this disparity as them "trying to find their sound," and I think they finally have it nailed down "Anaesthetic " is. at once uncomfortable and haunting in its combination of electronic and electric elements that creates what I think is their most cohesive effort Seven songs detail with beautifully poetic lyrics the discontent of the status quo and the promise of resistance as evidenced by the lyrics of "Shrink to fit" that profess "We sleep to sew the seams that we oppose. We shrink to fit in our pre-assigned roles. Resist with each stitch. Split the seams and start all over again. Cut the pattern that fits. Ready made rarely means ready to fit." I could quote the rest of the album, but III leave that up to you to investigate.

Jade Tree Records, 2310 Kennwynn Rd

Wilmington, DE 19810

www.jadetree.com

Rah-Bras RuyBlas'

It would seem humanly impossible for three people to make music that is so elaborately larger than life. If you were to just listen to Ruy Bias! without looking at the liner notes, you would be quick to assume that Rah Bras is a project consisting of a sizable cast of misfits; a band of electronic gypsies convening with a viking chorus. The twelve songs that make up the first full-length from the Rah Bras (featuring ex-members of Hose Got Cable. Sleepytime Trio and Damn Near Red) creates a wall of emotion and movement that is unstoppably poppy at times and chaotically unnerving at others If there was such a town (and there arguably is in each of our heads). I would travel to Twin Peaks to see them perform as a house band in one of the dance clubs where they would be very much at home. In the meantime, you might just want to see them on their North American tour this fall and winter

Lovitt Records. PO Box 248, Arlington. VA 22210-

09998

www.lovitt.com

Stylex Wonder Program

A few issues back, I claimed that Stylex was sincerely melding the wortd of rock and roll and electronic music in ways that virere sure to gamer them the attention outside of the loyal Northwest Ohio crowds that support them. I'm even more convinced this is the case after hearing their most recent full-length effort. Their creative use of keyboards, vocal processing, and time-tested formulas for constructing catchy rock songs (as well as strategically placed hand-claps') has deservedly earned them comparisons to The Faint and Brainiac Combine all of this with the fact that these (really great) kids have produced their new CD from start to finish all by themselves (i e wrote, played, recorded, produced, mixed, burned cut. folded, etc .. ), and you have a project that is SO worth checking out. I'll be the first to admit that the CD-R(evolution) has its fair share ot poorly-executed projects, but this is definitely NOT one of them Stylex would rather not do a CO than release something that they weren't completely happy with, and this is why we have had to wait so long to hear recordings of these 10 songs we've been singing along to at shows tor over a year now Check em out

$6/CD

Stylex, 15 N. Michigan, Toledo, OH 43624

www.stylexohiocom

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i^mt

a conversation with

ots Riley

w

photos aod words by Not4Prophet

^

The Coup has been around from the days of conscious hip hop through gangsta rap and the co-opted < rap that currently passes for culture, and has li\ed to tell a story of the streets, survival and socialism. For The Coup, revolution is rap and resistance, but never rhetoric. In their music, they talk about life and liberation and all those other little thi^g^ that usually slip through the collective cracks of our commercialized consciousness. The Coup wanna kill their landlord and the CEO and en- courage you to steal their album while you're sippin' on that ghetto glass of genocide and juice. Yeah, they're real, and they belie\c in anncd struggle too, but it's a war against who stole the soul and ripped otTthe rhyme. 1 met with Boots Riley, the leader of the Coup, in some posh apartment somewhere in downtown New York Babylon where neither of us seemed to belong to preach politics for the people and play a little party music.

The Coup has existed for over 10 years so you 've essentially seen everyone from Chuck D unci BDP to the X-Clan and H'u-Tang Clan, but I think when it comes to hip hop. a lot of folks' memories only go as far as MTV and Eminem. So who stole the soul'.'

I think the whole way that the history of hip hop is being told to people right now is a kind of cooptation or theft in and of itself They've essentially taken hip hop away from the source that it came from and whitewashed it so it no longer has a clear history and origin, so we become almost stripped of our collective memory, but hip hop is not just a series of ac-

cidental occurrences where somebody moved from here to there and put the peanut butter in the chocolate and then you had hip hop. When I was in Detroit, the thing was hamboning before I ever heard anybody rap - this was in '75, '76 - so when I first heard Sugar Hill Gang. I was like, "Hey, they got a hambone record on the radio," but nobody ever talks about things like that. Hip hop is not just a series of things that happened with a few people. It's not just what you see on TV. For what hip hop is today, you have to give props to those people that helped it to become what it is.

.SV; what would he the reason Jor blurring the history of hip hop'.'

It's an attempt to commodity the art or cul- ture so that they can sell it, like anything else. It's much easier to sell a simplified, watered- down version of anything than to deal with the real history and the complications and questions that may exist. Even the idea that the four elements are all that drove and com- prised hip hop is basically a way to commodify it. To be able to separate some- thing in such rigid categories is in keeping w ith the way that they sell anything.

//; terms of the histoiy of hip hop and artists like Public Enemy or KRS who helped to pio- neered political hip hop. I don 't sec an awful lot of politicking these days. What happened to "I 'm a rebel so I rebel "?

1 think riizht now w ith the lack of a Black mass

PEOPLE

movement out there, and with the fact that things are just getting worse economicalh for people. ue"re more and more - outside and inside of hip hop - being taught to embrace everything that is wrong with this capitalist system. We're essentially being told that it's cool to have a poster of Bill Gates on our ceiling and jerk off to him every night and we are being con\ inccd that Donald Trump and his type are some kind of social superhero, so for many people, images in hip hop of someone that has a million dollars are the only liberating images that they've ever seen in their lifetime. It's the only image they've seen of someone that's free from oppression. A lot of people are latching onto that sim- ply because there is no mo\ement that they see. so they are belie\ ing in the American dream that anybody can become a millionaire and that's what some of that hip hop that exists today is there to affimi, but it's really just telling of the fact that there is no movement out there. When they see that someone has a mansion and a big car, it's almost like they're witnessing power that they've never seen and ne\er had access to. It's not a real image but they think that it's a liberating im- age. That's liberation as far as they're concerned.

There was a time when some of its though! that the Hip Hop Nation itself could he that new revohitionaiy movement, hut now we 're saying that there's no movement that can move hip hop in a politically con- scious or revohitionarv direction.

Hip hop is not a movement in and of itself. Hip hop is not separate from the people. Hip hop was and has always been an outgrowth of people's struggles. It's an outgrowth of where the people are. The idea that they were putting out there that there's a separate Hip Hop Nation or whatever, and inside this Hip Hop Nation everything is politically perfect and The Nation will go this way or that way and lead the people, is an outgrowth of the fact that they tried to make hip hop seem like it wasn't an outgrowth of the people.

Talking about The Coup, who have been back and forth between major and indie labels, or Dead Pre:, for instance, who are on a major label, y(ni definitely have a question oj access. Although Dead Prez are still not being heard as much as, say. Jay Z or Puff Daddy, they still have a relationship with the big boys who essentially control the radio, TV and. potentially, billions of dollars in advertising. So the question is, would Dead Pre:, who are getting some above ground recognition, be a total obscurity if they were on an indie label that didn t have all that corporate power and if they were on an indie label, would that mean that there 's that many less people who could hear what they are tiying to do and the vital message that they re tiying to put forth in terms of the movement and the struggle'.^

Of course there's a lot of irrele\ant music being put out by the majors, but is v\hat"s being put out b\' the indies automatically more progres-