WEBVTT - Part Two: Judi Bari Didn't Bomb Herself: Earth First! & the Timber Wars 0:00:00.840 --> 0:00:03.160 Hello, and welcome to cool people who did cool stuff. 0:00:03.200 --> 0:00:08.160 I'm your host, Margaret Kiljoy. My guest today is Sophie. 0:00:08.200 --> 0:00:13.520 Who is this weird person on the zoom call. It's 0:00:13.560 --> 0:00:18.800 just they're weird. They're just Garrison. I'm very normal, very normal. 0:00:19.280 --> 0:00:22.439 Why would you think they're weird? It was the lime 0:00:22.440 --> 0:00:26.640 green ski mask? Oh is that weird? That's pretty normal 0:00:26.720 --> 0:00:32.920 for me. Our guest today is Garrison. That's what their 0:00:33.680 --> 0:00:40.360 Zoom name says. Anyway, I can't op sick failed. Damn it. 0:00:40.400 --> 0:00:45.879 I forgot to sign out of my Zoom account. Damn it. 0:00:46.560 --> 0:00:50.800 Our producer is Sophie Lichterman. Hi, Sophie, Hi Magpie. Our 0:00:50.840 --> 0:00:53.199 audio engineers Ian. Our theme music was written for us 0:00:53.200 --> 0:00:58.000 by young woman. And this is part two of a 0:00:58.040 --> 0:01:01.480 two parter. And you know the real You are not 0:01:01.760 --> 0:01:05.679 allowed to listen to this until you listen to part one. 0:01:06.319 --> 0:01:12.200 If you do, Garrison will find you and you'll see 0:01:12.240 --> 0:01:16.759 someone with a lime green ski mask and it would 0:01:16.760 --> 0:01:21.880 be the last thing you ever see. I love that. 0:01:21.920 --> 0:01:24.399 I've gotten much more mysterious since the first part, so 0:01:24.480 --> 0:01:28.160 that's good. It's true. Yeah, that was the adjective you picked, 0:01:28.160 --> 0:01:33.040 so it makes sense. Not ever joyful. God forbid? I wait, 0:01:33.080 --> 0:01:35.800 I'm kill joy? Okay? So this yeah, well, yeah, come on, 0:01:35.880 --> 0:01:40.760 what this week we are talking about Judy fucking Berry, 0:01:40.800 --> 0:01:43.480 the earth First or and labor organizer and all around badass, 0:01:43.680 --> 0:01:47.120 who has just started organizing against logging in California by 0:01:47.319 --> 0:01:50.040 organizing the loggers themselves, and we're gonna talk about how 0:01:50.040 --> 0:01:54.440 she did that. Judy, among others, they start a chapter 0:01:54.480 --> 0:01:56.920 of the Industrial Workers of the World, the anti authoritarian 0:01:57.000 --> 0:02:00.000 radical labor Union who rule, who we talked more about 0:02:00.120 --> 0:02:02.640 last September in an episode about the Spoken Free Speech Fight, 0:02:03.040 --> 0:02:05.960 when in the nineteen tens they organized loggers in the 0:02:05.960 --> 0:02:09.600 Pacific Northwest so effectively that the government started shooting them. 0:02:09.639 --> 0:02:13.440 This is, unfortunately, a decent gauge of the efficacy of 0:02:13.480 --> 0:02:17.960 your movement is the degree of violence to which the 0:02:18.000 --> 0:02:22.160 state resorts in order to suppress you. This new IWW 0:02:22.280 --> 0:02:27.440 branch has two goals. First, to bring environmental consciousness to loggers, second, 0:02:27.520 --> 0:02:32.000 to bring class consciousness to environmentalists. Well and more than that, 0:02:32.080 --> 0:02:34.720 the iw's goal. IWW's goal here is to organize the 0:02:34.760 --> 0:02:37.440 loggers just like literally organize them and fight for better 0:02:37.440 --> 0:02:40.799 working conditions. But the sort of like larger metaphorical goals 0:02:40.800 --> 0:02:43.440 are these other things, and the bringing of this organizing 0:02:43.639 --> 0:02:46.120 is to do that. And they were largely effective at this. 0:02:46.280 --> 0:02:48.480 They didn't like succeed outright, but they made a lot 0:02:48.520 --> 0:02:50.240 of progress, They made a lot of allies, and they 0:02:50.280 --> 0:02:52.240 did a lot of fucking good shit despite the fact 0:02:52.240 --> 0:02:55.079 that there are a lot of factors working to keep 0:02:55.080 --> 0:02:58.280 these two camps at odds. A couple of weeks ago, 0:02:58.480 --> 0:03:01.600 we talked about Chico Mendes, Brazilian organizer and the Rainforest, 0:03:01.600 --> 0:03:04.440 who went the opposite route. He went from workers organizing 0:03:04.520 --> 0:03:09.240 to environmentalism and he got shot for it. And he 0:03:09.280 --> 0:03:12.360 has this quote that I didn't include last time, mostly 0:03:12.360 --> 0:03:15.120 because I couldn't source it, and I still can't source it, 0:03:15.160 --> 0:03:16.639 but it's such a good quote that I'm going to 0:03:16.680 --> 0:03:20.799 say it anyway. He has this quote, environmentalism without class 0:03:20.840 --> 0:03:27.040 consciousness is just gardening. Yeah, it's just like not actually 0:03:27.040 --> 0:03:29.799 going to get shit done unless you fucking work together 0:03:29.880 --> 0:03:33.839 with your you know, fellow working class people. And that's 0:03:33.840 --> 0:03:36.520 what Judy Barry and her friends are on about. And 0:03:36.560 --> 0:03:38.960 they did this in a lot of ways. Judy says, 0:03:38.960 --> 0:03:40.360 the main way that they did it is just by 0:03:40.400 --> 0:03:43.600 fucking talking to people. Sometimes even the people that they 0:03:43.600 --> 0:03:46.000 were busy blockading, Like they'd be like, no, you can't 0:03:46.040 --> 0:03:48.560 go log hey, tell me about your life, tell me 0:03:48.600 --> 0:03:51.240 about how this company treats you like, and just like 0:03:51.360 --> 0:03:53.640 listen to people and hear them out and hear their 0:03:53.640 --> 0:03:56.720 problems instead of these sort of condescending city kids of 0:03:56.800 --> 0:03:58.960 fancy degrees who've never stepped into the woods trying to 0:03:59.000 --> 0:04:00.680 tell them what to think and what's to do. So 0:04:00.680 --> 0:04:02.720 they don't like show up and be like have you 0:04:02.800 --> 0:04:08.680 read the Marxism or whatever? It's not an effective strategy. 0:04:09.280 --> 0:04:13.200 She also interviewed loggers on her radio show at some 0:04:13.240 --> 0:04:15.280 point around there. Around here she gets herself a weekly 0:04:15.400 --> 0:04:19.200 radio show, the based fellow fellow podcaster we love to 0:04:19.200 --> 0:04:22.000 see it right, fellow podcaster Judy Barry. And the way 0:04:22.000 --> 0:04:23.880 that she got her podcast is much like the way 0:04:23.880 --> 0:04:26.960 that you and I got our podcast. It's not actually true. 0:04:27.920 --> 0:04:30.200 The only way I found describing how she got her 0:04:30.240 --> 0:04:32.479 podcast is someone who hates her describing it. So I 0:04:32.480 --> 0:04:34.920 don't know how true any of this is. But apparently 0:04:35.520 --> 0:04:37.920 a local radio station fired the only woman who had 0:04:37.960 --> 0:04:40.640 a talk radio station, so she stormed the radio station 0:04:40.640 --> 0:04:43.320 and wouldn't leave until justice was served. And in the 0:04:43.440 --> 0:04:45.560 end of the way that they were like, all right, 0:04:45.600 --> 0:04:47.960 we'll fine, We'll just give you a weekly talk radio show. 0:04:50.760 --> 0:04:53.119 Just like fine, fine, we'll let you all the radio, 0:04:53.160 --> 0:04:57.440 just leave us alone. Yeah, exactly. And she's actually a 0:04:57.640 --> 0:05:00.720 really good podcast I mean radio host. I listened to 0:05:00.880 --> 0:05:04.680 one of the episodes that she did where she is 0:05:04.720 --> 0:05:07.560 interviewing a logger and she's interviewing this logger because this 0:05:07.640 --> 0:05:11.359 logger wrote a letter critical of earth First and a 0:05:11.440 --> 0:05:13.880 letter also critical of old growth logging all at once, 0:05:14.240 --> 0:05:16.440 and so she was like, all right, like I'll talk 0:05:16.480 --> 0:05:19.680 to you, you know. Yeah. And so a lot of loggers, 0:05:19.680 --> 0:05:21.920 even once critical of Judy and earth First, realized they 0:05:21.920 --> 0:05:24.560 were also critical of maxim and clear cutting, and like 0:05:24.600 --> 0:05:29.000 because they're not like they're not they're they're intelligent people. 0:05:29.120 --> 0:05:31.720 It kind of threatens their job security. Yeah, and they 0:05:31.800 --> 0:05:33.680 know it. And sometimes they just like, well, my backs 0:05:33.680 --> 0:05:36.080 to a wall, what am I going to do? Yeah? 0:05:36.120 --> 0:05:38.480 You know, but like yeah, people are like, oh, this's 0:05:38.520 --> 0:05:42.640 clear cutting. That's a bad development in things. And so 0:05:42.720 --> 0:05:45.400 Judy gave a voice to these people by publishing their 0:05:45.440 --> 0:05:48.040 writing and environmentalist newspapers, by talking to them on a 0:05:48.200 --> 0:05:52.160 radio show, and loggers who don't like, who like won't 0:05:52.279 --> 0:05:54.520 cut old growth, who won't take jobs that they involve 0:05:54.560 --> 0:05:58.720 cutting old growth, become a thing and now it's time 0:05:58.760 --> 0:06:01.240 for a personal story an do do do Do Do Do 0:06:01.440 --> 0:06:04.680 Do Doo. One time, in like two thousand and three 0:06:04.800 --> 0:06:07.280 or four something, I was working with UM. I was 0:06:07.320 --> 0:06:09.760 working at blockade, this old growth timber sale in southern Oregon, 0:06:10.200 --> 0:06:12.800 and one morning, the loggers they get around our blockade 0:06:13.000 --> 0:06:15.000 and me and two other folks are like yelling at them, 0:06:15.440 --> 0:06:18.280 probably like don't log old growth, but maybe less politely 0:06:18.320 --> 0:06:21.280 than that, I'm not sure. And one of the loggers 0:06:21.400 --> 0:06:22.680 was like, well, what the hell do you do for 0:06:22.720 --> 0:06:25.320 a living? And we like all thought for half a second, 0:06:25.360 --> 0:06:27.120 and I was like, well, I'm a landscaper. And then 0:06:27.120 --> 0:06:29.920 the other two people boy with were like, we're loggers, 0:06:30.680 --> 0:06:33.680 because that's like what people don't like a fuck tone 0:06:33.680 --> 0:06:37.000 of earth firsters are foresters, loggers, whatever, like people who 0:06:37.000 --> 0:06:39.039 work in the forest for a living care about the 0:06:39.040 --> 0:06:42.360 forest quite often, you know, and like the loggers that 0:06:42.400 --> 0:06:44.120 I was working with in that particular time were people 0:06:44.120 --> 0:06:47.080 who refused to cut old growth. So the loggers they 0:06:47.080 --> 0:06:48.839 were taken aback and they were like, you're on the 0:06:48.839 --> 0:06:50.760 wrong side, and we were like, no, you're on the 0:06:50.760 --> 0:06:55.040 wrong side. It was not a very generative conversation. And 0:06:55.040 --> 0:06:56.720 then they quit their jobs they joined us. We all 0:06:56.760 --> 0:06:59.480 had beers and became friends. That part isn't true. They 0:06:59.520 --> 0:07:02.039 went up the mountain and illegally logged old growth and 0:07:02.160 --> 0:07:04.960 we failed at stopping them. And that particular timber sale 0:07:04.960 --> 0:07:07.640 was in a state like no in state logging company 0:07:07.680 --> 0:07:09.840 would touch it because everyone who lived within a fuck 0:07:09.840 --> 0:07:11.240 one hundred miles. I was like, what the fuck, We're 0:07:11.240 --> 0:07:13.520 not gonna cut that fucking forest, like fuck's wrong with you, 0:07:14.240 --> 0:07:16.400 and so they relied on bringing people from out of state. 0:07:18.040 --> 0:07:20.040 Almost done with the personal anecdote, when I went back 0:07:20.080 --> 0:07:21.920 to work a couple of weeks later as a landscaper, 0:07:22.080 --> 0:07:24.000 my boss was like, Magbie, you don't have to come 0:07:24.000 --> 0:07:25.600 into work today. We're cutting down a tree and I 0:07:25.640 --> 0:07:28.200 don't want you to be sad. And I was like, no, 0:07:28.280 --> 0:07:30.840 I'm a big kid. I can handle taking down a tree. 0:07:30.880 --> 0:07:33.800 I just don't want to fucking log old growth forests 0:07:34.000 --> 0:07:37.280 or clear cut at all. It was just like a 0:07:37.280 --> 0:07:39.119 pine tree that was like maybe gonna fall in someone's 0:07:39.160 --> 0:07:43.760 house in the suburbs of Portland, like whatever that is. 0:07:43.880 --> 0:07:48.080 That is an interesting perception of people's critiques of locking. 0:07:49.120 --> 0:07:51.520 You know, it was very sweet that my boss was like, 0:07:51.560 --> 0:07:53.280 you don't have to come into work if you don't want, 0:07:53.280 --> 0:07:56.080 because we're gonna kill a tree or whatever. You know. 0:07:57.720 --> 0:08:01.680 So Judy Barry is on that tip, the whatever on 0:08:01.760 --> 0:08:05.360 the like actually cares about workers tip. She organized the 0:08:05.400 --> 0:08:07.960 Industrial Workers of the World local and soon she's like 0:08:08.040 --> 0:08:10.600 meeting with mill workers and loggers and ships separately and 0:08:10.640 --> 0:08:14.240 helping them organize. And it's not just Earth First organized 0:08:14.240 --> 0:08:16.720 as loggers. As loggers organized themselves with the help of 0:08:16.720 --> 0:08:20.080 an Earth First organizer, and they fight for union type shit. 0:08:20.160 --> 0:08:22.800 But they got to do it all secretly. Louisiana Pacific, 0:08:22.880 --> 0:08:25.160 another logging company in the area, they had a PCB spill, 0:08:25.240 --> 0:08:30.960 some toxic chemical shit poly chlorinated by fennols. No one 0:08:31.040 --> 0:08:33.160 knew that they had any recourse, but Judy filed a 0:08:33.200 --> 0:08:36.200 complaint with cal Osha and they won compensation for the 0:08:36.240 --> 0:08:40.440 workers and this helps This helps her cred, right, But 0:08:40.559 --> 0:08:42.839 all the organizing is secret because none of these logging 0:08:42.840 --> 0:08:44.600 companies are union and so they got to keep it 0:08:44.600 --> 0:08:47.440 all under wraps, which unfortunately means that's a part of 0:08:47.440 --> 0:08:52.360 her legacy that's often overlooked. And as I read, together 0:08:52.400 --> 0:08:54.439 with some workers, she got the county to claim three 0:08:54.520 --> 0:08:58.160 hundred thousand acres from Louisiana Pacific to put into public 0:08:58.160 --> 0:09:01.160 hands and keep safe. And now let's talk about the 0:09:01.160 --> 0:09:06.000 most contentious tactic around this time. We're going to talk 0:09:06.040 --> 0:09:09.080 about tree spiking. Real quick, we're gonnae into tree spiking discourse. 0:09:09.679 --> 0:09:12.760 This discourse is still going on, Margaret, I'm not going 0:09:12.840 --> 0:09:16.200 to talk about modern discourse. I don't touch modern discourse. 0:09:16.480 --> 0:09:21.760 I'm a historian, thirty year old discourse. Yeah, this is 0:09:21.840 --> 0:09:24.680 newer than I like talking about. I'm so nervous to 0:09:24.720 --> 0:09:27.600 release this because it's about people I like care about 0:09:27.640 --> 0:09:32.200 and shit, you know, like I like writing about dead people. 0:09:35.080 --> 0:09:38.959 But tree spiking, I am not going to give you instructions. 0:09:39.040 --> 0:09:42.280 It is a crime and it has complicated ethics. In 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:44.960 the early eighties, Earth First advocated tree spiking, or some 0:09:45.000 --> 0:09:47.959 individuals amongst it it or whatever the fuck. The basic 0:09:48.040 --> 0:09:50.160 idea was that a metal or ceramic rod or spike 0:09:50.200 --> 0:09:52.280 is inserted into trees and then you put up warning 0:09:52.280 --> 0:09:54.720 signs everywhere saying these trees are spiked. If a chainsaw 0:09:54.800 --> 0:09:56.480 hits a spike, it can break the chainsaw and it 0:09:56.480 --> 0:10:00.600 can endanger the wielder. There were no known sarious injuries 0:10:00.640 --> 0:10:03.040 or deaths caused by tree spiking until suddenly one day 0:10:03.120 --> 0:10:08.160 there was. In May nineteen eighty seven, a sawmill worker 0:10:08.240 --> 0:10:11.160 named George Alexander was nearly decapitated when the blade on 0:10:11.200 --> 0:10:13.760 his mill hit a spike and the blade broke. It 0:10:14.320 --> 0:10:18.240 cut his jaw on half. This was not an Earth 0:10:18.240 --> 0:10:22.600 First related spike. It wasn't an old growth tree. It 0:10:22.720 --> 0:10:26.360 also was added after the log was cut. It was 0:10:26.400 --> 0:10:28.720 like while it was waiting in the yard at the mill. 0:10:29.240 --> 0:10:31.840 Because tree spiking has done by the environmentalist, was done 0:10:31.840 --> 0:10:34.680 on public lands with huge warning signs and announcements, because 0:10:34.679 --> 0:10:37.640 the goal was to minimize the economic viability of a 0:10:37.640 --> 0:10:40.400 public timber sale project, to bring it down below its 0:10:40.400 --> 0:10:44.360 like threshold of value. These old growth forests and these 0:10:44.360 --> 0:10:49.400 private forests, it wouldn't have made much sense because the 0:10:49.440 --> 0:10:54.280 economics of private timber is completely fucking different. Least of 0:10:54.320 --> 0:10:56.360 all to do after the logs are cut, because at 0:10:56.360 --> 0:10:58.160 that point you're not saving a tree. And it was 0:10:58.200 --> 0:11:01.800 some twelve inch diameter tree. They don't know who spiked it. 0:11:01.840 --> 0:11:05.080 There's a bunch of people guessing there was like a 0:11:05.200 --> 0:11:07.640 crank in the area who very clearly spiked the trees 0:11:07.640 --> 0:11:10.400 in his property. I say crank, but this thing that 0:11:10.440 --> 0:11:12.520 he did, like he spiked the trees in his property 0:11:12.520 --> 0:11:17.600 because it was right next to private land and they 0:11:17.600 --> 0:11:19.960 were always known for like famously cutting the trees on 0:11:19.960 --> 0:11:23.720 the other side of the fucking like cutting other people's 0:11:23.720 --> 0:11:25.640 trees illegally and just getting away with it. So he 0:11:25.720 --> 0:11:27.560 spiked all of his own trees and like put up 0:11:27.559 --> 0:11:30.080 signs and ship and so I spiked all these So 0:11:30.080 --> 0:11:33.000 it probably wasn't even him. I don't fucking know. I 0:11:33.000 --> 0:11:35.439 don't know if I can spike this tree. As soon 0:11:35.480 --> 0:11:39.240 as this happened, some North Californian and Southern Oregon Earth 0:11:39.280 --> 0:11:43.120 First chapters renowned spiking as a tactic, and Judy Berry 0:11:43.160 --> 0:11:45.520 is a big part of this renunciation and being her, 0:11:46.000 --> 0:11:48.880 She tracked down the injured worker, interviewed him, and published 0:11:48.880 --> 0:11:51.240 his words in a local newspaper and the Earth First 0:11:51.280 --> 0:11:54.200 Journal and later the Industrial Workers of the World's website. 0:11:54.240 --> 0:11:59.040 The IWW's website put it up. George Alexander was a 0:11:59.080 --> 0:12:01.360 twenty three year old. He was a second generation lumber 0:12:01.360 --> 0:12:03.840 worker and he had the most dangerous job in the mill. 0:12:04.000 --> 0:12:06.480 He was the off bearer who make the first cuts 0:12:06.480 --> 0:12:09.719 through the log. He used a giant bandsaw designed to 0:12:09.760 --> 0:12:13.840 cut through old growth redwood, and somewhat regularly, the off 0:12:13.880 --> 0:12:16.960 bearer hits metal pieces like from old fences and old 0:12:17.040 --> 0:12:19.200 nails and shit, because there are just pieces of metal 0:12:19.240 --> 0:12:23.079 and trees from people like fucking nailing as signed to 0:12:23.120 --> 0:12:25.240 a tree or whatever the fuck you know. Yeah, so 0:12:25.280 --> 0:12:28.640 it's fairly regularly that the band saw blade hits these things, 0:12:28.760 --> 0:12:31.640 lose his teeth and so the workers wear like face masks. 0:12:33.320 --> 0:12:37.320 George feels quite strongly that the company and its disregard 0:12:37.360 --> 0:12:40.480 for its workers safety is to blame. He was working 0:12:40.520 --> 0:12:42.440 with a blade that had already started to wobble and 0:12:42.480 --> 0:12:45.480 had cracks, so he complained about it and his bosses 0:12:45.520 --> 0:12:47.240 were like, get the fuck back to work, We don't 0:12:47.240 --> 0:12:49.960 give a shit about you. He thought about not going 0:12:49.960 --> 0:12:52.200 back to work because it was very dangerous, but he 0:12:52.240 --> 0:12:53.800 had a pregnant wife. It was the only work he 0:12:53.880 --> 0:12:57.319 knew and he didn't have a union. So the bandsaw 0:12:57.400 --> 0:13:01.240 hit a spike and eleven inch nail and the blade broke, 0:13:01.800 --> 0:13:04.160 and it almost killed him. It cut his jugular, it 0:13:04.240 --> 0:13:06.960 ripped out twelve of his teeth as he lay on 0:13:07.000 --> 0:13:09.200 the ground dying. I'm going to quote him about what 0:13:09.240 --> 0:13:13.640 happened next. I knew I was dying, and all I 0:13:13.640 --> 0:13:17.080 could think was Dick Edwards, the boss, and all the 0:13:17.080 --> 0:13:19.200 shit he gave me when I complained about the saw. 0:13:19.640 --> 0:13:21.720 I tried to get up, but they pushed me back down. 0:13:22.160 --> 0:13:24.520 I tried to beckon Edwards so he could come close 0:13:24.600 --> 0:13:26.720 enough for me to get my hands around his throat 0:13:26.760 --> 0:13:29.200 in a death grip. If I had to die, I 0:13:29.240 --> 0:13:32.199 wanted to take that bastard with me, and so his 0:13:32.280 --> 0:13:35.760 fellow workers saved his life. Someone stopped the bleeding, literally 0:13:35.760 --> 0:13:38.200 holding his veins together for a fucking hour before the 0:13:38.200 --> 0:13:41.720 ambulance arrived, while others used to blowtorch to free him 0:13:41.760 --> 0:13:43.920 from the twelve foot section of saw that was wrapped 0:13:43.960 --> 0:13:48.520 around him. From his hospital bed, he made his position clear. 0:13:48.800 --> 0:13:51.040 I am against tree spiking, but I don't like clear 0:13:51.040 --> 0:13:54.960 cutting either, And this is the only documented injury as 0:13:54.960 --> 0:13:58.400 a result of tree spiking. It's enough from my point 0:13:58.400 --> 0:14:00.040 of view. I guess I am or any of this 0:14:00.160 --> 0:14:03.080 course it feels so clear to me that the powers 0:14:03.080 --> 0:14:05.240 that ought not be are working really hard to keep 0:14:05.280 --> 0:14:09.800 the working class from uniting. And to me, this is 0:14:09.800 --> 0:14:14.040 a very resonant story about I don't know about this 0:14:14.080 --> 0:14:19.560 fucking guy, you know. Yeah, But as hard as she 0:14:19.640 --> 0:14:21.320 and some others were working to try and unite the 0:14:21.360 --> 0:14:24.600 working class, most loggers did not really like her or 0:14:24.600 --> 0:14:27.240 earth First at all, and you get this whole fucking 0:14:27.280 --> 0:14:30.720 culture war thing. Northern California, most towns were either logging 0:14:30.760 --> 0:14:34.000 towns or hippie towns. A small handful, because of hard 0:14:34.120 --> 0:14:36.200 organizing work, managed to have sort of a piece between 0:14:36.280 --> 0:14:40.560 the two, and the owners started organizing two And this 0:14:40.600 --> 0:14:43.920 is a recurring theme on this show. The workers get 0:14:43.960 --> 0:14:46.960 a union, why doesn't the right wing management get a union? 0:14:47.600 --> 0:14:50.040 Or in this case, to save the trees and treat 0:14:50.080 --> 0:14:52.920 workers okay group as a movement. Why can't the fuck 0:14:53.000 --> 0:14:56.240 the trees, fuck the workers group have a movement, so 0:14:56.280 --> 0:15:00.520 they make themselves a movement. Nineteen eighty eight, you get 0:15:00.560 --> 0:15:03.680 what's called the wise use movement, or it gets its name, 0:15:04.040 --> 0:15:06.360 or it became more popular. I don't know. It's like 0:15:06.360 --> 0:15:09.280 fucking rid. A lot of different versions about exactly when 0:15:09.280 --> 0:15:11.240 it came into being, but we're going in nineteen eighty eight. 0:15:12.280 --> 0:15:15.480 It's a pro extraction movement with a clever name. It's 0:15:15.480 --> 0:15:18.960 not about wise use, it's about fucking use up everything. Yeah, 0:15:19.000 --> 0:15:21.520 because it was wise used to be chill. We talked 0:15:21.520 --> 0:15:23.480 on the Chico Mendes episode about how the workers in 0:15:23.480 --> 0:15:26.720 the Brazilian rainforests they fought for extractive reserves where the 0:15:26.720 --> 0:15:30.960 forest is kept intact but rubbers gathered naturally and buy 0:15:31.000 --> 0:15:33.480 in large Earth first, even with its no compromise attitude, 0:15:33.600 --> 0:15:36.640 wasn't actually entirely against logging. They put together a ten 0:15:36.680 --> 0:15:39.800 part program about how to do logging sustainably, which includes 0:15:39.840 --> 0:15:42.480 shit like no clear cutting, no old growth logging, You 0:15:42.560 --> 0:15:46.680 must leave wilderness corridors for wildlife to move through. Million 0:15:46.760 --> 0:15:49.240 jobs must be kept, local logged areas, can't be turned 0:15:49.280 --> 0:15:53.760 into non forested areas, et cetera. Super fucking chill. It 0:15:53.840 --> 0:15:58.920 sounds like an actual wise use exactly. And that's something 0:15:58.920 --> 0:16:00.520 that like it would have taken me a while to 0:16:00.560 --> 0:16:02.560 understand when I first got involved, is that that is 0:16:02.560 --> 0:16:05.280 still part of a no compromise attitude, right, because it 0:16:05.360 --> 0:16:08.360 is not a compromise to allow humans to be part 0:16:08.360 --> 0:16:12.480 of the ecosystem. Yeah, humans have been building shelters out 0:16:12.480 --> 0:16:16.760 of trees for yeah, tens of thousands of years. Yeah. 0:16:16.920 --> 0:16:19.200 The wise use movement instead was the owner of big 0:16:19.240 --> 0:16:22.840 evil companies trying to get ranchers, farmers, miners, property owners 0:16:22.880 --> 0:16:26.520 at VARs et cetera to fight against environmentalists and to 0:16:26.560 --> 0:16:29.800 say that environmental restrictions were attack on the cultural values 0:16:29.800 --> 0:16:33.320 of rural people. It's what we call AstroTurf, a fake 0:16:33.400 --> 0:16:37.440 grassroots movement, and sadly it's been very effective. Of course, 0:16:37.440 --> 0:16:39.080 every time some rich kid from the city tells a 0:16:39.120 --> 0:16:43.800 lag or some ignorant shit, the wise use movement grows 0:16:43.880 --> 0:16:46.600 some wings. I don't know whatever, Yeah, you just you 0:16:46.680 --> 0:16:50.640 just set the ecological movement back decades, you know, twenty 0:16:50.720 --> 0:16:54.480 year old from Seattle. Well, and it's like, I mean 0:16:54.680 --> 0:16:56.960 I also get why people are like, fuck you don't 0:16:56.960 --> 0:17:02.000 cut trees. I like totally get that. Yeah, but like, 0:17:04.160 --> 0:17:07.240 fuck your bosses for putting us in this situation. Is 0:17:07.280 --> 0:17:09.960 what we'll actually get us out of this ship. The 0:17:10.040 --> 0:17:12.800 wise use movement people they use yellow ribbons as their sign, 0:17:12.840 --> 0:17:16.159 which is funny because like fucking ten fifteen years later, 0:17:16.240 --> 0:17:18.080 me and my friends are ripping yellow ribbons off of 0:17:18.160 --> 0:17:20.840 cars as part of the you know, stop the invasion 0:17:20.840 --> 0:17:23.760 of Iraq and Afghanistan thing. And they tried to get 0:17:23.800 --> 0:17:26.439 the sawmill operator, the one who had been hurt almost 0:17:26.520 --> 0:17:28.720 killed by the by the spike. They tried to get 0:17:28.760 --> 0:17:31.560 him to go on tour denouncing earth First, and he refused. 0:17:32.080 --> 0:17:35.760 And I am guessing that Judy and other organizers making 0:17:35.760 --> 0:17:38.240 it clear that they were in solidarity with him is 0:17:38.280 --> 0:17:42.080 why he didn't go on tour denouncing earth First. Yeah. 0:17:42.119 --> 0:17:44.280 This is the one thing I know about this tree 0:17:44.320 --> 0:17:47.480 specky incident is that the person did not turn into 0:17:47.520 --> 0:17:50.439 like an anti earth First campaign or afterwards. They actually 0:17:50.480 --> 0:17:55.359 were kind of chill, right, Yeah. And once he's healed, 0:17:55.600 --> 0:17:57.760 his bosses put him back on the night shift. They like, 0:17:57.800 --> 0:17:59.200 he wasn't on the knight shift, but they're like, fuck, 0:17:59.200 --> 0:18:00.639 you're going on the night if we don't like you. 0:18:00.960 --> 0:18:02.800 And then they laid him off when the mill closed 0:18:02.800 --> 0:18:05.439 because they clear cut everything. His quote about it was 0:18:06.280 --> 0:18:12.400 LP Louisiana Pacific is just sorry I didn't die wild. Yeah, 0:18:12.440 --> 0:18:14.280 and I believe it. I believe that they were like, fuck, 0:18:14.320 --> 0:18:15.560 we almost had a mar or why do you have 0:18:15.640 --> 0:18:19.520 to fucking survive. You know. Yeah, they could have like 0:18:19.600 --> 0:18:23.119 drafted like legislation or something. Yeah, they could have. They 0:18:23.160 --> 0:18:25.120 could have tried to hold a whole bunch of stuff. Yeah, 0:18:25.160 --> 0:18:28.840 if they could use this person's like dead memory to 0:18:30.800 --> 0:18:33.800 continue their extraction. But fortunately, since he was able to 0:18:33.800 --> 0:18:36.960 speak for himself, he was able to be like, fucktree spikes, 0:18:37.080 --> 0:18:42.720 fuck clearcuts. You know, shit is heating up earth versus 0:18:42.720 --> 0:18:45.480 blockading the shit out of stuff. Loggers are getting angrier. 0:18:46.440 --> 0:18:49.120 Judy and some of the others are running interference, like, hey, 0:18:49.160 --> 0:18:51.639 maybe you should have better conditions. But workers at this 0:18:51.640 --> 0:18:54.200 point are like shooting shotguns into the air. They knock 0:18:54.240 --> 0:18:57.120 a fifty year old person out like out colds by 0:18:57.119 --> 0:18:59.800 punching her in the face. People are like running into 0:18:59.840 --> 0:19:04.120 the crowd with chainsaws that are running like what the fuck. Yeah, 0:19:04.160 --> 0:19:08.240 they're fucking mad, and they hang Judy Berry in effigy. 0:19:09.080 --> 0:19:12.000 They hit people with axe handles. It's like a rough 0:19:12.040 --> 0:19:15.119 time and it's like yeah, and they're they're on the 0:19:15.160 --> 0:19:18.879 non violence thing right as a strategic move and they 0:19:18.920 --> 0:19:21.600 hold to it, and you know, it is one way 0:19:21.600 --> 0:19:25.240 to build a movement is strategic non violence. And during 0:19:25.280 --> 0:19:28.439 all this, the FEDS are infiltrating like crazy. It's the 0:19:28.480 --> 0:19:31.320 whole co intel Pro handbook for anyone who hasn't listened 0:19:31.359 --> 0:19:34.720 to anything that's happened fifty years ago. Co intel pros 0:19:34.720 --> 0:19:41.360 the counter intelligence program the FBI, basically disrupting leftist organizations 0:19:41.400 --> 0:19:44.400 all throughout the sixties and frankly to the present day. 0:19:45.200 --> 0:19:47.879 They're like in this case, they're sending letters claiming to 0:19:47.880 --> 0:19:50.680 be one earth First organizer to another, like talking shit. 0:19:51.040 --> 0:19:53.960 They're sending in spies and provocateurs. They're using their spies 0:19:54.000 --> 0:19:56.600 to start paranoia by accusing other people of being spies 0:19:56.600 --> 0:19:59.320 and provocateurs. Which is why it's always dangerous to talk 0:19:59.320 --> 0:20:01.800 about co intel pro is because you need to make 0:20:01.800 --> 0:20:03.679 sure people know that one of the things you have 0:20:03.720 --> 0:20:06.679 to not do is talk about co intel pro so 0:20:06.760 --> 0:20:11.200 much that you then spread this. Yeah, but it isn't 0:20:11.240 --> 0:20:14.159 stopping them. Co intel pro does not stop Earth First. 0:20:15.200 --> 0:20:18.040 I like to think that their horizontal organizing structure help 0:20:18.119 --> 0:20:21.280 people like a lot in a lot of ways, Like 0:20:21.880 --> 0:20:23.880 since they're all equals, they're able to kind of more 0:20:23.920 --> 0:20:25.560 be like hey, no, I didn't send you that letter, 0:20:26.160 --> 0:20:28.880 you know. And they have a culture that despite all 0:20:28.920 --> 0:20:31.760 of these like these evolutions and arguments and people leaving 0:20:32.119 --> 0:20:35.320 managed to overall not turn into hatred and actual fighting. 0:20:36.640 --> 0:20:38.879 And maybe that's my idealized take on it from like 0:20:38.960 --> 0:20:43.000 talking to folks, but it's what I believe. And the 0:20:43.040 --> 0:20:48.480 loggers are fucking mad. They're mad that they can't get 0:20:48.520 --> 0:20:55.080 the same deals that you all can get by doing God. 0:20:55.560 --> 0:21:01.000 The ads are getting like worse, Like there's an ad break. 0:21:01.040 --> 0:21:02.600 I thought, I was like, what type of deal is 0:21:02.640 --> 0:21:07.240 Earth First half? They're not getting paid like sales on 0:21:07.680 --> 0:21:10.280 bumper sticker. Earth First mostly sells bumper stickers. I think 0:21:10.280 --> 0:21:12.919 at this point, t shirts you can, you can, you 0:21:12.920 --> 0:21:15.960 can subscribe to the journal. That's true, there's an actual ad. 0:21:16.000 --> 0:21:20.240 Go subscribe to yourth first journal. Anyway, Um there's stuff 0:21:20.280 --> 0:21:23.920 you can buy stuff if you want. I don't fucking care. 0:21:24.040 --> 0:21:29.399 This episode brought to you by Green Ballaclavas. Get yours today, yeah, otherwise, 0:21:29.880 --> 0:21:33.560 otherwise Garrison's gonna be real easy to pick out. If 0:21:33.640 --> 0:21:36.040