""There is no King but King Ludd"" "Byron" "Earth First!" "Earth First!" "Earth First!" "The Politics of Radical Environmentalism" "Earth First is not an organization." "Doesn´t have a president, vicepresident or even a secretary." "It doesn´t have any officers at all." "No headquarters, no high end quarters." "And who is their leader?" "They don´t have a leader." "They are all leaders." "And there is thousands of them running around loose in these United States this very minute." "Earth First got itself started about 7 years ago (1980) by a few people who were tired of all the compromising by the main line environmental outfits." "Earth First is against that kind of compromise." "The way they see it, the wilderness is our natural, native home." "And when government and big business invade your home you don´t compromise, you resist." "If political means don´t work, try public protest." "If that doesn´t work, try civil disobedience." "And if that doesn´t work, as a last resort, you can try environmental sabotage." "Earth First people call this monkeywrenching." "Throwing a monkeywrench into the gears of the industrial system when it comes busting through the front door of your native original home." "If I had a little more nerve, I might joined up with them myself." "At least at night time." "And if I can get my mother and daddy to come with me." "I am here spiking this tree." "And all these other big ones around here today." "They are planned to be cut by the Forest Service." "The sale has been apealed and there is basically nothing else that could be done." "Nothing legaly that could be done." "This is the last method to save these big trees around here." "I am putting the nails in." "We will be telling the Forest Service about it by an anonymous letter." "We are a very specific warrior society." "That´s right." "There are bad men, bad women, trying to destroy everything that´s beautiful, everything that´s right, everything that´s wild on this planet." "And out of this planet, out of the Earth has emerged a society of warriors." "Women and men are planting their spears into the ground and are taking a stand." "And that´s Earth First!" "Earth First I think is a radical environmentalist eco-terrorist organization." "Well it´s not even an organization." "I think it´s a loosly knit group of zealots who are personally motivated to go out and defend the Earth using pretty illegal, pretty harmfull, physically harmfull tactics." "I´ve done all kinds of monkeywrenching." "I´ve taken out..." "I´ve munched roads, I´ve spiked trees," "I´ve siltated equipment, I´ve burned their books." "Couple of us cut down a billboard last summer in Corvallis." "Got cought for that unfortunately." "But..done some other things..here and there." "I am a criminal, because I´ve broken the laws of the society that said so." "Within that context I am a criminal." "But on the other hand that doesn´t have any negative connotations to me because I don´t recognize those laws as being anything important anyway." "As Ed Abbey said at the Little Granite Creek River Rendezvous a few years ago," ""You shouldn´t commit illegal acts, except perhaps at night and with your parents permission."" "Ten years ago I was the chief lobbyist for the Wilderness Society in Washington D.C." "I began to feel along with other people that the environmental movement was steadily loosing its passion and its soul." "There were basically two things going on." "One that people working for environmental groups, who started out as volunteers and passioned amatures were becoming profesionals and were becoming more concerned with careers, the salaries, the status, the access to high places - for the intrinsic value of access to high places." "And while that was going on, we were asking for less, we were taking weaker stands and position." "Earth First is warriors!" "And if you aren´t a warrior, than I suggest you find an another group." "And I am not criticizing you, because there is a need for other groups and other methods, but in Earth First we have got to be warriors first and foremost." "What I think about Earth First is...they serve a purpose of moving the debate to the next step." "When you have corporations that act illegaly and immoraly, and when you have bureaucratic environmental organizations like the Sierra Club and the Wilderness Society, the Audubon Society, that move slowly, sometimes you need people who are so frustrated and angry" "that they take direct action." "And I understand that type of behaviour." "And I understand the purpose that Earth First serves." "Well, basically I think they are folks who have a definite opinion about how some of the natural resources of this country ought to be managed." "And are willing to use any method available to them to express their concerns." "They are a radical environmental group that will not stop at anything to pursue what they feel is right." "I think what Earth First does is cross the line between peaceful assembly, peaceful demonstrations, to things that really have an impact." "We feel that there is very little wilderness left, and very little of that is old growth timber." "And some of this timber around here is the finest in the world." "And we feel it´s worth protecting." "Even worth going to jail for it?" " Yes." "I think Earth First is one of the most law and order organizations in North America." "We want to have the laws enforced which protect habitat, which protect wild species, which protect wilderness, which protect national parks." "Which protect the riparian habitat, and forest areas and private lands and the administration is not protecting them." "I am sure, based on their book for instance, that they do not intent to hurt anybody." "But they are definitely taking actions which have and can result in injury to people." "And possibly even worse." "Sabotage is done because of a sense that there is a higher purpose in the existing laws." "It´s shocking." "A shocking book." "It scares me in a way." "You know why it scares me?" "It scares me because there is a potential for violence, potential for violence and harm to human beings and I have a problem with that." "I don´t wanna see old growth forest ripped out and I don´t wanna see people poisoned and I don´t wanna see the air polluted." "But I don´t wanna see anybody die either." "I really don´t." "I am against the technics and tactics that they prescribe in there." "I am much more given to, lets get differences of opinions on the table and discuss and see if we can work them out." "Now I am sure that they come from the viewpoint that they have tried that and it hasn´t worked and so they have to take the next, what they consider the next step." "And that is a step that I don´t agree with." "Showing how to spike roads, to spike trees, to dismantle helicopters, to destroy tractors." "It´s terrorist activities." "Sometime when you have immoral timber and corporations, and you have illegal oil industry folks doing the things they are doing, you have to use their kind of tactics." "And their kind of tactics sometimes end up unfortunatelly at this level." "Why I have some complaints about the book Ecodefense." "Well there is this section on adding sand or sediments and things to the oil casings - it doesn´t say how much." "Do I add a little thimbleful or 5 pounds." "I could spend all night to find the right stuff to put in there and worry about them coming and getting my friends arrested or something." "Earth First offered something that other environmental groups hadn´t." "I´ve been an environmental activist for about 8 to 10 years." "And I was doing everything." "I was writing letters, I was talking to my congressmen," "I was reading environmental impact statements," "I was leading hikes to introduce people to the woods and I was loosing." "And being reasonable just didn´t seem to be getting anywhere." "Playing the game, playing the system just wasn´t working." "The trees were still being cut, the rivers were still being dammed, the air was dirty, the water was undrinkable." "And then I met Earth First." "My first exposure to mainstream environmentalism was a slideshow "Punching cookies"." "And I didn´t feel like those people were leaving that meaning within any type of energy to go out and work by themselves." "Do something on their own as an individual to further the cause." "Rather they were being fed and then going home and sated...didn´t do anything else." "And I feel like what we do as Earth Firsters or as direct action environmentalists is inspire individuals to continue the work that they have been exposed to on their own." "I have no choice but to do this." "I don´t know, it´s just somehow that the rainforest speaks to me, the wolf speaks to me." "The condor asks for my help and I can´t say no." "One of the things we said when we started Earth First was we allowed our actions to set the finer points of our philosophy." "That´s one of my disagreements with the greens." "Is that they seem content to sit around and hammer out these detailed agendas and statements of principles and all of this." "Then they wont do anything about it." "Earth First is the only activist green group around." "If you want to look at it that way." "The others are debating societies." "Action!" "Action of any kind." "And let our action set the finer point of our philosophy." "We don´t have to figure it all out." "We don´t all have to be pure." "We all don´t have to be saints on this planet." "Then do something for it." "We don´t have to have our philosophy home down to the n´th degree." "There is room for inconsistency." "But do something!" "Even if it breaks the law." "I do believe in a higher law." "It´s time for a warrior society to rise up out of the Earth and put ourselves in front of the juggernaut of destruction." "To be antibodies against the human pox, that´s ravaging this precious beautiful planet." "I don´t wanna live if there aren´t any rhinocerouses," "I dont wanna live if there aren´t any mountain lions in California." "That´s what my life is for." "I said throw it into the wheels of this insane progress and to fight for it." "That´s what warriors are for." "That´s what a warrior society is for." "Monkeywrenching is a tool." "This tie is a tool." "You know, I go out and I lobby members of congress and I go and I talk to the L.A. Times editorial board and I go to talk to the Archo Pacific Action Breakfast League on how to do what we think we are doing." "And they don´t like listening to me unless I am wearing a coat and a tie." "But you know it´s just a tool." "And I think the tools that we need are the legislative process, the public relations process, the consciousness raising of the american public and occasionally a tree spike to get our agenda across." "It´s habitat and survival that counts." "Not the process." "That´s the difference between Earth First!" "and the mainstream environmental movement." "What Earth First!" "has done for us here, is pretty much given.... rally the community in a positive way against the environmental community." "We realized that we had had accomplished our first major goal, when we started Earth First!" "Which was a realignment and restructuring of the environmental movement." "And that is that the Sierra Club now is taking stronger positions in the California Desert Protection Act of Santa Cruz for instance, is a good example." "So when years ago the Sierra Club only wanted 5 million acres, then the Earth First!" "influenced them and they thought" ""why shouldn´t we ask for everything we want?"" "They moved it up to eight million acres." "In other words, Earth First!" "is convincing good people in mainstream environmental groups not to compromise before the game starts." "I don´t think Earth First!" "has credibility with anybody frankly." "I think there is a few people on the radical fringe that think Earth First!" "is credible, but the forest products industry doesn´t think they are credible." "I don´t care about credibility." " "Fuck it, man!"" "I don´t care if we are credible to William Pat Moss or to Jim McLore or to Donald Hodel, or F. Dale Robertson." "Donald Hodel and F. Dale Robertson don´t have any credibility with me." "It´s sick." "I don´t believe the Forest Service thinks they are credible and I don´t think the public does." "When you see Earth First!" "members howling like wolves before the moon on local TV, it does nothing for their credibility." "As long as they are willing to work within the normal bounds of restraint, we are willing to listen to any descent they have to present." "We aren´t interested in credibility, or legitimacy with the game of thugs running this planet." "We don´t care if senator James McLore or secretary of Interior Donald Hodel don´t wanna let us into their office." "Because they don´t have credibility with us." "They are just a bunch of backstreet alley thugs, that have power, that are running things, but who have no moral, or ethical right to have any control over us." "You know, to be quite frank, it makes us look moderate." "When Earth First!" "is out there saying, a hundred million acres, and we know that we are going to win only 25 million acres, and you know, I go to Congress and I´m saying, you know, 25 million acres unless you give me a 100 million." "I can turn to the Congress and sayin´ "we are the voice of reason"." "You know." "It´s frightening in a society to some politicians, that the Sierra Club is the voice of reason." "Well compared to Earth First!" ", they are a lot moderate." "But I am worried about their quiet acceptance of their.." "lack of condemnation, of Earth First!" "in terrorist activities." "Earth First!" "was a fundamentalist revival, an attempt to get back to the roots of Muir, Leopold, Marshall." "To say that wilderness has a right to exist for its own sake." "Now this was a philosophy that a lot of people in the environmental movement believed in." "But nobody was willing to articulate it publicly." "Long is the legend of the life of John Muir, and many are the dangers he braved." "Without his leadership you can be sure," "Yosemite would never been saved." "A century later the battles remain, the momentum we're facing is huge." "But so is the movement inspired by his name, may his courage and his work live in you." "Muir Power to You, as you fight to keep that river alive" "Muir Power to You, as you help another species survive" "Muir Power to You, John Muir would've been proud!" "Oh, I think John Muir would be proud of the Sierra Club." "The principle of John Muir set down when he was trying to save the Yosemite (National Park), are the exact principles that we use now." "The world view of the executive director of the Sierra Club is closer to the world view of Jim Watt, Ronald Reagan, than it is to that of Earth First!" "And the one reason why we see Sierra Club as being inadequate is that they are basically trying to reform the system, which we feel is totally destructive of life." "And we are trying to subvert the system." "We´d like the system to collapse." "And when I say the system, I mean the modern industrial system as we know it." "And one reason why we see the modern industrial system as being so destructive, is because it´s based on the premise that human beings are superior, ...is for human beings that the world exists." "And I think that a lot of Sierra Clubbers accept that premise." "Whereas Earth Firsters reject that in favor of a biocentric world of view." "The idea that human beings are just another species among billions of others on the planet." "The Sierra Club is part of the system to... because we choose the governmental system to by a tool that we use." "But are we accepted parts of the system by those who are in control." "We are definitelly not calling the shots." "Well." "Moderate environmentalism is bureaucratic in nature." "The issue, the way I see it, is right here." "That´s the issue." "The issue isn´t sitting and cutting deals in smoke filled rooms." "The mainstream groups a lot of times aren´t even saying what I am saying." "Their positions are far too moderate." "They are willing to give up too much to commercial interests." "The major environmental groups still want reform." "They still believe in the system." "They still think that whatever man can use, that mans use of the natural world is still the highest and best purpose and they are just arguing about whether backpacking is better than mining or not." "And whereas I think Earth First is saying that the natural world for its own sake." "For its own continuance." "For its own continued life and diversity is the highest and best use of this world." "They are anti-technology, they are anti-capitalism," "I think they are more of a socialist or marxist kind of philosophy and they are digging at the basic roots of the United States and its constitution." "And I think they are a significant threat to the american way of life here." "It´s not a problem with capitalism or anything that I am talking about." "It is sort of a problem with money in general." "Money is a system that tends to canalize and sort of almost flow against the ecological energy flow." "In order to be part of the system, which is making use of it, utilizing it." "We aren´t left, we aren´t right, we aren´t in the middle, we aren´t even in front or behind." "We aren´t even playing that game." "They are a loose knit, I´d almost say disorganized radical environmental group." "They aren´t an environmental group maybe like the Wilderness Society or the Sierra Club, that stand up and fight issues at the level they should be fought." "Radical means coming from the root." "One of the definitions." "I think that certainly in that respect we are radical, that we go to the roots." "John Muir, Aldo Leopold, Rachel Carson is the old time religion as far as we are concerned." "But radical also means, it´s relative to what other people are advocating." "So in that respect, you know, we could have a radical wilderness proposal, we can take radical means to achieve our ends and so I think radical would be correct in that sense." "But are we truly radical?" "Is what we are saying really extreme?" "I think not." "I think we are more conservative." "I consider myself a conservative." "That warrior spirit is too valuable to be wasted on wars." "Let it be placed in a better context." "For instance acting to save mother Earth." "Then the fire fengled feathers really dangle." "The bow burned gold." "The spirit shined in the sun." "I think we have to look at the real definition of the words we use nowadays." "I mean the corporations like to talk about extremism and radical behaviour and all those types of things they´d like to broad brush environmentalists with." "And I think it is extreme to polute the air," "I think it´s radical to cut down old growth forest." "So if their actions escalate things to the point where the next action is the spiking of the tree, at that point nobody is hurt, nobody is injured, the tree isn´t cut down, then the next action that has to be taken is they are going into the forest to clearcut" "or do what they are doing and that´s when the confrontation and the escalation gets to the point of possibly somebody getting hurt, possibly being illegal." "I think the immoral action is based on the immoral activity of the corporation not on the spiking of the tree." "And that is our political approach, is one of monkeywrenching, of thwarting it, a political aikido." "Of taking the energy of the mad-machine and turning it against itself." "Of taking the power of the old ore and a bulldozer and liberating it, so it can go back into the earth." "Of taking the madness of the Forest Services forest plan and twisting it against the Forest Service." "Yeah we file appeals and lawsuits, we write letters, make wilderness proposals, but we aren´t fooled for a minute that we are engaged in a liberal reform." "We are sticking a wrench in this system, we are slowing it down, we are thwarting it, we are kicking it in the face." "We do get some concern when people do not use those channels which we provide and go to some other method which disrupts and in some cases endangers the safety of people, while they are doing their jobs." "Some other techniques which we have seen which I think they prescribe in Daves book like removing all of the survey stakes on a road for instance." "Now that´s very easy for someone to do." "Walk along a road or survey line and remove all those stakes without thinking about how much it will cost you to replace those." "Sometimes 15 - 20 thousand dollars worth of damage can be done in an afternoon." "The philosophy behind that is if enough of this goes on, if enough damage is done to the industrial tools of the incursion in the wild places, then insurance rates are going to go up." "The Forest Service wont be able to both build new roads and keep their old network together, if it´s being torn up." "You can look at the economic aspect." "Longterm and shortterm." "It may cost a logging company so much, so if a couple of trees are spiked, a couple of their machines are trashed, it costs them so much, that next month they can´t afford to bid on another sale." "It has cost us some money, not only from the Forest products Industry..." "You know, the logger who is out there or the road builder who is out there, they are trying to make a living." "Or the mill operator that is relying on that timber supply from that sale." "So I calculated I´ve probably cost about a million dollars worth of damage recently." "But...they can sue me, I don´t have any money..." "HAHAHA" "Go to jail - free coffee, great, three meals a day, TV..." "Monkeywrenching is in many ways using the tools of the devil against the devil." "And that´s a very broad thing." "A very broad definition I think." "But specifically monkeywrenching can mean quasi illegal acts." "Of course tree spiking is a favourite topic to discuss." "But I think that any action that is a personal action and a commitment against the jugernaut of industrial civilization...is monkeywrenching." "Whether it´s a tree spike or whether it´s sand in a gas tank." "Well one type of monkeywrenching is destruction of private property such as machinery which is being used in a destructive fashion." "Monkeywrenching of course also includes activities such as removing ribons from trees that are to be cut, pullin up survey stakes." "I see monkeywrenching as direct action which is generally illegal with the goal of stopping wilderness destruction or some other type of environmental harm." "As a responsible action to decomission a selected target that is damaging some natural area." "What we are doing is, tearing of the the clearcut tags and all the ribbons on this proposed cleacut unit." "The Forest Service has plans to clearcut all this - this whole area." "That's what the yellow tags we're finding here--look at all around here, it's about 30 acres, and we're tearing these off and hiding them and burying them." "To totally remove all trace of the survey." "Earth First, while we don´t all engage in monkeywrenching, are even advocated is that we do not condemn it." "We do not put it down." "That we recognize monkeywrenching as a legitimate tool of self-defense for some people within Earth First." "Monkeywrenching is not a guerilla warfare it is a monkey warfare." "That people can support it because it´s not threatening and that we have to employ very carefully, very selectively." "I call it terrorism." "I think that people who say that, have never spent a week in Beirut, or even say in Paris." "Terrorism by definition is the killing of, sort of the wanten killing of innocent civilians for it to achieve some sort of political goal." "Whereas ecotage definitelly makes a big effort not to hurt living things at all." "It is a defensive sort of thing." "The idea is to stop a bulldozer that´s bashing around into the wilderness, to prevent loggers from cutting trees." "Things like that." "Terrorism is a violent attack that puts human life in jeopardy." "Monkeywrenching is simply sabotage of inanimate machines for ecological purposes." "I don´t know if it´s terrorism or not." "I couldn´t tell you." "It is certainly a violation of law." "And I think a violation of proper behaviour." "I am sure it depends on each individuals perspective." "To me it´s very close to terrorism." "Everybody follow the dancing spike!" "I´ve been a tree spiker for many a year" "I spend all my money on tree spikes and beer" "I go down to the valley where the tall timber grows" "How many I've gotten, well nobody knows" "One of the most bothersome things here is that our local Audubon and Sierra Club and even our local Earth First chapter have not come out strongly condemned the activities of Earth First." "You never heard anybody saying, oh gosh, it´s really too bad that the mill worker down in northern california had his face ripped up by a spike." "And until people start saying, hey we don´t think it´s worth human life to save these areas." "You know they are in a sense condoning murder." "Logging companies don´t wanna bid on a sale like this." "They know the trees are full of nails." "We spike the nails high up here so the actuall loggers don´t get hurt, if they are going to cut them." "But the companies will know that blades would get damaged in the mill by these things, if they do try to cut them." "But, as I said, we will notify them." "They probably wont even try." "The log on the carriage over here is that carriage comes forward on the left side of the band there;" "the teeth saw the log as the band saw was going around." "What happened there is they hit a spike that was embedded in the wood and the bandsaw actually broke in two pieces and flew out of there." "And a part of it hit this guy in the neck and knocked his teeth out;" "done quite a bit of damage." "That´s the reason that the mill employes are a little bit concerned about tree spiking going on by environmental groups that are protesting the logging of these areas." "Monkeywrenching is a defensive action." "And I think that it´s aimed at guilty parties." "The trees for example in tree spiking - you know, a mill is a guilty party in the destruction of the forest." "Terrorism is destruction of biodiversity, the freedom of not only the natural life forms to live out their lives unfeathered and free and alive." "But at the same time extinguish human spontaneity and human freedom." "That´s what true terrorism is." "Terrorism in the form of western governments today." "That doesn´t even bother me whether people call us terrorists." "Because I think the most important thing, part of our work, is to get our message accross." "And those people who think we are terrorists are not damaging us because we are still getting our message accross to those who are sympathisers." "And the more sympathisers we reach, the stronger we become." "And in the end I think people will realize that the terrorists are really the people we have been fighting." "The destroyers of the Earth." "What happens in a clearcut is they destroy all the trees in the area, all the old growth trees." "All the species that depend on old growth have no place to go." "They disrupt the soil completely." "The soil is completely disrupted, it´s completely torn up, it´s gonna erode." "What happens is that there is a net decrease in the ammount of species in this area." "The species that depend on old growth, like spotted owls, woodpeckers, have no place to go." "This is done on a very large slope here." "It´s probably an illegal one, but no one watches it." "All this soil is going to erode to the creek down there." "If there is any trout breeding grounds there, they will probably be destroyed." "Clearcutting is where you harvest everything that´s merchenable of a given say have 5 acres or 10 acres you are gonna harvest." "You cut everything, take it all to the landing and hawl it to the mill or use it somehow, firewood, or whatever." "And so there´s nothing left." "It´s as bare as the mill yard here." "I pretty much feel that the biological and ecological foundation of the" "Earth is under siege right now." "And something has got to be done to at least slow the technological beast down to the point where we can stop and at least examine what we are doing." "We have essentially halted the process of speciation or evolution on this planet and we´ve even succeded in turning it backwards." "And this is something that is excelerating at an alarming rate." "Some of the most respected and famous biologists and ecologists in the world today are saying things that make my blood run cold." "If I didn´t get drunk now and then, if I didn´t have a sense of humor," "I´d strap dynamite around myself and go down to the Glen Canyon Dam." "We are living in an era of overpowering horror." "Michael Soulé, founder of the Society of Conservation Biology recently said that vertebrate evolution may be at an end." "Others have said that one third of all species may become extinct in 20 years." "That by the turn of the century the only large mamals left will be those we choose to allow to exist." "Let that sink in, my god!" "We don´t have time to live normal lives!" "We don´t have time to pretend that it´s business as usual." "It's where the deepest water's at" "It's where the biggest mammal's at" "It's where out future food is at" "It keeps the atmosphere intact" "The ocean is a habitat we depend on!" "Habitat, Habitat, Have to Have a Habitat Habitat, Habitat, Have to Have a Habitat" "Habitat, Habitat, Have to Have a Habitat You have to have a Habitat to carry on!" "The forest is a habitat, a very special habitat" "It's where the tallest trees are at" "It's where a bear can scratch her back (ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch)" "It keeps the ground from rolling back" "Renews the oxygen, in fact The forest is a habitat we depend on!" "Habitat, Habitat, Have to Have a Habitat Habitat, Habitat, Have to Have a Habitat" "Habitat, Habitat, Have to Have a Habitat You have to have a Habitat to carry on!" "I don´t think we are loosing any species; on a whole scale..." "I guess they are saying that just because we are logging these areas we are going to loose all these species." "I say that´s kind of a farce." "The exciting part is trying to figure out how we can have the grizzly bears and the piliated woodpeckers, of course we don´t want the grizzly bears here;" "but how we can have piliated woodpeckers and spotted owls and still maintain healthy communities." "Because if you don´t have healthy communities it´s not going to be anybody there to appreciate those critters." "The things that are available." "Do you mean what has already happened in the industrial society, we will be sitting with our own waste, we will be sitting for hundreds and perhaps thousands of years with toxic waste, on nuclear waste." "And how we deal with that says something about how we are as persons." "Breathing may become hazardous to your health." "Tresspassers will be shot, sold and subdiveded, and your sister tortured with electricity." "And the mushroom cloud, red eye like wine on our breath." "I think things are under control." "It takes constant vigilance and it takes everything from, you know, introducing legislation to an occasional tree spike." "But things are under control." "Yeah right now things are under control of corporate interests on the planet as a whole and they don´t seem to care much for anything except short term profits and how much power they can create for themselves." "Even in terms of the management philosophies that they are currently using that they are not that agencies of the government, reformed environmental groups, and the corporations are not doing a very good job in our estimation." "People don´t adopt industrial lifestyles." "They have it showed down their throat." "And the only way to get rid of it is to cough it up." "And that´s going to be a violent reaction." "We are talking about no compromising the remaining 10 percent of the continent that is being rapidly gulped up because in the last 200 years so much of it has been used in this industrial jugernaut that keeps biting away at the lifeblood of the continent." "We are offering a fundamental challenge and critique of industrialism, progress and technology." "Are we luddities?" "You are damn right we are luddities!" "Do we love the scent of a burning bulldozer?" "We love the scent of a burning bulldozer!" "No one stands up and questions technology or industrial society because they don´t recognize the rights of other species to inhabit the Earth." "The only way you can have industrial society is to trample on other habitats, other communities." "I don´t think technology is going to kill us." "I think judicious use of technology and an inteligent use of technology is the answer." "I don´t believe in going back to a pre-industrial society as a solution to any problems." "Many of us in the deep ecology movement or the Earth First movement would like to see human beings live much more like the way they did 15000 years ago as opposed to what we see now." "So better beware, be wary, be warned, be aware that though the budgy chirps in her cage "Gross National Product"." "Tweet!" "tweet!" "The finger's on the trigger, teeth are in the neck and old man coyote is a humped back Groucho. auuuuuuu" "There is some things wrong with the industrial system when profit becomes greed and when greed becomes the driving principle." "There is nothing wrong with the system of profits when it´s balanced with some type of environmental sensitivity." "The major threat to biological diversity is industrial society." "I mean even though everybody has fucked up applying technology, no matter if it´s simple agriculture or sofisticated hunting and gathering and herding as a lapse." "Everyone has certainly made mistakes, but no one has made mistakes like we are currently making right now." "I think maybe Earth First would like to see the cities ripped out and Los Angeles go back to the indians;" "I understand that." "But that´s not reality." "We are antitechnology." "Somebody is gotta be antitechnology." ""I am with the forest till the day I die."" "What we're gonna do here in this area of the Forest Service." "These trees have been saved, in this clearcut, 'cause they're marked with a big W for Wildlife." "And by just carefully marking a few extra..." "You know, these trees that we'd save and they'll never even know the difference." "It's a real good trick." "You've gotta use the same kind of paint, but as long as you don't mark too many, they'll never even know." "Earth First is just simply a warrior society, that has a biocentric empathus." "Our goal is to protect as much threatened natural diversity as is possible now." "To save the building blocks." "To make sure that there are grizzly bears and great blue whales and rainforests and old growth redwoods somewhere." "So that in the final thrashing of the industrial monster everything else thats good on this planet is not destroyed." "Our job is damage control." "I think we have learned that because they threw the book at me, because I´ve got maximum jail sentence, that tells us something." "That tells us that the developers, that the uranium miners here in Arizona, that the loggers in Montana," "that the Forest Service across the country, that the politicians fear us." "That they fear what we represent." "I see monkeywrenching or sabotage as a very limited part, a small part of a much larger campaign." "It´s not an end-all tactic." "But during a campaign where we are trying to protect old growth there can be some spiking, some road desurveing, equipment being damaged as part of an overall attempt to slow down or in some cases even to harrass the people" "who are involved in this tremendously destructive activities." "Monkeywrenching is kind of almost a coup de grace, and the most unexpected tactic that we have." "And is the one that has cost the other side the most money and is hard to defend against." "And it absolutely is part of a vital strategy." "The future of monkeywrenching is that it´s going to continue to become more and more widespread." "More and more people are going to engage in it." "Some people are going to get caught." "That´s inevitable." "Some people are going to go to jail." "It´s very clear that some of their actions are a crime." "And they should be dealt with as criminals." "The only monkeywrenchers they´ve caught, were caught because of their own foolishness, their own carelessness." "The Forest Service in Oregon has turned over treespiking cases to the FBI now because they´ve admitted that they can´t do anything with it." "Of course the FBI can´t do anything with it either." "Earth First members need to be held accountable for their actions, whether it´s treespiking or damaging equipment or causing loggers lost time." "There are already existing laws in the book which Earth First strongly supports." "And in a certain sense, strongly supporting those laws means that you have to engage in sabotage if you do support those existing laws of the books because the administration is not supporting them." "I think on the other hand, when they go too far to endanger peoples lives through maybe treespiking or some other form of terrorist activity," "I think they have gone too far." "All the laws are forgotten, all the laws are avoided, all the laws are completely thrown away." "And then you still have the old growth forest being cut down," "I can see why people would then spike the trees and lay down in front of the bulldozers." "I am saying, take the law into your own hands." "That´s all you do." "If you just go by their laws, down go the trees, up goes the slashes..." "Why are we doing all of this?" "It´s because we are the most important generation of human beings that ever walked this planet." "That today, this moment, 1987, is the most critical time in 3,5 billion years of organic evolution on this planet." "We aren´t trying to save backpacking parks, we aren´t trying to clean up the air so we have nice scenic views of the Grand Canyon." "We are trying to help evolution to continue." "Whether it´s nuclear war, Big Mountain, acid rain." "All these are mere symptomatic ills;" "the basic divorce from our source, the sacred mother Earth." "We are finding our place in the Earth, we find out who we truly are." "We are the children of Turtle Island" "A story that´s old, and that´s new" "On Turtle Island there´s a turtle smile Carrying the world for you." "Wilderness is the essence of everything we are after." "Natural diversity." "We aren´t an environmental group." "Environmental groups worry about environmental health hazards to human beings." "They worry about clean air and clean water for the benefit of people." "And ask us why we are so roughed up if something is irrelevant and tangential as wilderness." "Something as elitist as wilderness." "Well I can tell you a kaibab squirrel doesn´t think wilderness is elitist." "They don´t have any compassion for people." "They are out there trying to save the wilderness." "Who are they trying to save it for if it´s not people?" "I don´t know who are they trying to save it for?" "Wilderness is the essence of everything." "It´s the real world." "And our goal is the day when there is no word in any language on Earth for the concept of wilderness." "Because that concept is no longer needed." "Because everything is wilderness." "And it just is." "It´s no longer a concern for the environment that motivates these people but it´s a social revolution that they are talking about." "Ask Muir." "He said that if it comes to a war between the races," "I´ll side with the bears." "And what side would you be on?" "And I say that time has arrived." "John Muir would say that he would be on the side of the grizzly bear." "It depends." "Certain bears, certain people." "All bears and all people." "I don´t know." "The bears." "The problem with Earth First is that they don´t care about people." "They really don´t care." "They could care less.." "It depends where your priorities are." "If you look at something like a thousand year old tree or an irreplaceable old growth ecosystem it´s a matter of priorities." "Deep ecological philosophy holds that living things have a right to exist." "Living individual trees, ecosystems have just as much the right to exist as individual humans or human societies." "Deep ecology is a philosophy that enunciates the whole idea of biocentrism that the natural world is greater than and more important than the small part of it, that´s the human race." "I think the principal tenet of deep ecology is the endorsement of biocentrism." "All life is equal or all natural life is equal." "I think it entails on how we experience the world." "If we experience the world as an extention of ourself, of our ecological self, if we have a broader and deeper identification then we feel hurt when other beings, including non-human beings, are harmed." "I think it offers people a way back from the alienation and pain that are pretty much the dominant themes of the modern age." "Where people feel less and less connection to each other obviously." "Probably no connection whatsoever to the land anymore, because it is such an abstract idea to them as they sit on their freeways and commute to work." "And it offers a way back into the community a way back into the whole and into the scheme of things." "Kind of a spiritual completeness that we have been without for seven thousand years." "Look at these ponderosa pines, look at the maple." "They are screaming out of joy." "And that´s what we´ve got to scream out with." "Whether we are sitting in jail." "Or standing in front of the bulldozers or writing letters or being crushed by the oppressiveness of urban smog, we still gotta ring with joy." "And there is no more glorious life than the life of a warrior in defense of what´s right." "And my heart is so bold and so cheered by the warriors" "I see here this week." "The women, the men, the children, those of us who are turning grey." "We are all warriors." "We are all fighters." "We are all dedicated to something so much larger and greated and more beautiful than ourselves." "And that´s the essence I think of being a warrior." "It´s a recognition that in your life the most important thing is not your life." "As Martin Luther King said," ""If human beings doesn´t have something to die for, they don´t deserve to live."" "Those are hard words, but they are true words." "And I pity those people." "Who are only interested in their paychecks, their VCRs and their own life." "And I salute you." "I celebrate you." "And I love you for being fellow warriors." "Earth First!" "Earth First!" "Earth First!" "Subtitles ..." "WAFPRESS"