For The Wild - LARK ELODEA on Appalachians Against Pipelines ⧸308

00:00:00.000 Hello and welcome to For the Wild podcast. I'm Ayanna Young. Today we are speaking with Lark

00:00:10.780 Elodia. There has always been this long history of extraction in this region, but there's just

00:00:17.900 as long of a history of resistance since colonization. Lark is a person of settler

00:00:24.840 descent living in the beautiful mountains of Appalachia. They have been working with

00:00:29.180 Appalachians against pipelines in the campaign resisting the 300 plus mile Mountain Valley

00:00:34.140 pipeline for over four years and have lived in the region for years longer. Doing this work gives

00:00:39.840 them inspiration as well as heartbreak. They have seen mountainsides blasted, incredibly diverse

00:00:45.200 forests bulldozed, friends and comrades jailed and released and jailed again. They have seen

00:00:50.720 communities come together in vibrant, brave and unimagined ways and through many small victories

00:00:55.420 strung together have yet to see the pipeline completed. Lark is one of many, many pipeline

00:01:00.920 fighters and water protectors and forest defenders contributing to the fight against reckless fossil

00:01:06.160 fuel infrastructure and extraction across Appalachia, across Turtle Island, and all over

00:01:11.420 the world. They add to the cumulative resistance with an earnest offering of small strengths,

00:01:16.980 painting banners, writing articles, facilitating meetings, carrying heavy things to steep places,

00:01:22.280 growing cooking and preserving food watching workers writing letters to jailed friends and

00:01:27.460 at times living at blockade and interfering directly in the would-be work of pipeliners

00:01:33.100 they fall in love with this region over and over with the steadfastness of the box turtles

00:01:37.960 the tiny vibrancy of mosses after rain with the magical night chorus of tree frogs and flashing

00:01:43.520 fireflies they are deeply concerned about the intersecting threats of white nationalism the

00:01:48.300 prison industrial complex, and ecological degradation in Appalachia and beyond, but

00:01:53.380 are inspired to keep working towards a future that confronts all these things head on.

00:02:02.540 Well, hello, Lark. Thank you so much for joining us today. I'm really looking forward to talking

00:02:09.640 about this intense topic with you because yeah I feel like more people need to know

00:02:16.920 what the threats are in your neck of the woods. Yes thank you so much for having me. We're always

00:02:25.580 excited to talk about the campaign against the Mountain Valley Pipeline. Well let's just jump in

00:02:32.580 right there and start by talking about the fight to stop the Mountain Valley Pipeline and

00:02:38.200 what it means to fight on an issue from the beginning and through potential development.

00:02:46.320 Sure. I think maybe it makes sense to start by talking a little about the pipeline. So

00:02:52.920 this is a 303 mile long 42 inch diameter fracked gas pipeline that is

00:03:01.240 ripping through the mountains of so-called West Virginia and Virginia. There's also a

00:03:08.120 proposed extension through North Carolina called the Southgate extension that is tied up in

00:03:14.040 permitting right now and hopefully will never come to fruition. I think it's important to note that

00:03:20.600 when we are talking about this 42 inch diameter pipeline, that is massive, right? You can climb

00:03:27.660 in this pipeline and hang out in there. It is so, so huge. And when you imagine that, you can just

00:03:34.060 imagine how much gas is going to be flowing through it and there's been a lot of opposition

00:03:40.100 to this pipeline since 2014 when it was proposed and that opposition has looked really different

00:03:47.240 in a lot of ways you know folks had community meetings they started community groups people

00:03:53.200 talked to politicians and they wrote letters and they filed public comments and they attended

00:03:58.660 hearings and I think there's so much opposition because it's so clear that this pipeline is

00:04:04.060 just a very, very bad idea. The Mountain Valley Pipeline will be responsible for the emissions of

00:04:10.840 nearly 90 million metric tons of greenhouse gases a year, which is equivalent to at least

00:04:16.900 23 coal plants or 19 million passenger vehicles. It will expand fracking in the region, and if

00:04:25.580 folks don't know about the process of fracking, that is an incredibly invasive and toxic process

00:04:32.240 in the form of extraction that involves drilling and pumping lots of unknown chemicals into the

00:04:39.360 ground and it causes earthquakes and it poisons water and it makes people really sick. So it's

00:04:45.800 not just the pipeline itself that we're talking about. We're talking about expanding this toxic

00:04:51.280 industry as well. The pipeline crosses 235 miles of forests. It impacts 23 federally endangered

00:05:01.280 and threatened species and it crosses a thousand water bodies over a thousand water bodies including

00:05:08.320 major rivers like the greenbriar and the golly and the roanoke it's also slated to cross the

00:05:15.160 jefferson national forest and that is actually where this direct action end of the fight began

00:05:23.120 just off of the appalachian trail in the jefferson national forest and at this point the direct action

00:05:29.900 piece of the campaign is more than four years old. It began with two tree sets that were right off of

00:05:35.540 the Appalachian Trail, and it's gone on longer than any of us could have ever imagined. So it's

00:05:41.400 included aerial blockades like those tree sets and dozens of lockdowns and big walk-ons, and

00:05:49.880 it's been really amazing and inspiring to be a part of it. There's just so much

00:05:53.640 community-led action happening, and we have so much community support, so it's really special.

00:05:59.900 Oh, gosh, I feel the momentum and just the roller coaster of fighting large resource extraction projects. I've spent much of my formative years in these types of campaigns and direct actions with others fighting for life.

00:06:18.300 And it's a lot, it's a lot. And you're really reminding me of just how much it takes from so many people over an extended period of time. And yeah, there's so many questions I have.

00:06:34.840 And so I don't know how linear I'll be in asking, but I'm really contemplating just the power dynamics behind the pipeline and who benefits from it and also thinking about those who are unlikely allies who may typically be in favor of such development but are negatively impacted by this pipeline.

00:06:57.760 Sure. Yeah, I guess to start a little bit about the power dynamics. So I don't think there are a lot of surprises about who is benefiting from this, right? It's giant fossil fuel companies and banks and shareholders, right?

00:07:18.140 Equitrans Midstream is the main company driving this. There are some really huge names in the

00:07:24.680 shareholder department, like Con Edison. Banks include JPMorgan Chase, PNC, Wells Fargo. And

00:07:34.280 I think at this point, it does seem like some of those investors are having some regrets,

00:07:39.540 I will say. This pipeline is more than four years behind schedule. It was supposed to be

00:07:45.180 built in 2018 or be finished in 2018 and at this point there's actually no completion date because

00:07:52.840 of some recent court rulings and the budget has at least doubled so it's over 300 excuse me it's

00:08:00.380 over three billion dollars over budget and I think there's sort of this imagined idea that this

00:08:05.640 pipeline would be good for the community or could be good for the community and that it's going to

00:08:11.460 provide all of these jobs and economic development but like with all forms of extraction there's sort

00:08:18.060 of this boom and bust cycle and frankly with this pipeline and with a lot of pipelines most of the

00:08:23.580 workers are coming from out of state anyway and the jobs that were promised in regards of this

00:08:30.720 pipeline haven't come here as far as your question about unlikely allies like I mentioned there is

00:08:38.460 so much local opposition to this pipeline and support for this pipe support for the campaign

00:08:44.420 against the pipeline excuse me um including people who have taken action themselves right like

00:08:51.860 becky crabtree in the first year of the direct action fight who is a retired school teacher

00:08:57.520 from west virginia locked herself into her first ever car an old pinto on the path of the pipeline

00:09:04.780 And last year, three self-described old folks also locked themselves to a car on an access road, blocking access to pipeline work sites.

00:09:17.420 And I think these stories are really inspiring, right?

00:09:20.480 Like one of the self-described old folks scheduled that action around their dialysis appointment.

00:09:26.920 And those are some really unique stories to hear coming out of a fight like this.

00:09:32.160 So yeah, it is interesting to see folks who aren't typically opposed to fossil fuels or fracking coming out against this pipeline, but we are sort of continuously steering our message away from the not-in-my-backyard attitude, nimbyism, and we really want to make it clear to folks that it's not just about not building a pipeline here. 0.98

00:09:54.320 It's about not building pipelines anywhere. And I think the campaign, especially because it's gone on so long, it's been a really important opportunity to have like challenging conversations regionally and locally about other issues like the police and white supremacy or gender and sexuality. 0.85

00:10:15.040 and some of our long-term blockades have been really important spaces for that and I think

00:10:21.700 folks have had really important conversations in those spaces which has been really amazing and I

00:10:28.740 think in the end there are some people who haven't been willing to engage in conversations and are

00:10:37.820 very like pro-police or anti-trans and in the end even though those people may be anti-pipeline

00:10:46.120 we don't consider that to be a true alliance if that makes sense. I guess I'm wondering about

00:10:54.000 how pipelines are marketed in general of course but you know with this one how is it marketed

00:11:01.680 to residents and voters especially engaging with questions on quote energy security and

00:11:07.020 manufactured scarcity yeah i think that's an interesting question um and i think the most

00:11:14.620 important thing to highlight is that uh those threads are basically a lie right these are

00:11:23.860 stories that are told to us about fossil fuels about pipelines um and specifically with a pipeline

00:11:32.060 like this they don't actually need to convince the public that it's a good idea they will try

00:11:37.520 certainly right but all they really need to do is convince these federal agencies and local agencies

00:11:44.080 like the federal energy regulatory commission FERC right they need three people on FERC to agree

00:11:50.980 that the pipeline is a good idea and it's not like the public gets to vote on this all kinds

00:11:57.880 of people have come out against it and I think to your note about energy security we know despite

00:12:06.200 the fact that there's sort of this story that oh there's all this gas and we need a way to export

00:12:13.980 it or we need a way to use it this pipeline is actually going to create that demand for natural

00:12:19.040 gas and like I said before the fracking boom has not created the same job growth that it promised

00:12:26.340 I think we're really seeing the energy security narrative play out right now, especially I know Joe Manchin out of West Virginia has really been trying to push the Mountain Valley pipeline because of this manufactured gas shortage.

00:12:44.740 And I say manufactured because the fossil fuel companies don't need to be making this much money, right? The reason everyone's paying so much money at the pump is so that the fossil fuel companies can continue to make record profits.

00:12:58.700 And I think the reality is the landscape of natural gas has really changed since they started building this pipeline. Like, it's something most people understand is natural gas has not brought the prosperity that it promised.

00:13:15.300 And a lot of people are saying that this could be the last big pipeline of its kind that comes through the Appalachian Basin.

00:13:22.840 You know, it's looking to other pipeline companies and investors like maybe this wasn't a good idea.

00:13:29.120 The Atlantic Coast pipeline was canceled in the summer of 2020.

00:13:33.000 And I think what we're really seeing is that this is a failed project.

00:13:36.080 and we suspect and know that some investors are having regrets about it based on

00:13:42.880 some of the investor calls and I guess the last note I would make about energy security is

00:13:50.860 I would hope that people are thinking about water security just as much as energy security

00:13:57.220 I know we've been prepared for these times. I know in my bones. I know we've been prepared

00:14:17.260 For these times I know

00:14:20.780 In my bones

00:14:24.400 In my blood

00:14:28.160 In my belly

00:14:31.200 I can feel

00:14:35.700 We are ready

00:14:38.080 In my blood

00:14:41.860 In my belly

00:14:44.840 i can feel we are ready we are ready we are ready

00:14:58.620 yeah it's kind of shocking how the dominant culture has imbued in us

00:15:09.860 a type of amnesia or forgetfulness that water security is important or something. It's really

00:15:18.400 odd. And I'd love if you could help ground us in Appalachia and unpacking the histories of racism

00:15:26.340 and classism that have made areas of Appalachia a sacrifice zone. And also just thinking through

00:15:33.360 your organization's rootedness in the space and the vision for the future of your home.

00:15:39.860 um yeah I will say the history of Appalachia is very long and complicated you could probably do

00:15:47.340 a whole podcast just on that if not many episodes of a podcast on that um but I will

00:15:55.260 try to do it justice in a short period of time and I think when thinking about the history of

00:16:04.220 Appalachia and I am not actually from here I wasn't born here um which feels important to say

00:16:10.780 but from what I have learned about the history is that there has always been this long history

00:16:16.940 of extraction in this region but there's just as long of a history of resistance

00:16:22.480 since colonization and it has often felt like even the indigenous history of this land

00:16:30.560 has been extracted or has been attempted to be extracted it's very challenging to learn about

00:16:37.060 indigenous peoples who are and were here in this region and I know that's not a unique quality

00:16:44.700 about indigenous history but it's very extreme here right like the West Virginia official state

00:16:50.200 line is that no one was here when the white settlers arrived but we know that isn't true

00:16:57.340 We know that the Mountain Valley pipeline goes through Monacan and Tutelo and Cherokee and Yesen land and possibly and probably lands of other people who we don't even know about.

00:17:09.800 And I think since colonization, extraction has essentially been used to recolonize land again and again, right, through logging, through coal, through railroads, and most recently through natural gas and fracking and pipelines.

00:17:28.640 and this has always happened from outsiders coming in and from a few wealthy people continuing to

00:17:41.260 make a lot of money off of the land and its people right like after the civil war uh industrialists

00:17:49.580 and boosters who were eager to make some money from the timber and the coal in the mountains

00:17:55.860 They popularized stereotypes of Appalachians as backwards and a need of civilizing intervention of industrial capitalism.

00:18:06.940 And I think you really do see ways in which that is still present today.

00:18:13.040 And yet, throughout that entire time, there have been really powerful examples of resistance to those various forms of extraction.

00:18:23.980 And one of the most powerful examples I think of happened in the mine wars in the 20s.

00:18:30.820 You know, people were fighting to unionize when the coal companies owned everything in West Virginia and Appalachia.

00:18:38.220 They owned the land, they owned houses.

00:18:40.760 People had to buy things that the coal company owned, the company store with company script.

00:18:47.780 And people were fighting and fighting to unionize.

00:18:50.640 And this is a fight that really happened across racial lines, right? Like Black folks, poor white folks, recent immigrants, all organized together and organized the Battle of Blair Mountain, which is the largest labor uprising in U.S. history.

00:19:08.460 and these folks stole trains and they blew up buildings and they took arms and everyone really

00:19:14.360 did this together and the struggle only ended when the National Guard dropped bombs on them and I

00:19:21.000 think this is a really important example because it illustrates the ways in which the history of

00:19:28.020 resistance to extraction here is multiracial it is militant and I think it also says a lot about

00:19:35.540 the relationship that people have to the government around here I think that is really

00:19:41.820 still pervasive today you know folks have not forgotten that when they were in struggle that

00:19:47.760 was the government's response um and I think the way that everyone organized together was really 0.95

00:19:55.360 used to crush that movement uh you know when it was time for the minds to fire folks black folks

00:20:04.200 for the first to go which caused racial tensions right they coined the term hillbilly as derogatory

00:20:11.800 for poor white folks so I think it's just important to recognize the role that that

00:20:20.520 had and sort of like the ending of that movement as well and yeah I think

00:20:26.240 it's important to reflect on these examples not to compare ourselves to them or to self-aggrandize

00:20:34.180 but to just ground ourselves in the history of that struggle and in an honor that in this land

00:20:43.960 and I think a lot of those negative stereotypes that I just talked about that are from hundreds

00:20:52.120 of years ago are still really persistent today right I think Appalachians are often depicted as

00:21:00.880 unworthy of sympathy or of allyship and struggles here have really been ignored by a lot of the rest

00:21:09.120 of the country partially because of this depiction of folks from Appalachia but I will say despite

00:21:16.500 that my experience is that people really do have a like different relationship to land here that is

00:21:22.900 very unique and special

00:21:25.860 well yeah i'm also thinking about the ways that protest is dictated by state power and

00:21:41.960 in wondering how do we circumvent this and protest in new and innovative ways that

00:21:49.720 may be more impactful um well it seems like maybe this would be a good moment to

00:21:59.200 define direct action so for me direct action means that instead of going through some created

00:22:10.400 channels like writing your senator or signing a petition or maybe even going to a march you just

00:22:18.480 do the thing that you would protest so you stop the thing that you want to stop like a pipeline

00:22:25.180 or you do the thing you're trying to do like give away free food to address hunger uh and i think

00:22:34.320 it's a powerful tool that's been used for centuries it really creates a flashpoint about

00:22:40.820 around an issue and it's uh not necessarily an appeal to power but it is a way to stand up to

00:22:49.200 power and be really powerful um and i think you're right though the state is constantly using

00:22:57.580 intimidation tactics to discourage protests and we've experienced that often in the campaign

00:23:04.840 people have had some really extreme charges, including threats of terrorism, felonies simply

00:23:17.580 for locking themselves to a piece of equipment, which is generally the flavor of direct action

00:23:24.320 that the campaign is engaging in, right? Tree sits, aerial blockades, lockdowns, walk-ons to

00:23:32.020 disrupt work for a site, and I think folks have also been

00:23:38.580 jailed for months at a time, and it really shows the way MVP

00:23:43.660 and the state are working hand in hand, right? We see the

00:23:48.700 state and the courts continuously come down on the

00:23:51.200 side of the pipeline, and the Forest Service was actually

00:23:56.960 reimbursed by the Mountain Valley Pipeline after Forest Service

00:24:02.020 block after there were blockades in the national forest in 2018 and I think trying to circumvent

00:24:11.040 that and be creative I think that's really great but I think the most important thing is to not let

00:24:17.520 that kind of intimidation scare us into being less disruptive and there are definitely forms

00:24:26.040 of protests that are changing right like social media storms or actions that are quickly coordinated

00:24:31.820 across the continent but in this campaign people are using to great success tactics that have been

00:24:39.380 used for decades and we are mainly just relying on the basic concept of putting your body on the

00:24:47.040 line and in the way of something to stop it and I think one of the most important things as we

00:24:56.040 engage in that tactic is to just have power in numbers because the more of us there are, the safer we are.

00:25:26.040 Thank you.

00:25:56.040 yeah i'm with you there oh it's really good to be reminded and revitalized to

00:26:10.300 be engaged truly engaged with these struggles in our local communities i think it's really

00:26:19.540 easy to just get wrapped up in so much that we can't really support or be helpful with.

00:26:30.280 Maybe this is a design of the dominant culture to make us feel disempowered or scared to really

00:26:36.940 show up in this way and believe that we can fight these big fights.

00:26:42.760 but it's yeah it's just giving me a lot of it's giving me like a confidence boost

00:26:49.960 again um and there's definitely fights that I'm seeing coming up all over the place but especially

00:26:56.080 where I'm at with mining operations and old growth logging and things of that nature that

00:27:01.060 are going to need bodies and hearts and minds so this is good for me right now um I'm wondering

00:27:10.040 what moral values the state is claiming when declaring certain forms of protest to be quote

00:27:17.000 criminal and thinking through some of their more uh creative tactics like blocking roads

00:27:27.080 with painted cars and dressing up in costumes yeah i guess i think it's tricky to throw around

00:27:36.540 the word morality in a situation like this, I'm not sure it's really about the state claiming

00:27:44.280 moral values at all. I think the state is doing what it has always done, which is protecting

00:27:50.720 industry and extraction. And throughout the campaign, sort of as I've mentioned, we've seen

00:27:56.820 the way that these institutions of government and corporations are inextricably tied. And really,

00:28:04.140 any protest that disrupts that relationship or that profit from industry is perceived as a threat

00:28:12.900 and it must be crushed and criminalization is one way to do that and that's something the state has

00:28:19.420 used for centuries right and that's goes for any disruption of the status quo it's not just

00:28:24.860 pipelines and extraction and fossil fuels I would say that applies to people trying to disrupt

00:28:30.460 institutional racism and borders and colonialism and we know that the hammer will come down

00:28:36.020 especially hard on people of color black brown indigenous folks um and yeah i don't think the

00:28:43.600 cops really get to claim any morality when they're wielding that with armed men and cages right um

00:28:52.740 And I guess I think this is also a good time to note that though people are risking arrest and putting their bodies on the line and sort of intentionally taking a risk that might lead to jail time, I don't think that the people who are arrested on this campaign doing these sorts of actions are better or moral or more deserving of support than other people who are arrested and jailed.

00:29:21.740 we talk a lot about the relationships between prisons and pipelines in this campaign. And

00:29:27.220 the whole concept of who is criminal is entirely constructed, right? And nobody deserves to be in

00:29:33.760 a cage. So I don't know if that answers your question exactly. Well, yeah, the questions are

00:29:42.220 really just jumping off points and I'm interested in wherever you take us and yeah um and it would

00:29:51.860 be interesting to hear more about uh the prison industrial complex in Appalachia specifically

00:29:59.320 yeah sure I think that um a lot of issues that you see in Appalachia today are related to fossil

00:30:11.060 fuels and sort of the legacy of an extractive economy and we see this in a lot of ways and

00:30:19.900 prisons are definitely one of them but you know also public health right the opioid crisis like

00:30:26.100 folks had their bodies broken in the mines and that's how they became addicted to pills and

00:30:32.180 that's why Appalachia is one of the centers or one of the reasons why I will say one of

00:30:36.580 Appalachia is one of the epicenters of the opioid epidemic right but I think prisons definitely fit

00:30:42.920 into that right I think there is uh at least the hope if not an actual prison boom the hope of a

00:30:52.600 prison boom in Appalachia as a new industry in the wake of some of the dying fossil fuel industries

00:30:59.520 like coal um and i think as folks on our end uh who do occasionally or to do intentionally risk

00:31:11.880 arrest uh and we know that this is a huge privilege and the way that we approach the

00:31:19.520 prison industrial complex in appalachia is really important right we have to do that with intention

00:31:25.320 And as folks that may go to jail and know they're going to jail, it's our obligation to uplift struggles of those who are on the inside, right? There were tree sets in Southwest Virginia that existed for two and a half years.

00:31:43.460 they were called the yellow finch tree sets and the folks that were ultimately extracted

00:31:47.560 from those tree sets did months in jail um and they really did like make an effort to

00:31:55.580 make relationships with folks and support folks who are inside and that is not a unique situation

00:32:02.520 other people who have done certainly less time but a little bit of time have also made relationships

00:32:09.620 in jail and I think it's really clear the way the struggles for prison abolition and for a world

00:32:17.980 with no pipelines are interconnected right uh in part the prison system is used as a means to

00:32:26.300 punish people taking action but I think there are so many other examples um two folks who

00:32:35.580 were arrested in the fall recently did a night in jail in a jail called southern regional jail in

00:32:45.160 west virginia and a week later after they spent a night in jail there a story was released about

00:32:53.520 how um prisoners in that jail are being denied clean drinking water and the guards won't give

00:33:01.440 them water and they're having to drink out of the toilet. And I think it's so basic to see these

00:33:08.540 two things. Everyone deserves clean water and no one should be locked in a cage. And I think the

00:33:17.020 question comes up, well, what do these things even have to do with each other? And a story like that

00:33:22.300 for me just makes it so blatantly clear. And we know that prisons themselves are environmental

00:33:28.440 hazards for the people who live in them right there are prisons that are built on mountaintop

00:33:33.800 removal sites here in Appalachia in Cleveland Ohio right now folks are fighting a proposed

00:33:40.220 prison on a toxic waste site and I think when I think about my vision for the world it's much

00:33:48.260 easier to look at it from a perspective of prison abolition right like a world without prisons for

00:33:54.800 me is safe and sustainable for everyone and obviously for me that world doesn't have fossil

00:34:01.640 fuel pipelines in it yeah i'm thinking about your slogan no borders no prisons no pipelines on

00:34:11.820 stolen land and i'm wondering specifically how pipelines serve as tools of the settler colonial

00:34:20.600 state and i'm just considering to the interconnected nature of many of these issues what might it look

00:34:30.040 like if we realize that colonization capitalism and climate change affect all of us in violent ways

00:34:35.800 even if it's on varying timelines yeah i think that is really important to highlight

00:34:42.960 right that we are like not only fighting for a world with no pipelines but

00:34:47.440 also no borders or prisons or colonialism or capitalism or white supremacy or patriarchy

00:34:55.220 and the list goes on and we really do see all these things as interconnected and ultimately

00:35:01.560 what we are fighting for is land back right return land to indigenous people um and i think

00:35:07.960 the way this pipeline serves the settler colonial state or the ways are uh immeasurable right like

00:35:17.020 pipelines use the tactic of state land theft for money making corporate extraction and that's

00:35:24.180 the hallmark tactic of the settler colonial state right that's that is settler colonialism

00:35:30.620 and sort of as I've mentioned I think this area has sort of been colonized again and again

00:35:37.520 and it's always the same small group of banker class people who are making millions and billions

00:35:44.060 of dollars from each of those passes of colonization right like from original colonization

00:35:49.660 and erasure or attempted erasure of indigenous peoples from coal from logging from fracking

00:35:59.540 and I think we often say no pipelines on stolen land and it is true that a lot of land or the

00:36:09.900 mountain valley pipeline has been taken from property owners through eminent domain but that

00:36:16.000 is not who we're talking about when we say no pipelines on stolen land right like we're not

00:36:20.960 fighting this fight in a bubble we're talking about the people that this land was originally

00:36:26.120 stolen from um and yeah i think there are some really specific uh ways that this pipeline serves

00:36:36.460 colonialism right at one point MVP proposed bulldozing sacred sites um the Southgate

00:36:43.400 extension which again uh is has recently been denied some important permits which is really 0.99

00:36:50.660 exciting so I'm sure if that will move forward but it's slated to go through Lumbee territory

00:36:56.220 um and some of the resistance to Southgate is indigenous led through really powerful organizers

00:37:03.380 like crystal cavalier um so yeah we are constantly trying to uplift other struggles but especially

00:37:11.240 indigenous struggles um like the folks up at unistoten who are resisting the coastal gas link

00:37:19.120 pipeline um we worked to do a lot of support for line three when that fight was happening and have

00:37:25.480 supported other struggles as well. I have a follow-up question connecting this idea

00:37:33.480 of extraction to constructed views of masculinity and I'm wondering what do you think drives people

00:37:41.980 to promote and search for meaning through violent extraction? I think that there is a lot of

00:37:51.500 scholarship around uh questions like that i think if that's something folks really want to take a

00:37:57.960 deep dive into maybe reading some bell hooks is a good option but i think briefly uh extraction

00:38:06.540 and particularly mining in the case of appalachia has really been framed as heroism you know

00:38:13.360 providing energy for america and whether or not that is true remains a question i think you know

00:38:21.480 know like this pipeline itself as i've already mentioned we don't need this gas the pipeline

00:38:26.660 will actually create the demand and it is almost certain that some of this gas will be exported

00:38:31.580 um so i think really you know like what our masculinity and patriarchy if not

00:38:39.620 a desire to conquer and dominate for profit and that is exactly what this pipeline is

00:38:47.900 mm-hmm yeah um so as we were talking before we started the official interview

00:38:58.920 it's the pipeline is kind of in a questionable state in terms of its building and I would like

00:39:09.160 if you could just walk us through a timeline a bit more and where you're at now where it could go

00:39:16.940 how fast could it start moving and um yeah anything else that we should know about

00:39:24.360 the just logistics of the potential building

00:39:28.520 sure so um the pipeline lost a few important permits this winter um and one of those permits

00:39:41.400 was the ability to construct in the national forest.

00:39:45.680 And I think it's important to note that in 2018,

00:39:51.400 when the direct action campaign started,

00:39:54.240 they were coming for the national forest first

00:39:57.020 because they knew it was an area that was really beloved to people

00:40:00.840 and that people were going to try to save, I think.

00:40:03.940 I'm sure there are other reasons too,

00:40:05.840 But a series of aerial blockades, including the two tree sits that I've mentioned, but also a blockade called a monopod, which is really like a single pole in the ground with somebody living on top of it rather than a tree sit.

00:40:24.420 um and then later a sky pod which is another form of aerial blockade that series of blockade

00:40:30.740 stopped construction in the national forest for 95 days um and then later that year the

00:40:39.160 court of appeals revoked mvp's permit to be able to construct in the national forest

00:40:45.900 now they've now done that for a second time so they're doing very badly at holding on to their

00:40:51.600 permits um but I think that's an important detail to highlight because it shows that

00:40:57.900 if it weren't for that direct action pipe may have already been laid up there um so that is

00:41:04.520 at least where we're at and that's not a very long stretch through the national forest over

00:41:09.440 Peters Mountain but it was a really important stretch both ecologically and to the community

00:41:15.520 Another important legal decision that came out was the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals invalidated MVP's biological opinion that was issued by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

00:41:31.460 And the biological opinion impacts a lot of other permits. So they're going to struggle to get their water crossing permits, basically, without that. They're able to cross some bodies of water.

00:41:45.520 but not all of them. And they do have 500 plus bodies of water to cross still, I believe.

00:41:53.740 So at this point, they are legally able to construct in some parts of the pipeline, but

00:42:02.040 they can't just do it as a whole, because it's sort of like fragmented. There are all these

00:42:07.820 places where they can't construct at this point. And I think dozens of groups have called on FERC,

00:42:16.260 the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, to issue an official stop work order, which would

00:42:21.180 mean that they couldn't construct at all, and FERC still hasn't done that. So technically,

00:42:27.300 my understanding is that they could still build a pipeline in a few spots. Whether they would do

00:42:32.500 that this year is unclear um they haven't started construction yet but legally i believe they still

00:42:41.680 could so it's sort of a an interesting moment for the campaign where it's really up in the air but

00:42:46.980 they still say that they are going to build this pipeline mvp says they're going to finish it

00:42:52.640 so on our end we have to believe them and we have to be ready um and i think if folks are interested

00:42:59.640 in joining this campaign, they should certainly look us up at Appalachians Against Pipelines and

00:43:04.520 get in touch over Facebook or Instagram. And yeah, I believe there will come a time where we're going

00:43:12.880 to need to be out there fighting the pipeline. So, and we still are in so many ways. But I believe

00:43:21.160 the direct action piece will become more necessary, perhaps soon, perhaps in months, we just don't

00:43:27.780 know. I guess one thing I'm wondering is, of course, the best outcome is that the pipeline

00:43:39.580 doesn't get built. But how could that happen beyond just direct action? Or maybe you could

00:43:46.300 walk us through a few different possibilities with direct action without and how it could get

00:43:53.520 stopped from this point forward sure um i think there's sort of two sides of the coin some people

00:44:07.540 i've heard some people say um they don't have enough permits it's taking them too long right

00:44:14.240 they're they've they're twice over budget billions of dollars over budget they're more than four

00:44:19.820 years behind schedule they just there's no way they'll be able to financially survive and then

00:44:25.500 on the other side of that coin i've heard but most of the pipe is already in the ground they

00:44:29.460 cannot finish at this point um and i i see both of those i think it does seem like mvp as a company

00:44:38.320 is really struggling you know some investors have capped their investments um and i think

00:44:45.680 it is possible that it will reach a moment where it will no longer be financially viable

00:44:52.640 to build this pipeline. And I think delay through direct action

00:44:57.440 could be an important way that that happens.

00:45:04.940 FERC could also stop this pipeline. I believe Joe Biden could also stop this pipeline. I think

00:45:14.200 those seem less likely to me than mvp sort of like floundering in their own incompetence and

00:45:22.840 economic turmoil just because uh it has taken high courts to order the pipeline to be stopped

00:45:30.940 or pieces of the pipeline to be stopped for that to happen um and even that has come far too late

00:45:37.780 most of the time um but i suppose those are a few scenarios that could happen but i do think

00:45:44.720 they will struggle without this national forest permit and without this water permit i've heard

00:45:51.100 a completion date of 2024 thrown out there but that's not from mvp themselves at this point

00:45:57.000 they're just not even releasing a completion date but all i know is that once they start

00:46:04.820 working on this pipeline, we will also be back out there stopping them.

00:46:34.820 As their silhouettes

00:46:39.040 spin with the oak leaf

00:46:40.700 children's birth word

00:46:42.820 fall

00:46:43.600 I sing

00:46:46.780 all night

00:46:48.820 in startling

00:46:50.540 white

00:46:52.060 As I dance so young

00:46:58.560 with a lush green clung to our

00:47:00.660 fallen tree friends

00:47:02.820 Oh, thank goodness.

00:47:09.400 Yeah, I really appreciate you and all those who are showing up time and time again.

00:47:18.220 And I think that it's so important for us to feel inspired to show up in the ways that you and your comrades have.

00:47:31.160 And I guess I'm wondering, what do you think stops people from getting more involved in

00:47:38.440 these struggles, whether it's for direct action or otherwise, community organizing that, you

00:47:44.740 know, have nothing to do with a type of direct action that could result in arrest or things

00:47:51.360 like that?

00:47:52.220 What do you think the psychological block is for folks?

00:47:57.440 That's an interesting question.

00:47:58.960 I think there are a lot of really reasonable reasons I can think of, you know, these projects, like this pipeline are just so massive, and it feels so impossible to stop it.

00:48:20.180 you know like in 2018 I was sure that this pipeline would be built by the end of the year

00:48:27.520 and I think there it is really a scary time there's a lot of doom on the horizon it feels like

00:48:37.620 you know like climate change is looting and we're already feeling some really serious impacts

00:48:43.700 you know there's a lot of other really intense threats the rise of white nationalism

00:48:49.720 um continuous rise of the prison industrial complex and I think it does seem really scary

00:48:59.120 and really impossible and really like what is the point of fighting these struggles when the folks

00:49:06.560 and institutions that you are fighting have so much power and so much money and really like an

00:49:14.260 you know, a huge military also. But I also think that is one of the reasons that I

00:49:21.600 love talking about the campaign, because

00:49:25.780 it's been really successful, right? Like I said, I was sure this pipeline would be built in the end

00:49:32.920 of 2018, because normally they really just do build these pipelines so quickly. And now it's

00:49:37.900 been more than four years. And it really seems like a question to me of whether it will ever be

00:49:42.460 built um so I think I totally understand hesitation but it is all the more important

00:49:52.420 for more folks to get out there and be involved in these struggles and fights because like we've

00:49:58.200 already said right power in numbers the more people there are the easier it is to win not

00:50:04.020 that it'll be easy at all but the safer we all are as well yeah

00:50:11.300 I'm wanting to imagine a world without pipelines with you and what might energy

00:50:22.080 and relation to land look like without them yeah I think you know we've already said it it's not

00:50:30.760 just a world without pipelines right it's a world without all of those things like borders and

00:50:36.320 prisons and colonialism and capitalism and racism and sexism and homophobia and transphobia and

00:50:43.320 again just want to highlight land back return land to indigenous people and as a settler like

00:50:49.800 what the world looks like after that is not really up to me you know um and i guess i think

00:50:57.360 it's good and important to have a vision for a better world and I don't think this is what

00:51:07.320 you're doing with this question but I think often this question is sort of used as a like

00:51:11.120 gotcha question right like well if you hate pipelines what's the alternative and I think

00:51:19.360 that is a question right back to the what we just talked about that stumps people and they're like

00:51:25.740 well I don't really know I don't have a better alternative and it is okay and right to stand up

00:51:33.720 and say something is wrong even if you don't have a perfect solution or vision for the problem right

00:51:41.060 like we can't let that question bully us into doing nothing even if we don't have a perfect

00:51:48.660 answer to solving this and I just feel like there is so much indigenous knowledge and there are so

00:51:57.280 many innovators of smart and sustainable and equitable technologies waiting for a chance to

00:52:04.000 do good and fix what's wrong but none of those have seven billion dollars and a police force

00:52:12.100 and a prison system backing them up and this little piece of work that we're trying to do is

00:52:17.560 fight back against this horribly destructive bad thing to be able to give a chance to those people

00:52:23.660 who have that knowledge and those good ideas and I think there really is no perfect solution

00:52:30.080 when it comes to energy right like all forms of renewable energy are flawed and

00:52:35.120 certainly the answer isn't for Exxon to build solar panels and yeah we just can't ever have

00:52:43.440 a short answer to this question you can't just build the better pipeline or reroute uh because

00:52:50.240 it's not about a better route any technology change or sustainable technology that's happening

00:52:56.240 within this context of colonial capitalism is also going to be violent and bad and that's why we're

00:53:02.580 always saying no pipelines but also like none of these other things at the same time

00:53:07.420 yeah thank you for speaking to that um that particular comment around well you know if you

00:53:17.540 don't want pipelines how are we gonna heat our house or how are we gonna live our lives and

00:53:23.800 i think that blocks our creativity and our imagination for a different world and we're

00:53:33.800 not going to be able to change everything at once, but I think stopping new extraction

00:53:39.560 projects is necessary, and I don't want us to get stifled by these types of blocks because

00:53:56.200 yeah, we can't figure it all out at once, so yeah, I appreciate you speaking to that.

00:54:03.800 Well, Lark, thank you so much for your time. And I just want to ask if there's anything else

00:54:15.620 you may want to share with us. I would just encourage folks to get

00:54:22.240 involved with struggles happening in their own communities locally, but also definitely check

00:54:30.060 us out Appalachians Against Pipelines. Like I've said, I think there will come a time where we're

00:54:36.160 calling for folks to come be a part of the campaign. And I hope to see folks here in the

00:54:43.960 mountains. Thank you for listening to For the Wild podcast. The music featured in this episode

00:54:53.320 was by 40 Million Feet, Alexandra Blakely, Camilla Jade, and Cold Mountain Child. For the Wild is

00:55:01.320 created by Ayanna Young, Allie Constantine, Erica Ekrem, Francesca Glaspell, and Julia Jackson.

00:55:09.660 To support For the Wild, find us on Patreon at patreon.com slash for the wild.

For The Wild - October 12, 2022

LARK ELODEA on Appalachians Against Pipelines ⧸308

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