Raising the Bar: Checking in on Mountain Justice Summer By Mike Roselle

Mountaintop removal/valley fill coal mining in southern West Virginia in May 2003                              Photo by Vivian Stockman

One thing I hear people say a lot around here in Alabama is "Thank God for Mississippi, because it makes us look good." I say “Thank God for Floyd Satan, because he makes me look good”. Floyd and I just finished a road trip through the Southern Appalachians. We were getting psyched for Mountain Justice Summer and wanted to know what was going on. There have been lots of meetings and we have been to only a few of them. Usually we are down the street in the bar. I have always found that if you sit in the bar nearest a large environmental meeting, sooner or later you will see just about everybody you need to meet. This is what I always referred to as the Brower Hour, in honor of the late David Brower, who always said that the best campaigns were first written down on bar napkins at closing time. Now I know that this method of organizing has come under fire lately, and there seems to be something of a new temperance movement afoot, but let me tell you something; Floyd and I are dedicated to proving once again that David Brower was right. And just for the record, this idea for this website was jotted down on just such a napkin at just such an hour at the Old Post Pub in Missoula. Josh still has our business plan in the bar napkin file wrapped around a half-eaten burrito.

Floyd is something of a shaman. The bar is his sacred cave and Charlie Watts his ceremonial drummer. Over the altar hangs the Velvet Elvis, patron saint of all those who seek the eternal truth. Like a shaman, Floyd can see through the grimy walls of the bar room deep into the universe. Or at least that’s what it looks like he’s doing. Shamans, of course, are here to help us to better see our own world by taking us into another world, a different reality. In their world, what we would normally see as natural and logical seems ignorant and absurd. It is kind of like going to Washington D.C., except the beer is cheaper and there is plenty of parking. Floyd has always told me he would see all of his lost friends in That Big Barroom in the Sky. He also believes that Dickey Betts and the Allman Brothers will get back together for this. I think that before this happens, Hell will freeze over.

As I think about Mountain Justice Summer, it reminds me how unreal what passes for reality really is. Pulling into Whitesville West Virginia, I was reminded once again just how much of our perception of reality is based on what little information we possess. Like everyone else, I know coal comes from West Virginia. And, like everyone else, I know that here are some courageous local people who are standing up to the big coal companies to protect their homes and their mountains. But seeing this for the first time was both terrifying and inspiring; Terrifying to see the impacts of Mountaintop Removal close up; and inspiring to witness the courage of groups like Coal River Mountain Watch and the Ohio Valley Coalition in their heroic efforts to stand up to them against incredible odds. What they are fighting here is nothing less than the ecological plunder of the Earth and ethnic cleansing. These big coal companies are currently engaged in a depopulation campaign that Joseph Stalin and Nicolai Chauchesku might admire. Right now, these few organizations are the only thing standing in between the mountains and the bulldozers. I plan to be out there with them in May for Mountain Justice Summer and I urge everyone who can, to come out to West Virginia this summer and help these folks out.

When I think about Mountaintop Removal I realize how irrational this world really is. 99.9 percent of all scientists agree that human activity, especially the burning of coal, has lead to climate change. Yet the Bush administration still acts like atmospheric science is as complicated as string theory. Even if Jesus Christ himself walked up to along him with Socrates and Joe Namath and told him that carbon dioxide causes climate change, George W. Bush wouldn’t believe it. Wining this debate with logic and reason may be hard. If politicians used logic and reasoning, we’d all be driving the flying solar cars we we’re promised by the futurists in the 1950’s. Multi-national coal-mining companies have left many regions of the world all but uninhabitable. They pump massive amounts of carbon into the atmosphere, saturate the air with mercury and other chemicals, kill rivers and streams, poison the water and otherwise pretty much do the opposite of what we need to be doing about our energy consumption. But more urgently, Mountaintop Removal is upping the ante on climate change; more destruction of our rivers and forests with fewer jobs and less accountability. It also means less action on renewables and conservation.

Worst of all, they are attempting to intimidate and silence the only people who are standing in their way. They are trying to push them out of their homes so they can level whole mountaintops and dump the refuse into the creeks and valleys of West Virginia. We should not let that happen. Mountaintop Removal is one of the most extreme examples of how wrong things are in this country. How we respond to it will likely determine how much longer we can continue to pretend that we are actually fighting the multinational energy companies and addressing the root causes of climate change. This battle cannot be done without a confrontation.

Sometimes people walk up to me and say, “Mike, industrial civilization sucks, the world is going to Hell in a hand basket and I am just a simple lowbagger so what can I do?” And I have to admit; it’s a good question. It seems to me the best thing you can do is to help out your friends. When I look around and see so many good people who have not given up hope, and are willing to do more than just complain, and are standing up for what they believe, it makes me want to have a beer with them and to ask how I can help. This is one subject in which Floyd and I both agree.

Come seek justice amongst the mountains of West Virginia this summer and keep the fine company of Mike Roselle, still dispatching from the road.

For more information on mountaintop removal in West Virginia, check out mountainjusticesummer.org.