#1541 Tear down paradise and put up a dystopian police state (Cop City)
Best of the Left - Leftist Perspectives on Progressive Politics, News, Culture, Economics and Democracy
Jay Tomlinson
4.5 • 3.4K Ratings
🗓️ 5 February 2023
⏱️ 70 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Air Date 2/5/2023
Today, we take a look at the threat to the lives of environment protectors around the world with a special focus on the first environmental activist in the U.S. to lose their life at the hands of police while defending the environment and the people who depend on it as part of the Defend the Atlanta Forest movement against the construction of what they have dubbed "Cop City."
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SHOW NOTES
Ch. 1: Record number of environmental activists murdered - BBC News - Air Date 9-13-21
227 people were killed around the world in 2020, the highest number for a second consecutive year. The victims were called "environmental defenders" by the report – killed for protecting natural resources that need to be preserved,
Ch. 2: Cop City - The Takeaway - Air Date 1-17-23
Digital producer Zachary Bynum reports from Atlanta, talking with activists, organizers, and elected officials from the city to determine what this all means about race, land stewardship, and power.
According to Global Witness’ report titled ‘Decade of Defiance’, 1733 activists were killed between 2012 and 2021. 227 of them were killed in the year 2020. Last year, 200 environmental defenders were murdered. Nearly 4 people a week!
SWAT teams and other armed police officers from eight different federal, state, county, and city police agencies conducted a raid on those camping out in the Atlanta forest
Six people in Atlanta have been charged with domestic terrorism for taking part in protests against a massive new police training facility known as Cop City.
Ch. 6: Environmentalists in danger Part 1 - DW Documentary - Air Date 10-29-22
Around the globe, people are risking their lives to protect the environment and climate. When environmentalists’ activities disrupt organized crime and other illegal profiteers, they are sued, threatened and even murdered.
Just weeks ago, law enforcement officers — including a SWAT team — were violently evicting protesters who had occupied a wooded area outside the center, when they shot and killed a longtime activist and charged 19 with domestic terrorism.
Ch. 8: Environmentalists in danger Part 2 - DW Documentary - Air Date 10-29-22
Ch. 9: Cop City: Forest Defender Killed by Police in Forest Raid - The Takeaway - Air Date 1-25-23
We checked in with Founder of Community Movement Builders Kamau Franklin and Sean, a participant in the Defend the Atlanta Forest movement, for an update on the situation.
Former energy executive Roberto David Castillo has been sentenced in Honduras for orchestrating the murder of environmental activist Berta Cáceres in 2016.
MEMBERS-ONLY BONUS CLIP(S)
Ch. 11: Cop City Part 2 - The Takeaway - Air Date 1-17-23
Glasgow memorial honors 1,005 land and environmental defenders who have been murdered since the 2015 Paris Agreement. One in three of those defenders killed was an Indigenous person. 2020 was the most dangerous year on record for environmental defenders.
FINAL COMMENTS
Ch. 13: Final comments and conversation with Ben about his fallen friend
Bonus clip: More training not enough to reform police culture says whistleblower - MSNBC - Air Date 1-31-23
Whistleblower Katie Sponsler, former National Park Service ranger, U.S. Air Force veteran, and advocate for police reform, joins Joy Reid on why more training alone is not enough to reform police culture.
MUSIC (Blue Dot Sessions):
- Opening Theme: Loving Acoustic Instrumental by John Douglas Orr
- Voicemail Music: Low Key Lost Feeling Electro by Alex Stinnent
- Activism Music: This Fickle World by Theo Bard (https://theobard.bandcamp.com/track/this-fickle-world)
- Closing Music: Upbeat Laid Back Indie Rock by Alex Stinnent
Produced by Jay! Tomlinson
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Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Welcome to this episode of the award-winning Best of Left podcast in which we shall take |
| 0:07.4 | a look at the threat to the lives of environment protectors around the world, with a special |
| 0:13.0 | focus on the first environmental activist in the US to lose their life at the hands of |
| 0:17.8 | police while defending the environment and the people who depend on it as part of the |
| 0:22.6 | defend the Atlanta Forest movement against the construction of what they have dubbed |
| 0:27.0 | cop city. Clips today are from the BBC News, The Takeaway, Down to Earth, Unicorn Wyatt, |
| 0:35.2 | Democracy Now, a DW documentary and NBC News with additional members only clips from The |
| 0:41.6 | Takeaway and Democracy Now. And stay tuned to the end where I'll have a conversation with |
| 0:47.0 | a friend of the Fallen Forest Defender from the protest in Atlanta. A record number of |
| 0:58.8 | environmental activists were murdered last year. According to the campaign group Global |
| 1:03.3 | Witness, there were more than 220 killings, many of them linked to resource exploitation |
| 1:08.4 | such as logging and mining. A third targeted indigenous people, the highest number of attacks |
| 1:13.8 | 65 was in Colombia. So let's join our Louis Wilson, who is Senior Communications Advisor |
| 1:19.8 | from Global Witness, Louis Good to See You. That's a shocking number, 220 people killed, |
| 1:25.9 | at a time when the climate crisis is getting worse by the day, what else do you report |
| 1:31.0 | find? Well, as you point out, our report found that as the climate crisis intensifies, |
| 1:39.4 | so too does violence against those protecting the planet. Our report found a very clear |
| 1:45.8 | link between resource exploitation, so the felling of trees, the extraction of minerals, |
| 1:52.1 | and violence against people protecting the planet. So in some of these countries that |
| 1:57.1 | we're looking at, is there just no protection or sufficient protection to protect those |
| 2:02.8 | who are defending their land? That's correct. And governments and industry |
| 2:08.4 | in these countries, the worst affected countries, have made it very clear that their priority |
... |
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