Hey Everyone! :-)
I've decided to start a new series on this blog that I hope you'll all like. If you read this blog regularly, you know I watch quite a bit of new media. So, I thought I'd start a series with some videos from YouTube that catch my eye.
Today's videos will be politically oriented, but that won't be the case for every video in this series. The videos I choose to share will be whatever catches my eye. They could be political in nature, but they might also be animals, food, entertainment, or anything else that seems interesting, important, or amusing to me.
I hope you enjoy this series, and I'd love to hear any thoughts you might have. Feel free to leave comments down below. :-)
So, on to today's video.
As some of you might know, there is currently an oil pipeline under construction in North Dakota. The pipeline is under dispute because the pipeline goes through land that belongs to the Native American Standing Rock Sioux tribe. The pipeline will also go under the river that the tribe uses for drinking water and almost certainly, based on how prone oil pipelines are to spills and leaks, poison the water and make it impossible for the tribe to use it.
There have been massive protests over this that have gone on for months, but there has been a near-total blackout of news about this on mainstream media. Over Labor Day weekend (the first Monday in September for those of you outside the US), the company that is building the pipeline, Energy Transfer Partners, hired "security guards" (mercenary soldiers) to run interference against the protectors as the company construction crews destroyed a Native American burial ground.
These mercenaries had dogs that they sicced on the protectors. The dogs bit several people and the incident was filmed by Democracy Now!'s reporter, Amy Goodman. A warrant was issued for Amy Goodman several days after Democracy Now! released the footage that they had recorded. As a journalist, Ms. Goodman shouldn't be subject to arrest for doing her job. The First Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees a free press in this country. And yet, Ms. Goodman is being charged with trespassing and inciting to riot for simply recording what happened. The very definition of journalism.
Now, the charges against Amy Goodman were dropped. They were so outrageous that the judge wouldn't even hear the case, he simply refused to sign the document giving the prosecutor authorization to bring them against her. But just the fact that she was charged at all is something that should concern everyone who values the First Amendment.
Also, Amy Goodman isn't the only person who has been arrested in connection with this pipeline. Peaceful protectors have been arrested as well, and their families harassed by police. One protector who was arrested is Shailene Woodley, the actress who played Tris in the Divergent movies, and she has made several public statements regarding her arrest, including the fact that she was strip-searched even though the only thing she was charged with was trespassing. In short, the government is colluding with private corporate interests to deny US citizens their constitutionally guaranteed rights. And yet, mainstream media remains silent.
I'll leave a link to a couple of Amy Goodman's videos below, and I would definitely recommend that you subscribe to Democracy Now!'s YouTube channel if you're interested in hearing something other than the propaganda put out by cable news channels. But the video I'll be featuring today is by Jordan Chariton from TYT Politics, a channel on The Young Turks network, which I'd also recommend you subscribe to. This video is about the latest goings on at the Dakota Access Pipeline.
And, as promised, here are the links to Democracy Now!'s Amy Goodman's videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VADcWANqBp8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrfEasDnfGM
Thank you all for stopping by today! I hope you enjoyed today's post and that you'll also like the next video I feature. :-) Peace!
No comments:
Post a Comment