Well done Greenpeace...

[nwdiver]

Pulling stunts to inconvenience the oil company when what you have a problem with is the policy is childish. It is your (our) government.

Still trying to figure out how this is any different than the civil disobedience in the 60s... or was that 'childish' too...

 

[rolosrevenge]

I am astonished that in the apparent need to self-justify, several of us are so willing to throw out the entire history of effective social disobedience and non-violent protest. I have not seen any reasonable counter-arguments to nwdiver's many examples of well-accepted successes for these sorts of actions. You absolutely have a right to disagree, but to deny history? I think not.

Self justify? I still have a gas car and I don't protest ships. I'm far less involved and don't pretend otherwise. I think purchasing an EV and convincing others to do so will kill the demand, while flotillas and stunts trying to impede movements will not. Unlike previously mentioned examples of civil rights, there's a huge economic incentive to get the oil, and always will be until we transition away from it. What this does is tell oil companies not to dock in Portland, which will probably hurt Portland more than the companies in the long run.

 

[Incredulocious]

I am astonished that in the apparent need to self-justify, several of us are so willing to throw out the entire history of effective social disobedience and non-violent protest. I have not seen any reasonable counter-arguments to nwdiver's many examples of well-accepted successes for these sorts of actions. You absolutely have a right to disagree, but to deny history? I think not.

Yes!! I was considering a response when I came to your response. Exactly! How can folks so easily deny/dismiss the history of the effectiveness of protests leading to change? Yes, do support better alternative solutions to burning oil but don't dismiss the efforts to also protest, demonstrate, or petition for change.

Okay, changed "mock" to dismiss... Okay?? ;-)

I'll add that it doesn't matter that it's not an issue of civil rights or that there's great economic incentive to keep drilling. Protests, demonstrations and even petitioning draw attention to issues and help lead to change, as we've seen through history, even recent history, on big and small issues.

What doesn't seem to work is trying to change someone's opinion on an internet forum. ;-) (I am surprised to find myself defending Greenpeace though, after being put off by some of their past approaches to other issues.)

 

[brianman]

... don't mock the efforts to also protest, demonstrate, or petition for change.

I didn't see "mocking". Did I miss some posts, or did they already get moderated?

 

[nwdiver]

Unlike previously mentioned examples of civil rights, there's a huge economic incentive to get the oil, and always will be until we transition away from it. What this does is tell oil companies not to dock in Portland, which will probably hurt Portland more than the companies in the long run.

So direct action protests against immoral acts motivated by racism are ok but protesting immoral acts motivated by greed aren't?

The fact that Shell is driven by PROFIT and not IDEOLOGY should make these protests MORE effective; The more difficult, expensive and inconvenient this becomes the less attractive this insane 30 year plan gets. Bad PR costs $$$, delays cost $$$, lawyers cost $$$...

There's two sides to this addiction... supply AND demand... we need to address BOTH.

 

[BrianC]

The protesters have all come down after 40 hours and the ship passed by the bridge on its way to Alaska now. :scared:

 

[rolosrevenge]

And I posit that addressing demand is more effective in this case. And those addressing the demand are more committed.

 

[Canuck]

Two solutions come readily to mind-

...
(2) Eliminate money entering (make it illegal) to make it harder to influence the process with cash.

This can't be changed without a constitutional amendment given the Supreme Court's majority (and asinine) ruling of Citizens United. The only good thing to come of that ruling is that Roberts realized his blunder and he "also learned a similar, valuable lesson from a far less familiar ruling: House v. Bell, from Roberts’ very first term on the court. Few remember the facts of this case—Paul House, a man sentenced to death, won the right to file a habeas petition in federal court—but you can bet Roberts will never forget it. Joined by Scalia and Thomas, Roberts wrote a partial dissent that contemptuously dismissed House’s claims of innocence. To House’s contention that his scratches and bruises were from his construction work and a cat’s claws, Roberts derisively replied, “Scratches from a cat, indeed.” Several years later, however, prosecutors dropped all charges against House, who was exonerated by DNA evidence."

John Roberts isns liberals more often.

 

[mkspeedr]

I have been a happier calmer person since I restricted my car/motorcycle forum posts to cars and motorcycles.

 

[beeeerock]

This couple would agree:

~

Dammit... out of reputation power!! Two fantastic posts with excellent images and I can't give the attaboys they deserve! :biggrin:

The bridge protest did more in a day for public awareness than working to convince politicians 'the right way' has done in a decade. Conservatively, how many people world-wide saw news coverage of the protest? Of those, how many absorbed the message? And of them, how many might have Google'd to learn more about the drilling program? I don't think 100 million would be out of line for the first number. Maybe a billion, depending on how far the news coverage spread. Say 10% absorbed the news: 10 million. 1% of that number decided to learn more: 100,000. Very conservative numbers.

Working the political way is a farce. We all know that big business calls the shots... and the one percenters. Was the fix for the presidential election in Florida so long ago? Controlling the nominations is the key - then we're stuck to vote for the candidate we hate the least.

The only way things will change for the better is if the general population finally realizes that it's THEIR future at risk, their children's and grandchildren's futures at risk... all being squandered for a profit today. They (we) will have to force the change on global leaders. How that will happen, I don't know. If it will happen, I don't know. But there isn't a politician on the planet with the cahonies to do anything meaningful on his/her own.

 

[lolachampcar]

"The bridge protest did more in a day for public awareness than working to convince politicians 'the right way' has done in a decade."
I think not.

 

[nwdiver]

Here's an interview with the executive director of Greenpeace;

The polar pioneer will be returning to Seattle at the end of the drilling season. Pacific Northwest drama is likely to continue...

 

[rays427]

nwdiver,

You mentioned that we should quickly install 200 GW of solar. Do you understand what that actually does. The average daily output is 5 hours per day of production. There is also a 20% loss in converting between DC and AC. So 200 GW ends up producing 200x5x365x.8 = 292 Twh of electricity per year. Unfortunately it does not produce that on a consistent basis. In general Solar produces about 6 times more in the highest summer month than the lowest winter month. For air conditioning use this works great but for heating and operating cars not so well. To convert all cars (does not include diesel trucks) to electric operation would require about 1,100 Twh per year. This assumes electric cars are 4 times more efficient than ICE cars. So you would need about 750 GW additional Solar to replace the average use of all cars. You would still need other source of energy to balance out the monthly needs. If you include all heating requirements then you need much more. Wind power helps in many locations in that it produces more in the winter than summer although that's not the case in California. So because the sun doesn't shine all the time nor does the wind blow all the time you need a lot more installed capacity than with many other forms of energy. Nuclear has the best output versus installed capacity. Geothermal is also very good. Next is fossil fuels. I always thought hydro would be very reliable but that also is dependent on the weather. In a drought hydro gets cut drastically. It's going to take a long time to replace fossil fuels because of the amount of installed capacity needed by renewables versus the daily output. By the way the solar output I used above includes having the solar panels installed in the best orientation without shading. In my case my roof is not in the best orientation and so my 12kw system maxes out at 7.7 kw per hour. My highest output per day was 63.5 Kwh and the lowest was 1 Kwh. The maximum average daily for any month was 58.47kwh/day and the lowest was 7.19kwh/day. So how are we going to provide the energy we need on that day when the sun and wind are absent? We either need to install a lot of additional capacity or one heck of a lot of storage. So I think we will continue to need fossil fuels for the foreseeable future. By the way the current price of oil is already reducing the capital outlay of the oil companies. This will eventually dry up the overcapacity and drive up the price of oil. This is good for those of you that want to reduce the use of fossil fuels but will be costly for those that still depend on it. I know my viewpoint on this issue is not very popular on this forum but it's what I believe using the available data. Have a nice day.

 

[nwdiver]

nwdiver,

You mentioned that we should quickly install 200 GW of solar.

Well.... I think I probably used the word 'NEED'.... this is somewhat off-topic so my response is here;

 

[nwdiver]

Yes... this is the Huffington post; Yes... for some reason it's posted in their 'Religion' section...

But... it's still a good read... Civil Disobedience and Climate Change