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About Eugene weekly. (Eugene, Oregon) 1993-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 21, 2012)
NEWS SLANT POLLUTION UPDATE • Thanksgiving is a big family holiday for some, a celebration of “America” for others and, for many indigenous peoples, a reminder of racism and genocide. We give big props first to members of the Eugene community for speaking out about their feelings about a flyer that advertised the “Spanksgiving” Fetish Ball using an image of a woman in facepaint and an “Indian headdress.” And second kudos to Diablos Fetish Night for immediately responding to those concerns from the Native community. You can catch some of the dialogue on EW’s and Diablos’ Facebook pages. As soon as Diablos knew there was an issue, the organizers responded, apologized and reached out to the indigenous community. A representative went to the UO’s Many Nations Longhouse and a conversation ensued. That’s pretty classy. • The shopping season is upon us, for better or worse. Consumer spending drives our economy but we are also addicted as a nation to accumulating and consuming more “stuff” than we need, and exhausting our natural resources in the process. Black Friday, the highly profitable day after Thanksgiving, is also Buy Nothing Day in recognition of our excesses. The solution, of course, is to buy and consume wisely. The big box stores and their parking lots will be crowded, but we also hope to see strong consumer support for small, locally owned stores and festive gatherings like Holiday Market at the Fairgrounds. The holidays can also be an incredibly tough time for those among us who are lonely and down on their luck. Let’s share the love and the bounty. • What’s happening with the Kesey Collection at the UO Knight Library? The massive archives contain thousands of original manuscripts, letters, personal journals and artwork from the novelist’s lifetime. The collection has been valued at more than $1 million and private collectors are interested in it, along with other university libraries. So far about $300,000 has been raised and a memorandum of understanding is being negotiated with the Kesey family in order to keep the collection at the UO. According to Keri Aronson, director of development of UO libraries. Aronson could not provide details concerning the MOU, but she is upbeat. “We’ve had checks come in from all over the world and we’ve had donations ranging from $1 to $25,000,” she tells us. “Ken touched so many lives with his powerful words and personality. I feel very lucky to be involved in this project. I have met so many wonderful people and each and every one of them has their own story about Ken.” The latest community fundraising effort was by Voodoo Doughnuts, which raised $10,000 with its “Easy Kesey Lemon Pesey” doughnuts with special psychedelic colors and a chewy cube of “acid” on top. The treats have been selling at all three Voodoo shops since July, says Sara Heise of Voodoo. A press conference was held last week by Voodoo owners Tres Shannon and Kenneth “Cat Daddy” Pogson to announce the $10,000 donation. Photos of the colorful event, which drew a big crowd at UO but got little attention from the media, can be found at wkly.ws/1dz and anyone wanting to organize a fundraiser or otherwise contribute can contact Aronson at keria@ uoregon.edu or check out the Kesey Collection Facebook page. • Oregon’s Ducks tripped over Stanford Saturday and Duck fans are aching. Losing hurts, but fans should be celebrating that Oregon has gone 44-7 over the past four seasons — as good as any team in the nation. Just think, you could be an Auburn fan. The Tigers won the national championship two years ago and looked ready to dominate for years. But this year Auburn is 3-8 and has not won a conference game. The Ducks’ loss to Stanford may have knocked them out of the national championship, but we should enjoy their excellence on the field. What’s next? We continue our stunning prediction record: The Beavers are up next and the Ducks will need to bounce back fast. Coach Kelly’s Oregon teams have never lost two in a row, so they should roll over OSU by 21 points at noon this Saturday in Corvallis. • Another unneeded Walmart in the metro area? We hear the retail giant plans to open a new, smaller store in the Gateway Shopping Center area in Springfield. That area is already heavily congested and this comes at a time when downtown Springfield is starting to show some life. Walmart promises jobs but always has a net negative impact on communities when you figure in the small businesses that are killed, and the non-union wages and hours that keep most Walmart employees in poverty and relying on public services. lighten up BY R A FA EL ALDAVE Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) records indicate that Junction City has now paid the water pollution penalty mentioned in Nov. 15’s Pollution Update. The City of Eugene’s Stormwater Annual Report is now online, and public comments are being accepted until 5 pm on Nov. 30. Go to wkly.ws/1e4 DEQ is accepting public comments on school bus company First Student, Inc.’s stormwater pollution plan for its Corvallis bus maintenance facility until 5 pm on Nov. 30. Visit wkly.ws/1e5 to see the plan, and wkly.ws/1e1to comment. According to Grist, Americans will throw away $282 million worth of uneaten turkey on Thanksgiving, and “per pound, the resources needed to produce that turkey are equiva- lent to driving your car 11 miles and taking a 130-minute shower (at four gallons/minute).” See wkly.ws/1e3 — Doug Quirke/ Oregon Clean Water Action Project TAR SANDS PROTESTED AT EUGENE SHELL STATION Protesters in Texas have put up treesits and locked themselves to machinery to stop the Keystone XL pipeline; thousands of activists gathered around the White House Nov. 18 to call on President Obama to reject the controversial tar sands conduit; and here in Eugene, as part of a week of solidarity actions, local activists faced high winds and rain to voice their concerns about tar sands oil. Members of Cascadia Forest Defenders, Occupy Eugene, We the People, No Coal Eu- gene and other Eugene activists spent hours on Nov. 19 picketing outside of the Shell gas station on 7th and Van Buren and Chase Bank downtown. Activists say that the picket was held to raise money for the Tar Sands Blockade and to bring attention to Shell’s role in extracting tar sands from indigenous lands. According to Ben Jones of Cascadia Forest Defenders, “Shell owns 60 percent of the tar sands operations in Alberta.” Erin Grady, also of the Forest Defenders, says that more than 40 other cities have planned anti-tar sands solidarity actions. “The tar sands are something that affects every- one in North America,” Grady says, “because it’s a huge extractive project in Canada com- ing down through the middle of the country with a pipeline that will be probably leak and malfunction.” Grady says that tar sands extraction in Canada “is on a huge scale that we have not seen before.” Tar sands mining has been called “the biggest carbon bomb on the planet,” and climate change opponent Bill McKibben has made tar sands extraction a focus of his 350. org campaign to curb global warming. Grady says many Eugene activists have traveled to Texas to protest the tar sands pipe- line construction there. “It’s so sad,” she says. “So many people, protesting for such a long time, and it’s still going through.” Grady says Obama got liberal votes by blocking the Keystone XL, but then he quietly OK’d the southern portion of the line. Oregon may not be facing a tar sands pipeline in its near future, but Oregonians do put tar sands oil into their cars. According to Michael O’Leary, energy and fuel consultant with the National Wildlife Federation, the data can be hard to fi nd; but he cites by way of example information from the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) that shows 90 percent of Oregon’s oil comes from Washington and about 8 percent of Washing- ton’s oil comes from tar sands crude. — Camilla Mortensen A PROTESTER CALLS FOR AN END TO TAR SANDS MINING Romney has made no long-range plans for life after the election. For now he’s just going to screw up one day at a time. S L A N T IN C LU D E S S H O R T O P INI O N P IE C E S , O B S E R VAT I O N S A N D R U M O R- C H A S IN G N OT E S C O M P IL E D B Y T H E E W S TA F F. H E A R D A N Y G O O D R U M O R S L AT E LY ? C O N TA C T T E D TAY LO R AT 4 8 4 - 0 519 , E D I TO R @ E U GE N E W E E K LY. C O M PHOTO BY CASCADIA FOREST DEFENDERS 12 November 21, 2012 • eugeneweekly.com
