The international environmental activist organization
Greenpeace is known for its confrontational tactics in
fighting to preserve certain species of wildlife and
land owned by or adjacent to indigenous peoples.
Sometimes they break laws in order to make their
point, including engaging in destruction of private
property. Well, this time they had taken it on their
collective chin to the tune of a $667 million verdict
against them in court.
A North Dakota jury very recently ordered Greenpeace
to pay $667 million in damages for its destructive
campaign in the '10s to block the Dakota Access Pipeline.
Energy Transfer LP, the plaintiff, gave strong evidence
during the trial that Greenpeace defamed the company
and abetted vandals. Protesters threw feces and burning
logs at security officers, and had even chained themselves
to construction equipment. All to get the pipeline's
financial backers to step aside from the DAPL project
by claiming --- quite erroneously --- that the company's
"personnel deliberately desecrated documented burial
grounds and other culturally important sites," T
Energy Transfer stated that Greenpeace's actions delayed
the pipeline's construction and increased construction
costs by hundreds of millions of dollars. Greenpeace
said, in its defense, as it never expressly order the vandalism
even if it did train protesters. The jury wasn't buying it,
therefore it awarded the colossal amount in damages that
it did.
Greenpeace tried to cloak their actions in the First Amendment,
stating that they were merely exercising their free speech and
protest rights. However, there are no 1A rights to defame and
destroy. This is a commonly fallacious way of thinking among
far-left groups that take violent actions against people and
property in their protests. Maybe this ruling will persuade such
groups to reconsider their methods of protestation.
But your leery Peasant wouldn't bet on it.
MEM
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