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February 22nd, 2016 
Awake Goy 
Print FriendlyAbove Photo: From No ACP Facebook
Over 700 folks joined us on this beautiful sunny Saturday! This was the largest anti Dominion protest in VA history! We can’t thank the attendees, the arrestees and our wonderful team of point people and liaisons enough. We have more love for you all than we ever have.
We came to our state capitol to challenge the toxic relationship between Dominion, Governor McAuliffe, DEQ, and our legislators. The rally was full of insightful and intersectional speakers that enlightened us to Dominion’s overreach, green-washing, eco-racism, eco-feminism, Appalachian resistance history, and much more. We ask everyone to reflect on these intersections going forward. The march was full of music, large scale puppets, costumes and passion. We passed by many of our reserve landmarks including Dominion, McGuire Woods and SunTrust where we received word that the democratic party was having a committee meeting. The demand was simple: repeal these permits NOW!
Upon getting back to the capitol individuals chose the best path for themselves. For most, this was going to the capitol steps to continue to defy the rules set forth by the state and instead continuing to call out the toxic relationship while demanding that McAuliffe get there immediately to hear our demand of repeal. Unsurprisingly, he did not show up, and individuals’ choice to stand their ground culminated in 9 arrests. The arrestees were mostly female bodied while the cops were mostly men. We had a lot of concern around this as sitting on the steps for reproductive rights in 2012 resulted in violent arrests that then sparked a nationwide resistance against the state’s attempt to control our bodies. Today the police were well prepared to protect their meaningless ground with many large scale arrest buses, capitol and state police. We had no idea what to expect but were grateful that we had lawyers and bail bondsman ready to go for us. Fortunately, the arrestees were only met with summons! This means they will have the option to pay a fine OR fight it in court which we will learn more about later. We want to point out that recently we have noticed the police offering summonses over jail arrests which we think is a good thing for us! It’s cheaper for support and it also means that we may have serious opportunities to ESCALATE.
We want to also reflect on our lessons of autonomy. All of you have the choice to escalate whenever you want and wherever you want! There was lots of talk today of targeting the DEQ offices and the Governor’s office the with sit in’s before March 9th ( the date Dominion has indicated to DEQ that they may start dumping). When folks get together and decide what actions are needed to meet specific goals (i.e. repealing the permits immediately) then you are participating in the most powerful type of communal decision. Collective autonomy!
We will try soon to provide direct action training in Richmond. In the meantime, our friends @we are cove point are holding a weekend a Spring Break with a big focus on direct action. We encourage all of you to go! Some links for self education can be found here:
https://www.facebook.com/events/1544556029189202/
Other direct action education: http://organizingforpower.org/
http://ruckus.org/
Please send all photos and videos to [email protected]. We will make some beautiful videos out of it!
We are asking for funds so we can cover the arrestees summons cost. This will be at least $1000. We also need funds if folks decide to go to court which is entirely up to them. Lastly, we ALWAYS need funds for future direct action because these events cost money, time and energy.
Thank you so much for being with us today! We can’t wait to see what y’all have planned next. Everyone NEEDS to step up the escalation if we want to get these permits repealed. The next few weeks are crucial.
We love you all so much. We can win this if we are brave.
No ACP
Source Article from https://www.popularresistance.org/dump-dominion-a-march-for-our-rivers/
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