How could anyone justify ruining this for coal? COAL!?
From the mountains, to the prairies, to the…….Oh! wait, never mind.
Mountain-top removal mining is a terrible thing. It ruins the scenery, but more than that it destroys ecosystens that have taken centuries to build. It also pollutes the air and especially the water in the areas where it is practiced. So why in the world would Verizon choose to sponsor a Labor Day event celebrating this environmental destruction?
Your guess is as good as mine. My guess is that the powers that be in this large corporation think they will get lots of good free advertising from this sponsorship. Well, they are getting a lot of attention. However, it may not be the type of attention they bargained for.
Read the following, then write to these people to let them know how you feel. If you really hate large corporations doing as they please with our environment and lands, you might want to check out companies other than Verizon. Let then know then speak with your wallet and your pocket book.
From our friends at the Center for Biological Diversity:
Verizon Wireless Faces Ire Over Mountaintop Removal Rally
Currently, Verizon Wireless is cosponsoring a pro-mountaintop-removal, anti-climate, anti-union Labor Day rally — and the Center for Biological Diversity is leading a pressure campaign to compel a quick about-face. Massey Energy’s “Friends of America” rally, to be held atop a former surface mine in West Virginia next Monday, will cheer for the devastating practice of mountaintop-removal coal mining, which blows up mountains and chokes waterways with debris in Appalachian habitat. The rally, organized by coal giant Massey Energy, will guest-star global warming denier Lord Christopher Monckton, and boasts an on-site anti-climate legislation petition to sign. Further, the rally’s Web site homepage shockingly features the company’s CEO on video accusing “environmental extremists” of destroying jobs by opposing mountaintop removal. (Meanwhile, the rally is competing with the nearby 71st annual United Coal Workers of America Labor Day celebration for attendees.)
But thanks to the Center’s immediate leap into action and bold national grassroots campaign, Verizon Wireless may be losing more than a few of its 87 million customers: Thousands of them are asking, Can you hear us now? and pledging to spend their money with their conscience. On August 30, the Center notified Verizon Wireless’ CEO in no uncertain terms that Verizon must withdraw support for the rally and mountaintop removal or we’d have to tell our 225,000 supporters why we left their pro-coal, anti-environmentalist, anti-union company. Now we’ve joined forces with CREDO Action, and in just three days our concerned citizens submitted 69,000 letters and made hundreds of phone calls to Verizon telling it to drop the rally.
Join us in commanding Verizon Wireless to withdraw its sponsorship and read more about our opposition in Advertizing Age. Help submit more than 100,000 letters by Labor Day — join the cause on Facebook, tweet about Verizon, and learn why Grist magazine calls Massey’s CEO “the scariest polluter in America” in this New York Times piece.
