Skip to content Skip to footer

Big Oil’s Devastation Worldwide (Video)

“Oil is a messy business, even when it’s legal,” says filmmaker Joe Berlinger, and we’ve all seen the effects of that business splashed across front pages and television sets over the last month. But the BP disaster isn’t the only mess that Big Oil has caused in the last couple of months, to say nothing … Continued

Honest, paywall-free news is rare. Please support our boldly independent journalism with a donation of any size.

“Oil is a messy business, even when it’s legal,” says filmmaker Joe Berlinger, and we’ve all seen the effects of that business splashed across front pages and television sets over the last month. But the BP disaster isn’t the only mess that Big Oil has caused in the last couple of months, to say nothing of the years and decades past. The newest oil mess to be cleaned up is a Chevron spill in Utah that has flooded a Salt Lake City creek with thousands of gallons from a pipeline with what was described as a “quarter-sized hole” in it.

Antonia Juhasz is director of the Chevron Program at Global Exchange, and Joe Berlinger is director and producer of Crude: The Real Price of Oil, which looks at the effects of Chevron/Texaco on people in Ecuador’s Amazon rainforests and their struggle for restitution. They both join Laura for a discussion of Big Oil’s ongoing destruction around the world, and what can be done about it.

If you want to do something to help, New Yorkers can attend a benefit screening of Crude with Joe Berlinger, Morgan Spurlock and others, and everyone can contribute to the Crude legal defense fund to fight Big Oil’s lawyers.

An important fundraising appeal: 9 Days to raise $50,000

Donations are down for Truthout at a time when media is under immense pressure. Google’s AI search has driven our traffic down by 15 percent, Trump is arresting journalists, and many independent media organizations face heartbreaking cutbacks and closures.

At the same time, movement media is vital in the fight against Trump’s authoritarian reign. Our mandate to tell the truth, share strategies for resistance, and speak against fascism is ever more urgent in this deluge of political censorship and misinformation. Yet, we are struggling to meet our publishing costs when our work is so urgently needed.

We are fundraising right now for those basic operating expenses — we need $50,000 in the next 9 days. If you can support Truthout with a one-time or monthly donation, you will make a significant impact on our work. Anything you can do makes a difference.