Photo: Steinar Melby
by Laila Haukeland, Hosteland
translated by Bergensia from original in Norwegian at KSU.no
Our National Costume and wind power
Imagine you are looking at a tree, where the tree is the city. A tree must have roots that extend beyond the trunk. The roots create stability and nourish. The roots are the countryside. For the tree to be stable, the roots need good growth conditions. So is our country Norway, too, like a forest with trees and roots that fold outwards. Should it not be city and land, hand in hand? Norway is both mines and yours, it is for you in the city and me in the countryside. I wish I could knock on every door in the city with hundreds of streets and say, “Hey wake up and see what happens to our country”. Norway is being destroyed, and our identity is threatened. If nature’s soul dies, our soul dies with it.
Nature in Norway is spectacular in itself; our pride and heritage meant for responsible management. Fjords, mountains, wild and beautiful is our Norway. I often say the landscape and nature is Norway’s national costume. The finest garment brings tourists because they want to admire and explore the magnificent, wild, beautiful, and unspoiled. Now, this national costume is being torn apart, bit by bit by the wind power industry. The pillars of the national costume are all the landscape and natural values of local, national, and global value – untouched life. The largest industrialization of Norwegian nature ever, according to KS (The Union for Municipalities) among others – takes place NOW !!! Wind power industrialization that destroys nature destroys us. Nationwide media are silencing debates for and against. It is also hidden in the corridors of power. A fierce battle is now being fought in several places to protect nature. The people have woken up! It is absolutely sick and beyond comprehension for many, you do have to see it with your own eyes to understand the extent.
For over 30 years, the wind power industry has been drawing up plans, in silence. Then a sudden attack happens when nobody was prepared. Place after place is affected and at the same time. There is war now against nature and people.
The voiceless
Remember that the roots of the tree are the areas of primary industries, agriculture, fishing, and reindeer husbandry. The food on the table for both city and country. But what about the food of the food for our food? We also call out for it, those voiceless species in the wild that cannot even shout when their houses are rolled over. You may like to roar in the cities for climate, but I do not distinguish climate from nature and the environment. When did it become a truth that one could isolate them from one another? There is a natural crisis NOW, says the UN. And environmental wastes are seen everywhere on both the sea and land. But here in our Norway, we see a Klondyke atmosphere arguing climate as the motive, “gold-digging times” at the expense of nature. It is a great shame !! It’s enough now and has been, for a long time enough!
Offenses against nature and people, and legislation
This is rigged and made clear by our elected officials and the authorities themselves. NOU Report 2006: 18. “One climate-friendly Norway” was prepared by the Low Emissions Committee, which would lead us to a low-emission society. At what price? Everything that is said today about the low-emission community can be traced back to this NOU report, so you should all read it. And what’s in it? “Climatevash all public plans”. “Accelerate the introduction of EU directives”. Take a look at those two quotes. It’s a fraud! Already in 2008 and before it political parties at the Storting took to the floor to get started on climate-washing legislation. I wonder when they should natural wash or environmental clean the laws in this country for nature and the environment, their intrinsic value seems to be of little value. Little protection despite nice words in many documents and signed international laws. It’s like bragging abroad in international fora and forgetting about the shit at home.
Legislation for climatevashing
In all gold-digging times, there is a head office, the State itself, NVE (The Norwegian Water Resources and Energy Directorate), OED (Oil and Energy Departement), and state energy companies share this. Bulldozers with broilers are needed to do the job, there are wind barons and power companies, owned by municipalities and counties. Those who do not work for the head office sits on the outskirts with their washing dishes and try to wash the “gold” that the assembly line passed. Yes, all those climate profiteers and wind power cowboys who see short term gain. So with climate-washed parked Norwegian laws, the lion can kill the prey, the jackal tearing at it and the vulture sitting waiting for the last feast. I think the vulture thrives on places like Cayman Island where only the feathers appear in the mailbox. A feather in the hat for the greatest gluttons in the world.
So who should protect nature’s self-worth when the legislation is washed, the cities sleep and the vulture is on the hunt. The vulture has also let others hunt. Those who knock on the doors and want to “borrow some nature”. I call them scoffers because their words are washed and if you tell them no, it is not respected even if the answer no is repeated time and time again. Leeches in the green shift, it is not green when nature is bleeding. The voiceless migratory birds will both bleed, suffer, and die. No living creature should be tormented to death. There is no Respect for Nature and Dignity. We as human beings have human rights at the individual level. The diversity of species that we somehow have set ourselves to manage has no individual rights regardless of species. The individual value only comes when the specie becomes scarce and a red-list curiosity [often not even then]. Living life should not be tormented to death. And it is below every dignity that words are heard in the debate that “normalize” the loss of individuals in the face of wind power. Insects lose their habitats in forests that are removed and swamp areas that are dug away. Hops in the gardens save only a few, a symbolic rescue plank. For the insects, they literally walk the plank in collisions with wind power turbines. Get out of the shutter and hear the warning, the insects die. Habitats, fauna, and mountains are cut away, dug up, and blasted away.
Chopping, digging, and blowing away people’s near nature can never be called solidarity or dugnad [voluntary work]. We cry out for our equal fellows who live in areas where wind power is built, resulting in diminished housing value and ruined landscapes and reduced quality of life. Nature is mental healths best medicine, absolutely free, it is now being contaminated. Our solidarity has been abused and it can end up in health issues for many. Join us in solidarity and take responsibility for the natural crisis NOW. In addition to roaring in the city, feel free to come to us and call out in the woods, where you will get answers. Answers of nature’s silence its own sounds, sounds of wildlife. Or on the mountain, mountains where noise sources are totally absent. Silence is in short supply in the world today. In silence, one can listen inward, get to know one’s own nature. Many people have forgotten it. We who are crying now are shaken inside over what is happening. Love nature and you love yourself, so simple, so easy. When one loves Nature then there is love. When what is loved is destroyed or threatened, deep sorrow and anger come to the many of us who just want to protect nature. When the outer nature is threatened, the inner nature is also threatened by many. One infant will die without physical intimacy, in this matter, it is the soul that suffers. I call the grief “love cries”, that love we all come from. For this grief is so much greater than eco-grief, earthly grief, and natural grief. This is also sadness for lack of confidence in a democracy in disrepair. Grieving a fall in dignity, respect, solidarity, and equality. That truth can be shouted out by someone when listening to those who whisper their grief through the mirror of the soul, what is the tears of love.
Conservation is no longer a word with any value or meaning, we are beyond that point, we have to actively protect
In Klondyke gold-digging times it happens more. Some can be fooled and buy glitter. It is the municipalities that are left with far greater intervention than what was predicted. In addition, noise pollution, shadow casting, flashing warning lights that takes the blue hour away. And worse the spread of microplastics, composite materials, and epoxy chemicals [and hydraulic oil spills] in nature that is particularly toxic to the aquatic environment, think of it as uptake in the food chain. Did the municipalities know that they had to protect their own area from climate-washed and planning and legislation being set aside? We believed nature and the diversity of species had their protection against destruction in the legislation, but no. The nesting time for nesting birds, for example, is practiced with a red carpet for the wind power industry and rejection for others. So equality for the law is not worth much when it comes to wind power.
War is waged against nature in our country, everywhere. It is a severe situation where we must fight to protect nature from our own country and from our equals. Now first against wind power on land, but we also see coastline concessions are on the move. Shallow water where fish spawn, such as Havsul on the coast of Møre. At Havsul there is tobies, food for both the birds of the Runde Birdmountain and larger fish such as cod. We have come to recognize the patterns of the players in this so-called green shift, we know mining for minerals is next. There are also changes in legislation, to avoid troubling municipalities that maintain their right of disposal over their own land. Wind power, mining, electrification of land and sea, green battery for Eu, and data centers popping up. Is anyone thinking about how much pressure this will put on the country’s nature in its entirety? So how should one endure when one is fighting one’s own country. Why should one trust in power when one sees that promises cannot be understood in any other way than meant to calm the protests and buy time for those who harvest more than they seed.
I have never before demonstrated or opposed in the public, but now I am roaring from within vulnerable anger and massive grief. This is so wrong. Imagine tearing up the national costume of Norway. If this happens to the extent that is currently reflected then I am afraid our national-soul is going down within its slipstream. Is it our aftermath? We who failed? We who let our country down for the dark slaves of greed? This we have not chosen, it is the power that bears the betrayal against us. So if I don’t knock on doors I hope the words I write will be read. Think of us living with the fear that there will come a day when there is a cry for security in the mountains that surround us. I fear that if no one comes to their senses soon, the mountains will be blown away forever, a changing horizon in sight. Then no longer will the safe mountains return with their echoes. Then the rich life in the countryside is lost to many and the roots are cracked. For the root in us all, our identity is where we live or come from. Now the roots of your peers in the countryside are being torn. And here at Vestlandet and the coast of Møre, many other pillars in the national suits are in danger of falling; Dalsbotnfjellet, Luteland, Bremangerlandet, Gulaslettene, Stadlandet, and the small beautiful island of Haramsøy.
So to the people of Norway and everyone else. Here’s my message: It’s time to wake up. Come out of the “green shutter” in your mind to fight to protect nature. Also consider other values in this: Spiritual and existential values. On the island, Selje at Stadlandet is St.Sunniva’s kingdom, which is also the site of Christianity in our country and the origin of the Diocese of Bjørgvin. It will now be demolished in the green shift’s name for 5 wind turbines. Is it possible? Sacrifice is genuine when it is done by devotion, respect, and love. What is now sacrificed by nature to the wind industry offers no bright future.
That the words solidarity and dugnad [voluntary work] are used in the name of wind power and the green shift, is a direct mockery to all who love nature, but also mockery to the true value of the words. Where is the dignity gone? I ask because as the green shift now appears it is dark, blood-red and cold.
