This week on CounterSpin: Two deep conversations, about oil and much more.
(photo: Jane Hahn/New York Times)
The BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico happened from the spring through the fall of 2010. The blowout of the Deepwater Horizon rig killed 11 people, and countless animals, on its way to becoming the worst marine oil spill in history. It seemed to take that protracted disaster on the US coast to generate a New York Times front-page story on June 16, 2010, about oil industry ravages in Nigeria’s delta region, which, the article noted, “has endured the equivalent of the Exxon Valdez spill every year for 50 years, by some estimates.” CounterSpin had a powerful conversation that week with filmmaker and video artist Sandy Cioffi, whose film, Sweet Crude, looks at the oil industry in Nigeria, and the way it is covered in the US. We’ll hear that conversation today.
(photo: Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council)
Also on the show: Oil spills are often discussed in media in terms of the Exxon Valdez. But if the use of the Valdez as a touchstone might give the impression that “lessons were learned” from that 1989 disaster…. Well, that mainly applies to the lesson that not disaster, but activism—dogged, ongoing, out-of-the-spotlight, misunderstood and maligned activism—is what changes things. That’s part of what we learned when we spoke with activist and marine biologist Riki Ott in 2009—then the 20-year anniversary of that “oil spill to end all oil spills”—now many spills ago.
Plus Janine Jackson takes a quick look back at recent coverage of Venezuela.
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