[GPSCC-chat] Into Eternity - Nuclear Past, Present and Future

Carol Brouillet cbrouillet at igc.org
Fri May 27 11:26:42 PDT 2011 

Here's a tabling opportunity....

<http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2011/05/27/18680563.php>http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2011/05/27/18680563.php 


Into Eternity - Nuclear Past, Present and Future
by Carol Brouillet ( <mailto:cbrouillet at igc.org>cbrouillet [at] igc.org )
Friday May 27th, 2011 11:13 AM
An award winning Danish film, Into Eternity will 
be screening this weekend in San Francisco. The 
film peers into the daunting question of 
containing the nuclear waste produced by the 
nuclear industry. With the situation in Fukushima 
out of control, concerned citizens are forced to 
confront the reality of the radioactive 
contamination of air, water, soil, food, ocean 
and the possibility of the nuclear disasters 
continuing and worsening, promoted by pro-nuclear 
governments. Citizens are mobilizing to monitor 
radioactivity and to shut down the nuclear industry.

intoeternity.jpg

intoeternity.jpg

Despite all of our differences, the future of 
humanity is bound to a technology born in the 
last century, the Pandora’s Box that tantalized 
scientists into attempting to harnessing nuclear 
power. Unleashed, the nuclear industry has 
terrified populations, invisibly threatening them 
with premature aging, cancers, a host of 
ailments, and birth defects, not sparing other 
species and life forms in the process. Shrouded 
in secrecy, heralded by the most powerful 
government, sanitized and promoted by the press, 
nuclear weaponry and nuclear power demand 
enormous government subsidies to exist while the 
costs and risks are born by the public. The 
scientists who witnessed and researched the 
harmful effects of radiation and began to voice 
their concerns were vilified and silenced. Those 
who championed the nuclear industry and developed 
the technologies were richly rewarded. Nagasaki, 
Hiroshima, nuclear tests, nuclear weapons, the 
threat of nuclear war have hovered over the 
consciousness of current generations, only 
gradually being replaced by the phantom threat of 
nuclear terrorism by rogue states and crazed 
religious extremists. In the wake of Three Mile 
Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima, the greater 
threat seems to be human error, hubris, the 
inability of the entire industry to contain the 
deadly, deforming radioactive particles from 
threatening humanity, our air, our water, our food, our ocean.

Eighteen years ago, I was invited to a meeting at 
the home of <http://www.joannamacy.net/>Joanna 
Macy and the 
<http://www.nonukes.org/ngl.htm>Nuclear 
Guardianship Project. At the time I had two small 
children and became pregnant which meant I was 
psychically, spiritually, physically concerned 
about my own children and their future. What I 
learned moved me deeply and during that pregnancy 
I edited a book entitled The Invisible Nuclear 
War - The Effects of Low-Level Radiation, the 
Massive Government Cover-Up, and the Continuing 
Battle Waged by the Nuclear Powers against All 
Life on Earth. We worked with 
<http://www.inochi.us/pff/index.html>Plutonium 
Free Future, an international grassroots 
organization working hard to halt shipments of 
plutonium and high level nuclear waste from 
France to Japan, as well as the development of 
plutonium fueled facilities in Japan.

The disaster in Fukushima was a stark reminder 
that even if the anti-nuclear movement in the 
U.S. succeeded in halting the construction of new 
nuclear power plants and nuclear weapons testing 
in the desert of Nevada, the nuclear industry has 
spread to thirty countries and boasts over 400 
plants with an additional sixty under construction.

People rarely want to know that they have a fatal 
cancer, even when they are in pain, and there is 
a possibility for remission or a cure. Most 
people do not desire to probe into our species 
embrace of a suicidal technology, unless 
compelled to by painful necessity, such as the 
realization that they or their family, friends, 
or offspring might lose their life, health, or 
future. Government assurances that they are 
protecting the public and in control of the 
situation ring false. The reactors in Fukushima 
are obviously out of control, as radiation pours 
into the ocean, the air, contaminating larger and 
larger areas which are being monitored by 
independent, concerned citizens. Dr. Rosalie 
Bertell, author of 
<http://www.ratical.org/radiation/overviews.html#NRBE>No 
Immediate Danger: Prognosis for a Radioactive Earth wrote-

“An individual death process, such as cancer, 
does not always end in a swift death. Sometimes 
there is a partial recovery and some or many 
years of fruitful living. This usually reflects a 
whole-hearted ‘conversion’ on the part of the 
patient: positive thinking; wholesome daily 
habits of rest, play and work; consciousness of 
the nourishing qualities of food, air and water; 
carefulness in avoiding physical and mental 
stress; development of wholesome interpersonal 
relationships; professional assistance in 
minimizing the strength of the cancer and 
maximizing the healing capacity of the body’s defense mechanisms.

“First the illness is correctly diagnosed as 
militarism
 Species death is seen as flowing from 
the violent control of the earth or peoples of 
the earth. Passive cooperation with the death 
process is no longer possible for those who 
choose life. There is personal and national 
dignity and freedom, whereby people neither 
accept oppression nor oppress others. There are 
moves to dismantle power, spread wealth, 
decentralize authority and restore harmony 
between people and earth. There is a unique 
potential to “blossom” and to find solutions. 
Whether or not it is possible to halt the nuclear 
death process, it is possible to slow it down and 
mitigate its effects. People can replace death 
dealing behavior with behavior appropriate to 
humans who share a fragile earth.”
Revealing histories of the origins of the nuclear 
age have been written, the stories told through 
radio and film, chronicling the scientists, as 
well as the victims, including workers, their 
families, the survivors of the first bombs, the 
tests, the accidents that followed and continue to this day.

Citizens are also mobilizing, creating new 
organizations, forming broader coalitions, 
organizing rallies, protests, petition drives, 
aid to the victims, setting up growing monitoring 
networks to track the radiation which is carried 
by wind and waves, deposited by rain, absorbed by 
the food chain, packaged and sold to the unwary.

An award winning Danish film entitled 
<http://www.intoeternitythemovie.com/>Into 
Eternity , playing this weekend at San 
Francisco’s <http://www.roxie.com/>Roxie Theater) 
is about “Onkalo – the world’s first permanent 
nuclear waste repository. Onkalo is a Finnish 
word for hiding place. It is situated at 
Olkiluoto in Finland - approx. 300 km northwest 
of Helsinki and it's the world's first attempt at 
a permanent repository. It is a huge system of 
underground tunnels hewn out of solid bedrock. 
Work on the concept behind the facility commenced 
in 1970s and the repository is expected to be 
backfilled and decommissioned in the 2100s – more 
than a century from now. No person working on the 
facility today will live to see it completed. The 
Finnish and Swedish Nuclear Authorities are 
collaborating on the project, and Sweden is 
planning a similar facility, but has not begun 
the actual construction of it. The film screened 
in New York in February, as well as at the San 
Francisco Green Festival, in the first week of 
March. The Roxie Theater has brought it back. 
Hopefully Into Eternity will draw more attention 
to the deeper issues over the current 
generation’s responsibilities to past, present 
and future generations. We need to ask ourselves 
about our individual and collective capacity to 
overcome denial, anger, move beyond coping, and 
find the strength and energy to live fully, 
overcome militarism, and revive the earth’s immune system.

Recommended Resources-

Nuclear History-

<http://www.tucradio.org/new.html>T.U.C. Radio

Iain Boal: THE BEGINNING OF THE NUCLEAR AGE - Enrico Fermi and Henry Moore

TO THE MEMORY OF CHERNOBYL: April 26, 1986 – 2011

Online Books- (Available at <http://www.ratical.org/radiation/>www.ratical.org)

KILLING OUR OWN- The Disaster of America's 
Experience with Atomic Radiation by Harvey Wasserman & Norman Solomon

SECRET FALLOUT-LOW-LEVEL RADIATION FROM HIROSHIMA 
TO THREE-MILE ISLAND by ERNEST STERNGLASS

No Immediate Danger, Prognosis for a Radioactive 
Earth, 1985, by Dr. Rosalie Bertell, "Part One, The Problem"

Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for 
People and the Environment by Alexey V. Yablokov 
(Center for Russian Environmental Policy, Moscow, 
Russia), Vassily B. Nesterenko, and Alexey V. 
Nesterenko (Institute of Radiation Safety, Minsk, 
Belarus). (Available at 
<http://www.tucradio.org/Yablokov_Chernobylbook.pdf>www.tucradio.org/Yablokov_Chernobylbook.pdf)

In print-

Voices from Chernobyl by <http://www.alexievich.info/>Svetlana Alexievic

Online Films-

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fCCVU4y7oE>Children of Chernobyl

Interview - 
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-hHTFWXr90>Dr. 
Alexey Yablokov - Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe

<http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/2011/03/a_is_for_atom.html>A 
is for Atom- a film by Adam Curtis

<http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5384001427276447319#>The 
True Battle of Chernobyl Uncensored

<http://www.japansubculture.com/2011/04/nuclear-ginza-japans-secret-at-risk-labor-force-and-the-fukushima-disaster/>Nuclear 
Ginza

Articles-

<http://www.veteranstoday.com/2011/03/28/from-hiroshima-to-fukushima-1945-2011/>From 
Hiroshima to Fukushima, 1945-2011 by Dr. Anthony J. Hall

<http://theautomaticearth.blogspot.com/2011/05/may-10-2011-welcome-to-atomic-village.html>Welcome 
to the Atomic Village by Stoneleigh

<http://www.ibabuzz.com/politics/2011/05/23/anti-nuclear-ballot-measure-starts-circulating/>Anti-Nuclear 
Ballot Measure Starts Circulating by Josh Richman

Get Involved- Organizations-

<http://fukushima.greenaction-japan.org/>Green Action Japan

<http://www.trivalleycares.org/>Tri-Valley Cares 
- Communities Against a Radioactive Environment

<http://www.space4peace.org/>Global Network 
Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space

<http://www.wslfweb.org/>Western States Legal Foundation

<http://www.eon3.net/>Ecological Options Network

<http://www.womensenergymatters.org/>Women’s Energy Matters

<http://www.energy-net.org/>The Energy Net (Abalone Alliance)

<http://nonuclearaction.wordpress.com/about/>No Nuclear Action Committee

A Rally in Solidarity with the People of Japan 
will be held in San Francisco June 10th 3:30-5:30 
pm at the Japanese Consulate (See - 
<http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=218843821468487>www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=218843821468487)

<http://nonuclearaction.wordpress.com/links-beyond-nukes/>Center 
for Safe Energy

<http://www.cagreens.org/>California Green Party

Citizen Monitoring Radiation Sites-

<http://geigercounter.com/>Geiger Counter Blog

<http://www.safecast.org/>SafeCast.org

<http://www.nirs.org/>Nuclear Information and Resource Service

Educational Websites-

<http://www.ratical.org/radiation/index.html>The 
Health Costs of Low-Level Ionizing Radiation

<http://www.fairewinds.com/>Fairewinds Associates

<http://www.communitycurrency.org/>Community Currency

Next week’s June 2, 2011 Community Currency Radio 
Show is with Ed Ellsworth on 
<http://www.communitycurrency.org/node/151>Empowering 
Citizens, Monitoring and Halting the Nuclear Industry.

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoyKe-HxmFk>Trailer 
for the film <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoyKe-HxmFk>Into Eternity

http://www.communitycurrency.org/node/150

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