Shane Moffatt and Richard Brooks exposed the destructive logging practices of Resolute Forest Products. So Resolute sued them for $7 million. But Shane and Richard are fighting back - and they need our help.
Shane and Richard are Greenpeace campaigners who have worked tirelessly to protect Canada's forests. In May last year, Shane and Richard published a report detailing their investigation into Resolute, Canada's largest logging company.
They explained that Resolute had been trashing the Boreal Forest, laying waste to critical Caribou habitat. Resolute can't have liked what they found, because it has sued them - and Greenpeace - for $7 million.
It's deeply ironic, because Resolute has shown nothing but disdain for the laws that protect forests. It has breached more forestry laws and regulations in Quebec than any other company since 2002 and has had to pay over $1.2 million in fines.
Lawsuits like this are often brought to silence critics. In Quebec, where Resolute is based, there are even laws in place to limit these types of lawsuits. It chose to cross provincial lines into neighbouring Ontario and file the suit there.
But Shane and Richard won't be silenced. Instead, they're standing up to Resolute - and they need our help to show the forest destroyer that together we can't be scared off.
They want to rally people all around the globe in a massive show of defiance, collecting thousands of names on a special work of art, the Guardian Tree, that they'll deliver to Resolute's CEO, Richard Garneau, personally. It's a clever, creative way to show Resolute that we won't be cowed.
I know campaigns like this can work - because I have been the victim of a lawsuit like this.
Last year, I was one of twenty one people sued by EDF Energy for a non-violent protest at one of its gas-fired power stations. They wanted £5 million out of us - but when tens of thousands of people joined together, the company had to back down.
So if we work together, we can stop this lawsuit and make other companies think twice about messing with us. Will you stand with Shane and Richard?
