Big Oil, Phillips 66 protests are justified

Note to the Phillips 66 gang: Transportation in the 21st century is a necessity, the lack of which for the greater population leads to an impoverished lifestyle. Ergo, if you are going to engage in rational debate about transportation, please confine your statements to sensible arguments.

The most recent meme emerging from Phillips 66’s supporters suggests that protesting expansion of a fossil fuel plant represents hypocrisy since driving our cars implies consensual acceptance of the fossil fuels themselves (“Oil protesters are hypocrites,” Jan. 19).

That particular notion begs the question: What’s our alternative? Had the fossil fuel industry not crushed any possible renewable energy option in the past century, maybe we would have had a choice.

Accepting this latest Phillips 66 prattle would be as foolish as saying the poor folk in Flint, Mich., are hypocrites because their only choice of drinking water poisoned by the state is a negation of their right to protest given that they drank the water.

Likewise, our right to protest further contamination of our ecosystem while forced to use fossil fuels is not duplicity. It is sound and justified.

Twelve unmitigatable environmental impacts is reason enough to deny the Phillips 66 expansion.

Attend the Planning Commission’s hearings and have your “no” vote heard.

This story was originally published February 1, 2016 at 3:35 PM with the headline "Big Oil, Phillips 66 protests are justified."