By Jessica Goad
The recent protests against the southern leg of the Keystone XL pipeline have reached a new height in Texas. On Thursday, Eleanor Fairchild, a 78-year old great-grandmother, was arrested for trespassing after she stood in the path of bulldozers and machinery on her 300-acre ranch outside of Winnsboro, Texas that were tearing down trees to make the way for pipeline construction.
Fairchild, who was joined in her civil disobedience by actress and activist Darryl Hannah, explained her actions in a video saying:
Get off my land. Period. I don’t want tar sands anywhere in the United States. I am mad. This land is my land. It’s been our land since ’83, our home is on it. They are going to destroy the woods, and also they could destroy the springs. It’s devastating, but it also is not very good to have tar sands anywhere in the United States. This is not just about my land, it’s about all of our country. It needs to be stopped.