Millions of acres of rainforest saved: A tiny Amazon tribe just defeated big oil in a historic lawsuit.
It’s not every day that you see a story like this. A real David v. Goliath story that results in a win for all of humanity.
The Ecuadorian government wanted to drill for oil through seven million acres of land in the Amazon. However, their efforts were stopped thanks to the Waorani people of Pastaza, who won a historic court ruling against the government. The lawsuit represented 16 Waorani communities who live inside the Ecudorian jungle.
As Rachel Riederer for The New Yorker reports:
On April 26th, a parade of hundreds of Waorani men and women, members of an indigenous nation in a remote part of the Ecuadorian Amazon, marched triumphantly through the streets of Puyo, the regional capital of the eastern province of Pastaza. Many had come from villages in parts of the rain forest that have no roads—journeying by canoe and small plane. They were celebrating a new court ruling, which held that the Ecuadorian government could not, as it had planned, auction off their land for oil exploration without their consent.
The ruling immediately protects have a million acres from government-sanctioned drilling but also puts a stop to a planned auctioning seven million additional acres of land that would have gone to private companies who wanted to set up oil exploration operations.
What’s more, the ruling could set a powerful precedent for other indigenous communities fighting to prevent government and corporate interests from drilling on their lands.
Mitch Anderson, Executive Director of Amazon Frontlines, summed up the impact in a statement:
“This is a major precedent for indigenous rights across the Amazon. Today, the court has recognized a pattern of deceit, bad-faith and manipulative tactics in the Ecuadorian Government’s attempt to earmark the Waorani people’s lands for oil extraction. This is a huge step forward in the battle to ensure indigenous people’s rights over their lands are respected. Guaranteeing indigenous peoples’ rights to decide over their future and to say ‘No’ to destructive extractive projects is key to protecting the Amazon rainforest and halting climate change.”
The Ecuadorian economy is experiencing a period of slow growth and its government is currently mired in international debt and has said it planned to use any revenue from oil drilling to help pay off those loans.
After the ruling, they said they planned to appeal the decision before a provincial court, which could reverse the decision. However, the Waorani have promised to keep fighting against the proposed drilling, even if it means seeking intervention from international courts to protect their sovereignty over the land.
“The court recognized that the government violated our right to live free, and make our own decisions about our territory and self-determination,” Nemonte Nenquimo, a Waorani leader, told the New Yorker. “Our territory is our decision, and now, since we are owners, we are not going to let oil enter and destroy our natural surroundings and kill our culture.”
It's an incredibly achievement for the Waorani people and for everyone on the planet. Their victory not only protects millions of acres of precious and vulnerable rainforest, it shows that any community can take a stand to protect the values of its people even in the face of immense power. Real change starts at home but it can have an impact that stretches across the entire globe.
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Resurfaced video of French skier's groin incident has people giving the announcer a gold medal
"The boys took a beating on that one."
Downhill skiing is a sport rife with injuries, but not usually this kind.
A good commentator can make all the difference when watching sports, even when an event goes smoothly. But it's when something goes wrong that great announcers rise to the top. There's no better example of a great announcer in a surprise moment than when French skier Yannick Bertrand took a gate to the groin in a 2007 super-G race.
Competitive skiers fly down runs at incredible speeds, often exceeding 60 mph. Hitting something hard at that speed would definitely hurt, but hitting something hard with a particularly sensitive part of your body would be excruciating. So when Bertrand slammed right into a gate family-jewels-first, his high-pitched scream was unsurprising. What was surprising was the perfect commentary that immediately followed.
This is a clip you really just have to see and hear to fully appreciate:
- YouTube youtu.be
It's unclear who the announcer is, even after multiple Google inquiries, which is unfortunate because that gentleman deserves a medal. The commentary gets better with each repeated viewing, with highlights like:
"The gate the groin for Yannick Bertrand, and you could hear it. And if you're a man, you could feel it."
"Oh, the Frenchman. Oh-ho, monsieurrrrrr."
"The boys took a beating on that one."
"That guy needs a hug."
"Those are the moments that change your life if you're a man, I tell you what."
"When you crash through a gate, when you do it at high rate of speed, it's gonna hurt and it's going to leave a mark in most cases. And in this particular case, not the area where you want to leave a mark."
Imagine watching a man take a hit to the privates at 60 mph and having to make impromptu commentary straddling the line between professionalism and acknowledging the universal reality of what just happened. There are certain things you can't say on network television that you might feel compelled to say. There's a visceral element to this scenario that could easily be taken too far in the commentary, and the inherent humor element could be seen as insensitive and offensive if not handled just right.
The announcer nailed it. 10/10. No notes.
The clip frequently resurfaces during the Winter Olympic Games, though the incident didn't happen during an Olympic event. Yannick Bertrand was competing at the FIS World Cup super-G race in Kvitfjell, Norway in 2007, when the unfortunate accident occurred. Bertrand had competed at the Turin Olympics the year before, however, coming in 24th in the downhill and super-G events.
As painful as the gate to the groin clearly as, Bertrand did not appear to suffer any damage that kept him from the sport. In fact, he continued competing in international downhill and super-G races until 2014.
According to a 2018 study, Alpine skiing is a notoriously dangerous sport with a reported injury rate of 36.7 per 100 World Cup athletes per season. Of course, it's the knees and not the coin purse that are the most common casualty of ski racing, which we saw clearly in U.S. skier Lindsey Vonn's harrowing experiences at the 2026 Olympics. Vonn was competing with a torn ACL and ended up being helicoptered off of the mountain after an ugly crash that did additional damage to her legs, requiring multiple surgeries (though what caused the crash was reportedly unrelated to her ACL tear). Still, she says she has no regrets.
As Bertrand's return to the slopes shows, the risk of injury doesn't stop those who live for the thrill of victory, even when the agony of defeat hits them right in the rocks.