For nearly a month, protesters in Hawaii have been speaking out against the building of the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) on Mauna Kea, a volcano which is the location of several sites that are sacred or important for other reasons to Native Hawaiians. Celebrities including The Rock and Jason Momoa, both of whom have ties to Hawaii, have joined the protesters and have been speaking out in support of their efforts. People wrote about Jason’s continued vocal opposition to the telescope:
Jason Momoa is continuing to protest the construction of a telescope in his home state of Hawaii.
In an Instagram post last week, the 40-year-old actor joked that he had gotten “run over by a bulldozer” while “trying to stop the desecration of his native land” during the construction on the Mauna Kea volcano, for the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT).
“F— THIS. And TMT is 4x bigger. Sorry Warner Bros we can’t shoot Aquaman 2. Because Jason got run over by a bulldozer trying to stop the desecration of his native land,” Momoa captioned a re-posted photo showing the 1992 construction of the Subaru Telescope, also located on Mauna Kea.
“THIS iS NOT HAPPENING. WE ARE NOT LETTING YOU DO THIS ANYMORE. Enough is enough. Go somewhere else,” the Game of Thrones alum concluded.
Momoa shared a series of videos to his Instagram Story on Sunday, showing the volcano from an aerial view and, later, during a drive sending his love to fellow protesters as they lined the road he rode down.
“Standing with my hero’s Love my ohana proud to stand and protect our sacred,” Momoa captioned a Monday photo gallery, adding the hashtags, “#maunaready,” “#maunamajority, “#kukiaimauna” and “#wearemaunakea.”
Hawaii News Now reported that this weekend, researchers were able to access the observatory for the first time in nearly five weeks, and protesters held a “Jam 4 Mauna Kea” that was broadcast live on Facebook. (Jason had posted about it last week.) I’m glad that Jason is continuing to bring attention to the protests. I still have no idea how this is going to end, but neither side seems to be budging. I appreciate both sides of the argument, but I still think that, given the number of telescopes already on the mountain, another site should have been chosen for TMT. I know that’s not as easy as finding a site for a typical building, but I can’t believe that these protests and the uproar weren’t foreseen by the telescope’s designers. The New York Time’s great overview noted that “[protesters] do not trust promises that the Thirty Meter Telescope will be the last one built,” because “they say they have heard [this] before.” So for the universities and institutes behind the telescope to believe that the protesters would suddenly not care about TMT or that they’d be easily cowed was insultingly naive.
He is defending his culture and his space and using his clout to do so. Well done.
Rooting for the protesters! They have been opposing this move since 2014, so I’m glad there is more publicity surrounding it. (And I’m glad I get to look at Jason’s fine self).
That sounds about right. I remember seeing it in the papers & on the news ever since I moved here four years ago; Hawaiians are tenacious & they are on the right side in this.
If that land/mountain is sacred to the Hawaiians, then the researchers should leave it alone. It’s like they have no respect for native land and cultural values.
Indeed. Especially when the Canary Islands are inviting the observatory.
The guv really needs to stop crapping on indigenous people. It’s shameful. People will look back on this horse manure the same way we look at the victorians for chaining little poor children to the machines in their sweatshops.
Also, I could look at Jason and Lisa all day every day. I’m impressed with them for standing up. Way to use your platform/fame for good!
this is awesome of him – best wishes to him and the protesters. the continued disrespect for native people in this country is astounding. obviously a telescope isn’t like – genocide – but the constant development on their land and disrespect for their sacred locations is this country is basically biting their thumb at an entire culture and acting like it is the consequence for daring to survive.
also he’s smoking hot and his handwriting is very good – which – sexy.
I’d like him to do some construction on me…
Inappropriate, sexist, I know, but that man makes my loins stir (can a woman’s loins stir?).
Imua! Ku kia’i!
Of course the people should be respected and listened to – but there are a few things I don’t understand. Can the issue be decided by referendum? If the old telescopes are out of date technologically – can they be replaced by the TMT? I would also be pissed off and protesting about the unbelievably low property taxes on all those big expensive houses the colonialists built all over the islands.
I just went to tmt.org and wrote to them. I pointed out people who make TMT are smart enough to find another location.
It is difficult to find another location. Close to the equator and preferably on a high mountain and preferably far away from city lights. As Hawaii is US territory there will be few issues of access for US scientists because if you build telescopes in foreign countries they sometimes come up with the idea to deny access to foreign scientists.
Also there is a need for more telescopes. The old ones get new parts as far as possible but ultimately there is a need for more telescopes. If the US wants to go ahead in astronomical matters then they need more telescopes, simple as that.
Quite frankly: long-term everybody profits from scientific progress. So please do support it.
I don’t quite get the outrage about building these telescopes on these holy mountains. I am christian so perhaps I simply lack the hawaiian cultural-religious mindset.
Christian Churches have been (ab)used for astronomical observations for centuries and nobody is bothered about that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Maria_degli_Angeli_e_dei_Martiri#The_meridian_line
There are already world renowned telescopes there… and theyve been there for decades. What an eyeroll this guy is.
As a Native Hawaiian, I appreciate that these celebrities are bringing attention to indigenous issues, but I do question how much they actually understand about the situation. For one thing, the protests against TMT were started by members of the sovereignty movement, which is a relatively fringe group among Natives (they believe that Hawaii is under illegal occupation and want America 100% out of the state.) There are already a lot of telescopes on Mauna Kea anyway and the agreement for the new one requires that some old ones be decommissioned so there will be less overall. Secondly, yes Mauna Kea was sacred to ancient Hawaiians (it’s the home of Papa and Wakea – the gods who gave birth to the first Hawaiian) but there is already precedence for putting scientific facilities on sacred sites – Kiluea which was the home of Pele the fire goddess has the Volcano Observatory Center and a bunch of other facilities. Also if they are going to build on the mountain, a telescope is one of the more culturally relevant things you could build. The study of ‘astrology’ was crucial to Native Hawaiian culture, Hawaiians had very detailed celestial maps that they used for navigation, time keeping etc. And one of the guiding values in Hawaiian culture is ‘ime ike’ which means ‘to seek knowledge’ It’s just frustrating to me that of all the issues facing Native Hawaiians this is what is getting attention because it’s trending on social media rather than something that would actually improve our day-to-day lives (like the fact that people from the mainland are buying up property to use as Air-BnBs driving up housing prices and making it impossible for locals to buy houses and the state is doing nothing to curb it.)
*Astronomy – not astrology
Thanks so much for this comment Abby. I find the whole protest thing odd, considering that (as you note) Indigenous cultures – including Hawaiians and Aboriginal Australians – have their own rich history of astronomy. If it was a golf course or a resort on Mauna Kea, I could totally understand it, but it is one telescope aiming to replace some of the ones that are already there to increase our understanding of the universe. Based on my understanding of the telescopes already there, the scientists DO try and keep their footprint as small as possible.
Hawaii IS under illegal occupation. The US stole it out from under Queen Lilioukalani. It was a dirty deal. Colonizing sucks.
I think they have a point.