Coal guys play rough with Ashley Judd over speech

When actress and University of Kentucky graduate Ashley Judd called mountaintop-removal coal mining "the rape of Appalachia" in a National Press Club speech last month, she probably knew there would be some pushback from the coal industry and its allies. But it may have taken a form she didn't expect, and it's making news in Eastern Kentucky.

This sign was displayed today at a golf course built on a reclaimed strip mine in Prestonsburg during a golf tournament related to the coal industry. "An anonymous donor paid for and made the sign in response to Judd's recent comments," reports Angela Sparkman of WYMT-TV in Hazard. "The sign is hanging at the same golf course Judd referenced regarding reclamation," telling the press club, "I'm not too keen on reinforcing stereotypes about my people, but I don't know many hillbillies who golf."

"She's not an Eastern Kentuckian," David Gooch, president of Coal Operators and Associates, told Sparkman. "A real Eastern Kentuckian never would have degraded the people here by saying hillbillies don't play golf." Judd was born in California but grew up mainly in Ashland, Ky., near the northeast tip of the state. Sparkman concluded, "We are are hoping for a response from the actress." (Read more) Here is News Director Neil Middleton's blog item on the topic.

The station did not show the sign's photo of Judd on air "because it might be offensive to some viewers," Sparkman said, but made it available through a link at the bottom of its online story. Its sister Gray Television station, WKYT-TV in Lexington, showed the whole sign but pixelated Judd's chest area in a report that led its 11 p.m. news. For coverage from Prestoinsburg's Floyd County Times go here.

UPDATE, July 9: Judd told WYMT in a statement that she expected criticism from "cunning, callous and greedy" coal companies. "They use people on the ground as their front, and pit us against one another," she said. "It is time to retire the cynical and superficial coal company-created argument that we must choose between people, their jobs, and our mountains," Judd said. "That is simply false, fear-based and fear-mongering." (Read more) Mimi Pickering of Appalshop in Whitesburg writes, "The true response to the coal industry 'topless' attack on Ashley Judd can be heard in 'Topless,' an amazing poem from Virginia Tech student Morgan Cain Grim. Listen to her reading it." Grim, of Floyd, Va., won the university's award for best undergraduate poem this year.

UPDATE, July 10: Celebrity-oriented media have picked up on the story: The New York Daily News and Hollywood News, and Auto Racing Daily; Judd is married to driver Dario Franchitti. (Hat tip to Penny Messinger of the Appalnet list-serve.)

UPDATE, July 11: Appalachian Kentucky author Silas House says in an op-ed in The Courier-Journal that WYMT's coverage has been biased and sexist. "Most of the controversy it's reporting on is being created by the station itself," he writes. "The sign is sexist, ignorant and infantile. ... Nudity is sometimes a part of acting, yes. But to imply that Judd has made her living off that is ridiculous. If George Clooney, another Kentuckian, had made the same speech, would they be putting up a sign about him taking off his clothes, since he, too, has appeared nude on film? Of course not. Because he's a man." (Read more)

UPDATE, July 15: Judd's mother, Naomi, Judd, has joined the "Music Saves Mountains" effort of the Natural Resources Defense Council.

UPDATE, July 16: In an op-ed, Ashley Judd explains her opposition to mounatintop removal and views on the region's future.