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vashtijoy:
Sorry to do this to you, Jarin, but I really hate that argument.
Nothing to be sorry for. I posted it publicly, inviting comment and debate. That’s the point of blogs like tumblr, livejournal, dreamwidth, facebook, etc.
To me, saying “it doesn’t matter if humanity kills off life on earth” because hey, we haven’t cracked the globe in two! is like saying it doesn’t matter if someone murders you because hey, your corpse is still right there! Sure, other people are going to be born, but you are dead, and that is still a crime beyond imagining.
I don’t believe I said that it doesn’t matter if humanity kills off life on Earth. It certainly matters to humanity (including otherkin) and to the other forms of life currently on Earth. But it’s not helpful to paint it as “harming the earth” or “murdering our mother” or “destroying Nature” or anything along those lines.
The Earth is huge, enormously old, and patient. It has been through mass extinction events before and brought new life forth every time. Nature is even bigger, encompassing the universe itself with far more concerns than life on one paltry planet. What we’re actually destroying is our current ecosystem — which might be compared to the Earth’s latest dress — and any chance we have at a sustainable future for ourselves.
That’s bad, I’m not denying that. But it’s not helpful to make it out to be more than it is. Because time and again I see the folks who talk about us harming the Earth start doing rituals to send Reiki or positive energy or whatever to “heal the Earth” rather than actually doing anything to help the real situation.
Even many of the folks who spout off about sustainable development/permaculture will turn around and completely ridiculously over-plant a patch of land while claiming to be in touch with the local nature spirits. And see nothing contradictory about it when the more than a dozen *packets* of seeds they planted in an area I’d estimate to be maybe 40 to 50 square feet at the supposed behest of the local nature spirits yields not a single plant.
I’d like to get away from this, from the airy-fairy version of caring about the environment. I’d like to see real work done to build sustainable systems. And I don’t think that’s going to happen when we’re focused on healing the pain of the earth-mother instead of actually examining the systems we currently have in place and seeing what can be done to make them better.
Ecocide is going on around us. Don’t handwave it; get angry about it!
I am. But I’m also angry at those who use the supposed “pain of the earth” as an excuse to tout how special, nonhuman, and connected to nature they are compared to the rest of humanity, while they do very little to actually help fight unsustainable practices or, as you term it, “ecocide”.
vashtijoy:
Sorry to do this to you, Jarin, but I really hate that argument.
Nothing to be sorry for. I posted it publicly, inviting comment and debate. That’s the point of blogs like tumblr, livejournal, dreamwidth, facebook, etc.
To me, saying “it doesn’t matter if humanity kills off life on earth” because hey, we haven’t cracked the globe in two! is like saying it doesn’t matter if someone murders you because hey, your corpse is still right there! Sure, other people are going to be born, but you are dead, and that is still a crime beyond imagining.
I don’t believe I said that it doesn’t matter if humanity kills off life on Earth. It certainly matters to humanity (including otherkin) and to the other forms of life currently on Earth. But it’s not helpful to paint it as “harming the earth” or “murdering our mother” or “destroying Nature” or anything along those lines.
The Earth is huge, enormously old, and patient. It has been through mass extinction events before and brought new life forth every time. Nature is even bigger, encompassing the universe itself with far more concerns than life on one paltry planet. What we’re actually destroying is our current ecosystem — which might be compared to the Earth’s latest dress — and any chance we have at a sustainable future for ourselves.
That’s bad, I’m not denying that. But it’s not helpful to make it out to be more than it is. Because time and again I see the folks who talk about us harming the Earth start doing rituals to send Reiki or positive energy or whatever to “heal the Earth” rather than actually doing anything to help the real situation.
Even many of the folks who spout off about sustainable development/permaculture will turn around and completely ridiculously over-plant a patch of land while claiming to be in touch with the local nature spirits. And see nothing contradictory about it when the more than a dozen *packets* of seeds they planted in an area I’d estimate to be maybe 40 to 50 square feet at the supposed behest of the local nature spirits yields not a single plant.
I’d like to get away from this, from the airy-fairy version of caring about the environment. I’d like to see real work done to build sustainable systems. And I don’t think that’s going to happen when we’re focused on healing the pain of the earth-mother instead of actually examining the systems we currently have in place and seeing what can be done to make them better.
Ecocide is going on around us. Don’t handwave it; get angry about it!
I am. But I’m also angry at those who use the supposed “pain of the earth” as an excuse to tout how special, nonhuman, and connected to nature they are compared to the rest of humanity, while they do very little to actually help fight unsustainable practices or, as you term it, “ecocide”.
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