Until Humanity, by which I mean largely the commercial world, aligns itself with the well being of the Planet, and not merely with its own (invented) Bank balance, Nature will continue to decline until the Earth becomes uninhabitable for human beings.
Polluted rivers – let’s be honest rivers of sewage, creating dead oceans, decimated forests. We cannot continue in this way that commerce is driving us. A change is needed in which we begin to fulfil the True Role of Humanity as Guardians of Life on this Living Planet and cease to deal with the Earth as if it is merely a lump of rock we can smash and crush and exploit to feed our transient desire.
Looking after animals was once called husbandry, indicating a familiarity shared between the creatures. Now they are numbers on a spreadsheet, with a financial value placed against each of them, and worse, a potential value.
I saw a programme the other day praising the use of technology to render about 93 % efficient fish harvesting.
I thought of Robin Wall Kimmerer’s comment on the improvement a young engineer proposed to the Native Americans he was camping with over summer.
In Braiding Sweetgrass, possibly the most intelligent writing on Nature in the last 50 years, she writes
“I once met an engineering student visiting from Europe who told me excitedly about going ricing in Minnesota with his friend’s Ojibwe family. He was eager to experience a bit of Native American culture. They were on the lake by dawn and all day long they poled through the rice beds, knocking the ripe seed into the canoe. “It didn’t take long to collect quite a bit,” he reported, “but it’s not very efficient. At least half of the rice just falls in the water and they didn’t seem to care. It’s wasted.” As a gesture of thanks to his hosts, a traditional ricing family, he offered to design a grain capture system that could be attached to the gunwales of their canoes. He sketched it out for them, showing how his technique could get 85 percent more rice. His hosts listened respectfully, then said,”Yes, we could get more that way. But it’s got to seed itself for next year. And what we leave behind is not wasted. You know, we’re not the only ones who like rice. Do you think the ducks would stop here if we took it all?” Our teachings tell us never take more than half.”
There is a comment I have in mind, I am not sure where from, that continues the quote for the Ojibwe host in which he said – “and what would we have to eat with our rice?”
It is time to re-assess the fishing and agri-industrial approach to food gathering, finding ways that do not pollute through over concentration. If that means changies to our diet so be it. This should be lead by ecologists and environmentalists, not by accountants, least of all by multi-national pharma-corporations. The cynical production of F1 generation plants that do not produce fertile seed might be deemed good commercial practice, but in truth it is nothing more than introducing Death into the self-perpetuating food chain. It has no virtue in a Living System. Those who promote such an approach are not exempt from Karmic Laws.
Is this the generation that will annihilate itself through satisfaction at the smidgen of knowledge it has gleaned from the universe? Wake up people, don’t drag behind on impossible journeys to greatness. Start living as Real Living Beings among a Host of others. One among many. Not one over all others.
