Watched three decent documentaries last night. Black Gold, Corporation and Objectified.All three illustrate the exploitative nature of corporations and the unsustainable trends in modern society. There were few revelations, but the fact that the docs are available means that there are alternatives available to those of us who object to what most folks see as inevitable circumstances.
So many of us continue on with processes that we vaguely sense are unsustainable and dehumanizing, because we have become accustomed and habituated to our ease and convenience. We have attenuated our connection to the natural world, such that switching off the power is a truly frightening prospect to most of us, not the least of which is myself, who would die without air-conditioning in the summer here in Texas. However, while clinging to my creature comforts, I also crave a connection to the processes that sustain me. So I persevere in my quest to at least incrementally strengthen my attachment to and participation in more of the steps in those systems. I want to reclaim my responsibility for participation, since I am, like all of us, accountable for the consequences, whether I like that or not.
We all are accountable.
Some questions that bear asking:
Why are commercial electronics built from materials are not biodegradable, if the technology is going to be obsolete in a year? If my cell phone is no longer current next year, why is the instrument itself built to last fifty-thousand years in a landfill?
Why are corporations given a free hand to plunder natural resources that belong to all of us on the planet without a thought to future generations or sustainability? How do we make corporations accountable for the unsustainable nature of their endeavors and the long-term costs to all of us?
Why has BP's corporate charter not been revoked and its assets liquidated to pay for cleanup in the Gulf of Mexico? How do we hold shareholders accountable for the environmental misdeeds of the companies they own? There is more to business than just profit. It does not exist in a vacuum.
How do I as a consumer use my dollars to influence conditions around the world, such that farmers who create those items I cannot grow myself are adequately compensated for their labor and allowed to fully participate in the process competitively? How do I establish a more direct relationship with the people who create those items I cannot create myself? It is the layers of business that grow up between us that distort the transaction.
I should also question, perhaps, if there are some things I just don't really need that badly or can do without, at least some of the time, because demanding the convenience of out of season produce and exotic ingredients, rather than eating seasonal produce when available and preserving what I grow, is part of the problem. There is enough variety in just about every region to sustain a quality of life we all can enjoy. We are all of us a little too in love with our comforts. It is killing us and killing the ability of the planet to sustain us.
I cooked tilapia with fresh-picked squash and English peas from the garden last night. It was delicious. And while I think it's important, to me anyway, to be responsible for growing my own food as much as possible, it is not a sustainable practice the way that I currently do it. My garden isn't outside the back door, it's seventy-five miles west of here. Everything I grow comes from seed or plants that I purchase, rather than seeds that I have saved myself. I use a tremendous amount of gas in my 1988 3/4 ton pickup with 300,000 miles on it, and I'm sure my carbon footprint is distorted as a result. However, with two trips each week to the river to work and harvest, I am at least creating meals for the rest of the year for me and a few other people, hopefully, and that is some small compensation. It is, at least perhaps, a step in the right direction.
But what if I want to go further?
If I wanted, I could move out to the river and live there for the rest of my life. I could go off the grid. I could raise more animals and provide my own sources of animal protein year round. I could raise dairy animals - a serious commitment of time and resources but also a serious portion of factory-farm systemic animal cruelty that I would be eliminating from my life. It isn't meat and dairy that I see as cruel to animals, so much as the industrialization of that segment of our lives and our removal from it. The failure of average people to cathect with those processes that nourish and sustain us is what creates that largest portion of that barbarism. Until I hold the knife myself at least once, I shouldn't eat the meat. See the life leave its body, and thank the animal. I can own that. Can you?
I feel less helpless than I used to. However, I am also a tad daunted by the prospect of living within the bounds of my own awareness and accountability. And I wonder what level of convenience and comfort I am capable of maintaining in my life without increasing my dependence upon technologies I cannot understand or control. What quality of life can I have without being trapped in technology and removed from the processes that sustain me?
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