Hey joeh! Nice to meet you. Tough topic to discuss, especially over the internet. So Id like to point out some things before i continue,
For example there is no “we” . There’s lots of individuals on this forum living in different places, under differing circumstances, its simply not possible to create an artificial category called “we” make up a set of moral rules for them and be done with it.
This issue has been going on and as long as i can remember and before. Do we need to resolve this “issue”? I think not. I already know my relationship with violence. It seems to me you need to resolve this issue for yourself. There are no universal rules and you won’t find an argument that will unite all under the banner of pacifism.
We could discuss violence and non-violence of course. Im trying to point out that coming at this discussion saying " Look here ! DO this. Don’t do this!" is often not very effective.
[quote=“joeh7762, post:1, topic:1357”]Not only do I believe that it’s possible to rewild nonviolently, I will go so far as to say that REWILDING MUST BE NONVIOLENT OR ELSE IT WILL NEVER WORK.
I think the issue of violence is the great unresolved issue of rewilding. And I need to be absolutely clear about this: I think the real issue here is VIOLENCE BETWEEN HUMAN BEINGS.[/quote]
ReWilding only makes sense in a localized context. In some places and times violence will have its place. In some much less so to the extent that its almost invisible or non-existant.
why the division between violence against humans and for example violence against the landbase and/or animals?
I think any emotion can have the same result or worse. depending. Love clouds judgement just as well if not more. As does fear. As does pride. And so on. We make do.
Yeah, that’s a problem eh? Civ is the enemy, but the enemy is made up of friends and collegues and family, of ourselves even. Difficult position i agree. Still I relate to Civ like this: Civ goes to war against the Wild and uncontrollable. not vice versa. This is happening wheter i want to or not. We are only enemies when we fight back. When we don’t fight we arent enemies we are window dressing. backgroundnoise.
as im sure we all are trying to do
I dont believe in enlightening the masses. If something scares me its mass politics and “reasonable” voices that we should follow. shudders . Also lots of people might join you who are similarly angry at civ when you show anger. I also want peace and quiet, im not sick of anger though. Sometimes i am angry sometimes not.
hmm some girls like machismo. some boys like machismo. But yeah there’s alot of posing and ideological positioning involved. Personally this bothers me as well but what bothers me is the people themselves. I deal with it because i have good friends with firmly established relationships that don’t need to prove themselves all the time with machismo.
yeah they didnt live in civ. again different people different times different places and so on…
[quote=“joeh7762, post:1, topic:1357”]As far as I’m concerned, the natural-unnatural distinction just doesn’t work, because it completely misses the point. According to my definition, Nature means everything that exists, therefore, nothing that can exist or happen in Nature is unnatural. That means that civilization itself is perfectly natural. The distinction that works for me is between HEALTH & SICKNESS. According to my view, wildness means health & civilization means sickness.
Human beings are social animals. A true society cannot be held together if people cannot get along with each other. Fear, anger, rage, hostility, aggression & violence between people cause social cohesion to break down. These negative emotions are symptoms of the disease we call civilization – signs that something has gone terribly wrong. True social cohesion can only exist when people are kind, gentle, loving & peaceful toward each other. Without this kind of relationship between people, social cohesion breaks down, & laws are created to take its place & try to hold society together. But I think we can all agree that laws really do a lousy job of holding a society together.[/quote]
“Negative” emotions aren’t diseases. Fear is healthy. Anger is healthy. “Negative” emotions are used to keep groups together too. Social cohesion breaks down when communities grow bigger then they can maintain meaningful relationships with. Social grooming can no longer be effectively employed to keep the people together and abstractions and laws are applied to keep from falling apart in smaller groups (which would be a wiser idea)
[quote=“joeh7762, post:1, topic:1357”]It makes more sense for me to view civilization not as a thing or a group of things created by humans, but as a PROCESS. More specifically – & essential to my argument – civilization is a PATHOLOGICAL PROCESS – in other words, a DISEASE. Even more to the point, the damage done to human beings by civilization is essentially PSYCHOLOGICAL TRAUMA. I believe that all the problems civilized people suffer from can be traced back to psychological trauma, usually done to us in infancy by our own parents.
If civilization is a disease, then rewilding should be seen as the cure. In my view, the essence of rewilding is HEALING OURSELVES from the trauma done to us by civilization.[/quote]
yeah. not much to add here
I think people can maintain a healthy relationship with violence.
It’s always good to digest and figure out exactly what you want to say, and how to incorporate new ideas. I know I want to hear what you have to say in response, since so much was thrown at you.
