Joeh, I appreciate your viewpoints, and everyone has their own perspective on rewilding. But since you said you have only recently joined, I’d like to recommend that you read more of Jason Godesky’s Thirty Thesis (if you haven’t already). I also second the recommendation to read Endgame. That book forever changed my perspective on the world.
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 second what Dan said about nonviolence. As long as an abuser or oppressor continues to commit violence against others, not stopping them inevitably assists them. In this situation, no one can remain neutral - if someone does not help the victim by acting to stop the violence (if they have the ability to), they allow the abuser to continue.
And by any definition of the word, civilization’s treatment of the natural world and indigenous people (and even civilized people) constitutes abuse, plain and simple. So what I said about non-violence applies here perfectly.
Also, there do exist ways to STOP civilization without committing violence - if one does not equate violence with attacks on “private property”. But if killing one person would save millions of others - and if failing to kill them would lead to the death of millions - then I firmly believe that killing them would prevent FAR more violence than “non-violence” (not killing them) would. So we see that the question of non-violence looks a lot more gray than it does black and white (to commit violence or not). It depends on how one asks the question - for example, “how could I prevent or eliminate the most violence from happening in the world?” And, “what do I mean by violence?”
Every fiber in my being is screaming "NO! THIS IS BAD! THIS IS WRONG! WE CAN'T DO THIS!" And I don't think this issue has been satisfactorily resolved at all, & it needs to be resolved.
I appreciate your perspective. However, I don’t know what you mean by “the issue being resolved”. Everyone has their own perspective, and everyone will continue to have their own perspective regardless of what you or anyone else says. Sure, you may convince others to change their own perspectives, but no one can make them change.
And I think many here would disagree that rewilding should stay strictly nonviolent. As you’ll find from reading more on the forum, many of us would agree that tearing down civilization makes up an essential aspect of rewilding (the process of undomesticating/uncivilizing ourselves, the land, and our way of life) - although we all have our own ways of going about it.
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.
I totally agree with your former statement, but I think the latter statement completely ignores the great majority of the violence that concerns us - the daily violence to the earth and countless trillions of non-humans by the death machine called civilization. It even seems like you’re ignoring the daily violence against millions of humans perpetuated by civilization, and only feel concerned about the (small) potential for violence against those who carry out the violence of civilization, by those on this forum. That just doesn’t make sense to me, especially in the context of rewilding.
The guys who want to do violence to the system, to "bring it down," seem like a bunch of very angry guys. They may very well be addicted to their anger. But my experience with anger tells me that it warps your perceptions & your judgment, & causes you to do stupid, foolish things. And it seems to me that using violence to bring down the system is an extremely stupid & foolish thing to do. I think the angry guys who want to bring down the system are confused in their anger; they are not thinking clearly about this issue at all.
Yes, I feel very angry, precisely because of the massive amount of violence civ has committed, and continues to at an ever-escalating rate, against the earth and all life. I also feel angry from the countless negative ways this culture has affected me personally. In fact, rage would describe it a lot better. But I can choose to let this anger hurt me, to cause me to self-destruct and act in stupid and self-defeating ways, OR I can choose to make this rage an ally, motivating me to take action to stop the violence that I see all around me.
I really agree with Edward Abbey when he said, “Love implies anger. The person who is angry about nothing cares about nothing.” My rage comes from love. If I didn’t love the world, and life (and myself), I would feel perfectly happy living in this death culture.
Also, I feel I should warn you not to stray into the realm of telling others how they think or feel - that goes against this forum’s guidelines for friendly and acceptable behavior.
I respect your opinion (except where you imply I don’t know what I mean), but I totally disagree about this. Everywhere I look, I see a war going on, whether I participate or not - a war against the earth, and against any who don’t accept exploitation and repression. This war has existed as long as civilization has existed, and not by accident. Civilizations have always needed war for their very existence, just like they have always needed to exploit people and the land.
So, therefore, I think fighting on behalf of the land, and life, and rewilding actually go hand in hand. But I don’t fight against other civilized people in general - I see them as victims too, just like me. I don’t see them as my allies, however, and they can choose or not to go down in flames with civilization.
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.
I don’t see fear, anger, hostility, etc as exclusively products of civilization, although I do agree that civ causes them a lot. But I find it interesting that the anger I talked about above represents one thing many on this forum have in common - one thing that brings us together. And I think of these feelings as perfectly natural, and healthy, responses to the state of the world today, and to life in civilization (most of us haven’t escaped yet).
In my view, the essence of rewilding is HEALING OURSELVES from the trauma done to us by civilization.
I do like your metaphor of civilization as a disease, and I agree that healing ourselves of it makes up an essential part of rewilding. Rewilding has other aspects though, also included on this forum.
I hope I’ve clarified my perspective, a bit.
Jessica