Land left alone to rewild

Regenerative Subsistence Land
#1

Interesting article from Orion magazine, accompanied by a video clip of a strange, butoh-like dance performance celebrating a chunk of previously developed land as she rewilds herself. In Brooklyn, of all places. Hooray!!! ;D

If you read the comments after the story, someone’s posted an entire article about how humans should bug out and leave the land and wildlife alone. He made many good points, but left me feeling sad that in our culture, even many of those who want to see the land rewild don’t even know or acknowledge that humans can live, and actually have lived for thousands of years, in a sensitive, harmonious and sustainable way on and with the land. The writer assumes we have something really wrong with us, just for being human, rather than tackling the way we live and act. . . as if membership in the human species makes us all road-bulldozers. . . the idea that we humans and the other-than-humans must (or even can) inhabit distinctly separate universes.

#2

Yeah, I hear you! I find myself explaining again and again that it is not human nature to destroy, and that we are not fully human when we are chained to a system that effectively funnels our behavior towards destruction.

This is something I had to articulate for myself at one point in my life, something I myself was not getting (Catholic upbringing…so much guilt over what is naturally human!). Once I got it, I found that it was a direly absent message among wider society. And so it is one of the main things I try to get across to people when I explain what rewilding is all about.

#3

Its the societial views that need change not the individual (PERHAPS with one or two exceptions… :P).

Once we start seeing humans as PART of nature, and NOT above it, we will go back to our “natural” way of life. It is not natural, if nature is not involved (or something that makes a bit more sense). This is why i make it a point to not say “i dont understand humans” but rather say “i dont understand the society around me” or smthg similar. (which i really don’t).

-Tj

#4

Well, not to sound rude here, but I feel exactly the opposite way, that it starts with individuals and individual psychological healing. I envision that the individuals who lead the way might accept a role of leading by example, by showing not by telling, and after change is shown to be possible in an individual’s relationship to the world, then social change will follow.

#5

[quote=“yarrow dreamer, post:1, topic:824”][url=http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/articles/article/2865/]
If you read the comments after the story, someone’s posted an entire article about how humans should bug out and leave the land and wildlife alone. He made many good points, but left me feeling sad that in our culture, even many of those who want to see the land rewild don’t even know or acknowledge that humans can live, and actually have lived for thousands of years, in a sensitive, harmonious and sustainable way on and with the land. The writer assumes we have something really wrong with us, just for being human, rather than tackling the way we live and act. . . as if membership in the human species makes us all road-bulldozers. . . the idea that we humans and the other-than-humans must (or even can) inhabit distinctly separate universes.[/quote]

I also think there’s the hidden implication there that people who live in a nature-based, nature-centered way are somehow not human, or less than human. The equating of civilized humanity with ALL of humanity. Historically, that assumption has led to inexcusable acts of destruction. Yarrow dreamer’s description of that guy’s post saddens me, but it also worries me.

#6

Hey there Possum,

It sounds like you have some confusion over the definition of civilization. Civilization refers to the way of life characterized by the growth of cities, which only become possible by surpassing the carrying capacity of the land through agriculture.

Please read Jason’s 30 Theses before posting here again, so that we’re all on the same page. This site is not about discussing whether or not civilization is unsustainable, it’s about what to do about the unsustainable civilization we live in.

http://anthropik.com/thirty/

Thanks.

#7

my apologies, merely bantering my two cents ^^