[Chapter_Fourteen] chapter_fourteen-beforebefore.net Digest, Vol 4, Issue 11

Fri Jan 21 17:32:41 PST 2011

chris-
here here!
thanks for such a great wrap up; my mind has been going all over the place
reading these threads, but your two paragraphs about summed up what i
would've said!
-antonio

On Fri, Jan 21, 2011 at 4:33 PM, Chris G <galanis_chris at yahoo.ca> wrote:

> Thanks Rachel & Harshall for expanding on your thoughts/ideas. I think
> there's a hundred interesting threads that could come out of this, and i'll
> try to specifically respond to what's been said.
>
> I experience the same heartache when i witness the suffering taking place
> every day everywhere in the world because of inequality and unbalanced
> distribution. Many people I know feel the same heartache. Many people in the
> world are oblivious to it and, like Harshall experienced, it's not their
> concern, and they're busy trying to keep up and make sure they don't get
> trampled in the race. There's also a small group of people who wield the
> most power in this structure. They benefit greatly from it and will do
> everything in their power to keep the machine running smoothly. They likely
> believe the world is a very just place and that people who get lost in the
> shuffle do so because of an inherent fault in their individual character.
> Unfortunately, this small group of people have the most leverage in writing
> the laws of their respective nations. They also control the military/police
> forces who uphold these laws, and will use incredible amounts of violence to
> sustain their positions. This is simply my own opinion, and for me this is
> the root of unfair distribution of the things people need to survive. I
> don't think most people are bad, and I don't think most people would choose
> to have others suffers. I think it's easier on one's psyche to keep your
> head down and ignore these realities.
>
> In response to Rachel's initial question, I'm not convinced that
> permaculture can/will ultimately upend this structure and re-distribute
> resources fairly. I feel that this experiment of civilization will
> ultimately have to run it's course, and what that collapse will look like is
> anyone's guess. It could be gradual and mild, it could be quick and
> devastating. I really don't know. What I think many of us are doing thru
> these various investigations/re-imaginings, is what evolution has always
> done on this planet, and that is to create an abundance of new
> strategies/adaptations to deal with a changing ecosystem which can no longer
> support the status quo. In this light, I think permaculture and all the
> other thousands of experiments/movements are completely valid and in fact
> quite beautiful and uplifting. Which of them succeed and go on to provide
> the structures/strategies in the future is anyone's guess. For me, it's work
> that is both terribly exhilarating and crushingly heartbreaking.
>
>    - cg
> --- On *Fri, 1/21/11,
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> Subject: chapter_fourteen-beforebefore.net Digest, Vol 4, Issue 11
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> Today's Topics:
>
>    1. Re: Permaculture and Justice (Harshal Deshmukh)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Fri, 21 Jan 2011 15:39:26 -0800
> From: Harshal Deshmukh <harshal05 at gmail.com<http://mc/compose?to=harshal05@gmail.com>
> >
> To: "Chapter Fourteen: Where abundant food and human cultures
>     intersect"    <
> chapter_fourteen-beforebefore.net at lists.beforebefore.net<http://mc/compose?to=chapter_fourteen-beforebefore.net@lists.beforebefore.net>
> >
> Subject: Re: [Chapter_Fourteen] Permaculture and Justice
> Message-ID:
>     <AANLkTi=D-n31uo=ebkxBavSsfaqkQyP6kix+x1t5P=Z2 at mail.gmail.com<http://mc/compose?to=Z2@mail.gmail.com>
> >
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="windows-1252"
>
> Thank you Rachel,
>
> well i know what you mean by that example about the homeless in the
> financial district. I'm originally from Bombay, India and go back every
> year
> to visit. In the 12 years that i have been away I have seen inequalities in
> that city and else where in India grown to such levels that i find it
> amazing that there hasn't been a revolution so far. Yes India has done
> well,
> but maybe for about 10 % of the population. there were still 20000 farmer
> suicides last year and what some people spend on a cup of coffee at a fancy
> coffee shop in Bombay, most people in bombay earn that much in a day maybe
> even less.
>
> we all know these inequalities so i wont get into more examples. When i ask
> my friends back in India that do they ever stop to think about it, they
> look
> at me like i have come from another planet. some have laughed at me on my
> face and some behind my back, but so far most (not all) of the people there
> are in a rush to get ahead and not worry about the person left behind. it's
> almost a case of "too bad, you dont have these opportunities, so you don't
> get to share in the resources we are consuming".
> i think inherently people aren't bad, but only after they are sure that
> they
> have basic food shelter and clothing and that's when they can look around
> and see if someone else needs help. but maybe the reason why people want
> more than their fair share is that we live in a world where in an instant
> everything you have can be taken from you..(be it medical problems or
> natural disasters or something totally randon) and that fear of losing
> everything makes us want to horde (for lack of a better word) more than our
> fair share.
>
> I dont know if permaculture can solve this social inequality or maybe it
> can
> if we can show working permaculture models which are based on fair share. i
> had a lot of questions like these when i took the permaculture course and i
> still struggle to find answers. sometimes i think i'm lazy to do whats
> right
> and think that unless everyone changes, why should i, and will it make a
> difference, somedays are better and i feel good about what i'm doing to
> live
> according to permaculture principals.
> maybe Gandhi said it best "be the change you want to see in the world"
>
> Harshal
>
>
>
>
> On Fri, Jan 21, 2011 at 3:01 PM, Rachel A. Buddeberg <rachel at rabe.org<http://mc/compose?to=rachel@rabe.org>
> >wrote:
>
> > Thanks for your follow-up and clarification, Harshal!  It helps me
> > understand where i need to clarify where i am coming from! The challenge
> of
> > email is that we cannot clarify what we typed when someone looks puzzled
> > ;-).
> >
> > And  i agree that this is a great discussion even if it meandered off my
> > intended path to other important questions/issues/ideas... I hope it will
> > continue (in any direction, really, though i'd love input on the question
> > i've raised because i am pondering them...)!
> >
> > I fear that it is indeed to simplistic to assume that injustices will
> > simply wither away when we move to a permaculture.  I think we need to
> > actively ensure that they disappear.  Maybe it will help if we focus on
> one
> > of the questions i raised...
> >
> > I asked:  How can we use permaculture principles to ensure just
> > distribution of resources in a world where almost everything is
> distributed
> > unjustly?
> >
> > What exactly did i mean?  Well, go to the Financial District in San
> > Francisco, for example.  What do you see?  You see people in rags who are
> > homeless.  And then you see people paying $20 or more dollars per day
> just
> > to park their SUV close to the office.  That's unequal distribution.  Can
> we
> > use permaculture principles to change this?  Obviously, it violates "fair
> > share." But is that enough?  If you've taken a Muni bus lately, you've
> > probably heard their appeals to fair share.  As if someone who didn't pay
> > will all the sudden pay because they realize they haven't contributed
> their
> > fair share? That's my fear: An appeal to "fair share" isn't enough.
> People
> > aren't just going to give up their SUVs so that someone else can simply
> > live.  So, what more can permaculture offer here?
> >
> > Rachel
> >
> >
> > On Jan 21, 2011, at 1:48 PM, Harshal Deshmukh wrote:
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > I guess i must have misunderstood what you have been trying to get this
> > discussion focused on, but i'm having a hard time understanding what you
> are
> > getting at when you say we replicate injustices from our existing society
> to
> > the world of permaculture. I assumed that if we kept the principals of
> > permaculture in mind and follow those we would not have these
> > issues/injustices? or is that too simplistic point of view? i'm not
> sure...
> >
> > as for as my statement about small tribal societies.. yes i understand
> that
> > human beings had far more varied and complex cultures than just tribal
> > villages, but they all collapsed or died out when they used up more
> > resources than they could regenerate.
> > my point was that somehow the surviving members will be forced to adapt
> to
> > what is left behind after we have degraded the landbase. maybe not in the
> > numbers we have now.
> > but this isnt what Rachel wanted to discuss in the first place i think
> and
> > i totally misunderstood her comments. so sorry about that :)
> >
> > thank you for this platform for this great discussion
> >
> > Harshal
> >
> > On Fri, Jan 21, 2011 at 12:32 PM, Rachel A. Buddeberg <rachel at rabe.org<http://mc/compose?to=rachel@rabe.org>
> >wrote:
> >
> >> I am frustrated since i seem to be unable to steer the direction in the
> >> way i would like it to go: To discuss the potential danger of
> replicating
> >> injustices, copying them from our existing society/culture to a world of
> >> permaculture.  I was trying to get that point across by painting a
> picture
> >> of an extreme future scenario that caricatured this for illustration.
> This
> >> isn't what i think the future will look like.  It's what i fear the
> future
> >> might look like if we aren't careful.  Could someone let me know how
> they
> >> understand what i just wrote?  I want to make sure that i articulate
> what i
> >> want to discuss...
> >>
> >> (And to clarify:  I wasn't suggesting that all middle class folks are
> >> white but rather that i've noticed that most permaculture people are
> white
> >> and middle class and that that might be a problem...)
> >>
> >> Rachel
> >>
> >> On Jan 21, 2011, at 12:05 PM, Chris G wrote:
> >>
> >> Hi all - one thing i find fascinating in these discussions is how we
> >> construct both past and future utopias based on *extremely* subjective
> >> variables. perhaps it's the difficulty in imagining anything outside of
> a
> >> context for which we have experience.which leads me to contemplate
> exactly
> >> what the "goal" of much of our work is. taking even just Rachel and
> >> Harshal's messages as examples (both of which resonate with me and i
> don't
> >> mean any disrespect in analyzing them) of assumptions:
> >>
> >> - all middle class are white
> >> having spent most of my life in the cities of montreal and toronto, two
> >> extremely multicultural cities, the ethnic profile of the middle class
> has
> >> changed tremendously from the 1960's to today. demographically, that
> shift
> >> will only increase over time. at least in urban areas, i imagine the
> >> generalizing of middle-class as "white" is a projection that will likely
> be
> >> less and less accurate in our lifetimes.
> >>
> >> - white middle class are the only people with access to backyards
> >> again, i see the opposite trend, where people of my generation, no
> matter
> >> the ethnic background, are buying up gaggles of condos on the periphery
> of
> >> inner cities - none of these have backyards. in fact the areas i see
> that do
> >> have gardens in cities i'm familiar with are the older run down
> >> neighbourhoods where there is often a large population of recent
> immigrants.
> >> i'm not even going to take new cookie-cutter subdivisions into account
> >> because it's my assumption that anyone who wants to live in a suburb is
> >> probably not trying to save the planet thru permaculture. rather, i see
> networks
> >> like this <http://www.landshare.net/letsgrow> are probably a better
> >> reflection of people's interest in issues of permaculture and social
> >> justice.
> >>
> >> - when civilization collapses small groups of urban elite will be able
> to
> >> sustain their urban gardens peacefully
> >> this just makes me start to imagine all kinds of horrible scenarios (ie.
> >> Cormac McCarthy's "The Road"). If anything in history has been proven,
> it's
> >> that in the wake of civil collapse, things get brutal, nasty, and life
> >> becomes survival through the threat and act of physical violence. It's
> also
> >> pretty safe to assume that the uncontrolled fires, pollution from
> destroyed
> >> industry, and lack of clean water and waste removal will make any kind
> of
> >> urban farming impossible.
> >>
> >> - before the industrial era, everyone lived in small tribal societies
> who
> >> produced a minimal impact on the landbases they relied on
> >> i can't even begin to go into why this is a historical perspective which
> >> bears no resemblance to reality. past human cultures have been as varied
> and
> >> complex as one could ever imagine.
> >>
> >> - when civilization collapses, we can go back to living like these small
> >> tribal societies once did
> >> i'm afraid that we will have polluted our landbases and altered climate
> to
> >> such an extent that it would be impossible to support anything close to
> >> present day population numbers on the untainted resources which still
> exis
> >> t, no matter what structures we put in place.
> >>
> >> sorry, that all sounds pretty nihilistic - and - i'm curious what
> >> motivates us (me?) to do this work, and what, really, is the expectation
> >> and/or outcome that we're working towards?
> >>
> >> thanks y'all, and thank-you for caring enough to explore these issues.
> >>
> >>     - chris galanis
> >>
> >>
> >> --- On *Fri, 1/21/11,
> >> chapter_fourteen-beforebefore.net-request at lists.beforebefore.net<http://mc/compose?to=chapter_fourteen-beforebefore.net-request@lists.beforebefore.net><
> >> chapter_fourteen-beforebefore.net-request at lists.beforebefore.net<http://mc/compose?to=chapter_fourteen-beforebefore.net-request@lists.beforebefore.net>>*
> wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >> [...]
> >>
> >> Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2011 23:11:28 -0800
> >> From: "Rachel A. Buddeberg" <rachel at rabe.org<http://mc/compose?to=rachel@rabe.org>
> >
> >>
> >> To: "Chapter Fourteen: Where abundant food and human cultures
> >>     intersect"    <
> >> chapter_fourteen-beforebefore.net at lists.beforebefore.net<http://mc/compose?to=chapter_fourteen-beforebefore.net@lists.beforebefore.net>
> >
> >> Subject: Re: [Chapter_Fourteen] Permaculture and Justice
> >> Message-ID: <7E3286A0-3F61-4FB5-A14F-6270CA452AB3 at rabe.org<http://mc/compose?to=7E3286A0-3F61-4FB5-A14F-6270CA452AB3@rabe.org>
> >
> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
> >>
> >>
> >> Reading your thoughts about offering yoga, reflexology etc and calling
> it
> >> permaculture, i realize that i might not have made my concerns as clear
> as i
> >> could have.  So, let me try again.   I am not trying to suggest that we
> >> call, say, a fight for equal pay permaculture.  The questions i would
> like
> >> to raise are more along the lines of asking if we are excluding someone
> if
> >> we offer workshops at a certain place, a certain time, in a certain
> way.  Or
> >> to put it more generally: Can we really practice permaculture within the
> >> ethical guidelines if we do not also address the issues of justice?   It
> is
> >> not an attempt to "water down" permaculture or include everything under
> the
> >> umbrella.  It is taking a look at how and where we practice permaculture
> and
> >> seeing if that meets the fair share criteria.  For example, can we
> really
> >> ignore the fact that mostly white middle-class people have access to
> >> backyards?  As i wrote before: I am worried that if we do not address
> all
> >> the interlinked issue
> >> s, we might end up with recreating the same problems all over again just
> >> in a different context...
> >>
> >> Let me try to formulate the image that i have in mind when i have these
> >> concerns.  Travel with me into the future, please.  It's post peak-oil.
> The
> >> oil-supported economy has collapsed.  There is desolation in a lot of
> the
> >> country.  Yet, there is bounty in a few places.  San Francisco (except
> >> Bayview/Hunters Point), for example, has an abundance of food growing
> thanks
> >> to the hard work of the people who had the time, money, and energy to
> >> prepare.  Those people are almost all white and well educated.  Because
> >> transportation happens via foot, not much food can be shared long
> distance.
> >> The food cannot be brought to places where there is hunger.  And nobody
> had
> >> thought to help those places prepare.  And those places happen to be in
> >> areas populated by less educated, mostly non-white people.  Is this how
> we
> >> want the future to look like?
> >>
> >> Rachel
> >>
> >> [...]
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> _______________________________________________
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