Stumbling into the Ecumenopolis or choosing the Soft and Green Path
Hey everyone! This will be a somewhat unusual and informal format compared to my other posts, but I just wanted to share a couple links to articles and posts that have been on my mind lately and hopefully hear from some of you on what you think of the material (and my reaction to it).
Perhaps I misread what they had said (or read into what was said out of context) and if that was the case I would appreciate you pointing that out and explaining how I misunderstood what they were trying to say in the comments section.
The profound logic of Western Civilization
Ok so firstly, I recently read this article:
It was posted by someone who often writes things I admire and respect a great deal.
What is the message you get from her post my friends?
I personally found that after reading it, I had a sort of sick feeling in my stomach and felt compelled to speak what was in my heart and on my mind.
The following was my response to her post:
I personally have no interest in acclimating to the norms of a civilization which appears to be headed in the direction of attempting to turn this living Earth we live on into some kind of dead Ecumenopolis ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecumenopolis ).
You said "a busy office full of chattering humans is not experientially much different from a busy forest full of chattering birds and insects — it’s just two different expressions of nature."
This is true in the same sense that 'a busy organ full of chattering cancer cells is not experientially much different from a busy organ full of chattering neurons and red blood cells — it’s just two different expressions of nature.'.
A busy office full of chattering humans in a modern day city, is a structure that represents a chain of events that constitute the violent rape, pillaging and then suffocation of the land it is built on. The city it is a part of represents a larger fractal expression of that same chain of raping, pillaging and suffocating of the land.
The continuing choices made by the humans within it which are as you say "pour(ing) more of (their) energy into generating corporate profits throughout our lives than the most pious monk pours into worshipping any deity." are what enables the continuing pillaging, raping and suffocation of the living earth, the transformation of that which is living and diverse, into that which is dead, uniform and able to generate fiat currency.
Rather than acclimatizing to the normalized raping, pillaging and suffocating of the living Earth by redefining that behavior (and the structures and ways of living it enables to continue) I choose to sever my dependence on those centralized systems, one step at a time. I intend on undermining the foundations of the corporation and bankster dominated governments by withdrawing my support from their centralized systems (and helping others do the same) until they collapse under their own top heavy weight. I aim to starve the beast and plant the seeds for something more aligned with integrity, equality, compassion and abundance to grow in its place.
I will work to help others who are interested in doing the same through focusing on initiatives like this:
Secondly, on a somewhat related note, another person who I respect and admire a great deal shared this on his website a while back:
Something he said also made me feel somewhat uneasy.
What did you get out of what James Corbett said regarding those who regard themselves as an “environmentalist” my friends?
(Before I share my thoughts on the particular aspect of the episode above that made me feel a bit uneasy, I would like to emphasize that for the most part, I appreciate and resonate with what James Corbett shares but in this case one part of his co-hosted post with James Even Pilato struck a cord with me. I would also like to say that on a separate note, I think that JEP (James Evan Pilato) shares some important and empowering information over at Media Monarchy, so if you have not listened to his excellent radio broadcasts I highly recommend checking out his material.
The following was my response to some of James Corbett’s statements in the NWNW episode linked above:
James, you said “anyone who is listening to this discussion and who is firmly in that camp and is firmly environmentalist and who says “who cares about humans, I mean, they’re just a cancer on the planet, but we have to save the Earth”. They are literally now drawing the line and asking you to step across it.”
I propose that implying that people who care about the environment or those that are “environmentalists” are part of a “camp” that is anti-human is also an action that attempts to “draw a line in the sand”. I feel that it serves to create a counter-intuitive and unhelpful us vs them situation (attempting to paint people as either ‘black’ or ‘white’, when in fact, as with most things, people’s attitudes towards humans and the protection of the environment fall into many shades of grey).
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en·vi·ron·men·tal·ist –
noun
1. a person who is concerned with or advocates the protection of the environment.
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That does not say anything about seeing humans as nothing more than a cancer, being willing to cull animals nor cull humans.
Killing a bunch of cows is obviously not going to help humans nor the environment. Whether livestock acts as a detriment or a syntrophic agent and regenerative presence in an ecosystem is determined by how humans raise and interact with the animals.
I personally do not tend to put myself in little boxes (such as the label “environmentalist”) but as you know very well, I am passionate about educating people about the importance of protecting, preserving and regenerating wilderness, soil, water and mature ecosystems. That passion (which some have and some may continue to choose to put in the box of “environmentalism” in their words and/or mind) does not involve a willingness to throw humans under the bus so that the wilderness, soil or mature ecosystems can flourish. On the contrary, I feel that humans are capable of becoming exactly the medicine this maimed world needs at this critical fork in the road that our family of humanity stands at now.
I contend that (in the context of the web of life and planetary organism which some call “Mother Earth” of which we humans are but one thread) whether or not a human being has an impact that is reminiscent to that of a cancer cell or has an impact which is reminiscent to a stem cell, white blood cell or medicine of some kind, is determined by how one decides to exercise their free will.
In other words, it is not an innate nor intrinsic quality in the human being that determines whether or not we end up interacting with the body of the Earth like a cancer cell interacts with the body of a human beings, but rather it is how we use the gift of our God given free will that determines whether we become like a cancer cell or a medicine. Each of us is capable of either path.
Caring about protecting the environment (intact wilderness places, mature ecosystems, fresh water, soil and “Mother Earth” in general) is not a perspective and set of priorities that is synonymous with being anti-human nor is it synonymous with thinking humans are intrinsically like a cancer on the Earth. Implying that idea is not only fallacious, it is also counter-intuitive to aligning our combined efforts to accomplish common goals for it serves to fragment our communities further (creating more us vs them camps unnecessarily).
I propose that throughout history we can observe many instances (in cultures all over, spanning millennia) where human beings chose to be as a medicine for this Earth, they chose to be as a cell within the planetary organism that served to increase the resilience, biodiversity, size and beauty of mature ecosystems, while living in their midst, reciprocally (and not diminishing them). We have a lot to learn from those humans in this time when many humans have decided to define themselves as takers, “consumers” and a parasitic presence within the ecosystems that support their life, rather than choosing to be part of a web of symbiotic relationships based in reciprocity.
Therefore, it is not our innate nature (as human beings) that determines whether we (as individual human beings) could be aptly analogized as a cancer cell or a medicine, but rather it is the choices we make, each and every day, which either serve to be life affirming and reciprocate the many gifts we are given by the living Earth, or they serve to do the opposite.
I feel like there are a great many people that are stumbling along a path that essentially leads towards the final destination of an Ecumenopolis. The global scale city may be totally unfeasible (given the current mainstream human tech and finite resource extraction limitations) but this is never the less the unspoken intended final destination given the choices of a great many humans on the Earth right now. If we continue down the path headed for converting all of the wilderness left into dead, cold, uniform structures, products and human artificial habitat (cities) we may (and likely will) fall short of creating a Ecumenopolis and only end up with a planet that is one quarter city and 3/4 dead wasteland, but it would nevertheless be a future I have no interest in living in nor playing a part in co-creating.
Thus, I share the words above and below in the hopes it can light the same spark that dwells in my heart within others, and together, we can choose the soft and green path towards a shared future worth living in and passing onto future generations.
“Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature — the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after winter.”
~ Rachel Carson, Author of Silent Spring
Ummmm, yes, Caitlin kind of lost me on that one too. It does seem like she is saying we need to adjust our own mindset to see modern civilization as just another part of nature -- ~ and that might reduce the cognitive dissonance of modern life ~ or something.
I'm agreeing with you on this one, Gavin. Accepting unhealthy offices as just the new 'nature' is not sensible. We need to stick with seeing it this way - and change it: "Take a normal healthy human animal and throw it into the mess of this dystopian corporate nightmare and tell me how it’s meant to live a happy and satisfying life. It’s like expecting dolphins and orcas to live happy and satisfying lives in concrete pools at theme parks, or factory farmed pigs living in cages barely bigger than their bodies. It’s just not the kind of living we’re built for." - a quote from earlier in her post.
Humans need to walk or run or move regualrly and we ned sunshine and fresh air and office life is not "the new nature". It is sickening and therefore change may require redesigning offices too.
Corporate profit is not natural. That is the real problem. Absolutely nothing in nature, except locusts who contain themselves by an every 17 year cycle (roughly), just keeps taking and taking and taking from their surroundings endlessly in increasingly greater amounts. Nature lives in balance with itself and humans as a group are no longer living in balance with nature - or with ourselves. The divide between the poor and wealthy is sickening to me. Why do the wealthy act like that?
Edit addition - I like Caitlin's work, nothing negative meant. We are all not going to agree on everything.
I had listened to the CR episode you reference here, but went back to listen again to see if I had misunderstood or missed something. I still agree with what James and James said. It may have something to do with one’s definition of “environmentalist,” which may have had the simple definition you gave … a long time ago. Now, it has accumulated some baggage (connotations), as can be seen by these definitions that popped up at the top of the search I just did:
“environmentalist noun
One who advocates for the protection of the biosphere from misuse from human activity through such measures as ecosystem protection, waste reduction and pollution prevention.
Someone who works to protect the environment from destruction or pollution.“
(Think Green New Deal, “Climate Change,” carbon credits, and every other Orwellian scheme and propaganda the powers that shouldn’t be are trying to force on all of us.)
The next one in the list that popped up is from Wikipedia:
“An environmentalist is a person who is concerned with and/or advocates for the protection of the environment. An environmentalist can be considered a supporter of the goals of the environmental movement, ‘a political and ethical movement that seeks to improve and protect the quality of the natural environment through changes to environmentally harmful human activities’.[1] An environmentalist is engaged in or believes in the philosophy of environmentalism or one of the related philosophies.”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmentalist
Hmmm… “the goals of the environmental movement.” That sounds like a can of worms to me…
Someone who is unaware of what has been going on for the past several decades might think this sounds benign, but to see how Wikipedia identifies an environmentalist, click on the “Notable Environmentalists” heading to find, among others, such distasteful people as Al Gore and Greta Thunberg.
These people are not just “concerned about the environment,” they are convinced humans are toxic and the population needs to be reduced.
I think the line James was referring to people stepping across was about people who are willing to offer themselves to die for the good of the planet. That is what “they” want - the Al Gore’s, the Bill Gates’, the Clinton’s, the WEFers, the Trudeau’s, et al. They want us to die because human life is the least valuable life of all (to them).
So, the bottom line is that I didn’t have a problem with what James and James said the first time, and when I listened again, I still couldn’t find anything that I disagreed with.