Dear Ecofems:
I'm the one out in the GA woods who only reads his email once or
twice a week and this last week was quite a lot! Wow! Nicole might
be acerbic, but so are some of her opponents; and I'm admiring her for
sticking it out and persevering with the list instead of shaking the
dust off her feet and having done with it as hopeless.
What little bit I've learned from living and working in the Third
World and among black folks in the US can be summed up as "Shut up and
listen!" I've been listening; and now I want to ask- what's to be
done? I found myself listening to the point of finding my own life
being controlled by their agenda, too; with me silenced by white male
guilt into not saying anything in support of my own right to think.
The Third World got donated most of my savings (though perhaps
misguidedly, through an agency similar to the Peace Corps which one
poster criticized as neocolonialist). They also got about 13 years of
my life working in agriculture of one sort or other-. And right now
I'm enough at wits end that I'm out there on 50 acres of clearcut with
seven other folks (all white, all educated- and all of them as much at
wit's end as I) gardening and planting trees and living as simply as I
can imagine; because that's what we can think of doing and doing
joyfully without either supporting oppression or having oppressed
people angry at us.
White rich folks and men have no right to tell the black, dark,
poor folks and women how to live or how to do anything- even to make
suggestions can be thrown out out of hand- its a foul, it's out of
bounds- we have no right to speak because of our background. We white
folks and men have been having a big party with the world's resources
for a few centuries (or maybe mileennia); and the rest of the world
wants their share now.
Here's a question for some productive discussion:
I think the party's about to be over, for everyone. It doesn't matter
if you're the one in the hotel at that expensive dinner or the one out
on the street. The planet isn't going to tolerate it any more. The
Third World is anxious to have its share of the good stuff; the First
World is anxious to sell it to them, make a profit, keep them in debt-
whatever. What I'm saying is I don't think the planet can afford to
have any more cultures binging. As a white male American, of course,
I can and likely will be told that my statement is a foul- since I'm
from the culture that's been doing the lion's share of the binging!
Working in Bangladesh, working as a lowly underling in a black-run
company; and liviing the life of a homesteader notwithstanding. But
just take it as a mere idea. I think one or two others on this list
might be asking something similar. Is there a way past the
First/Third World debate, the black/white debate, even
the woman/man debate--towards a planetary discussion?
Are we in relative agreement on the science here- that the planet is
indeed getting seriously disturbed by the excesses of human presence
and something needs to happen pretty soon to avoid disaster? If
that's so. if we do agree on that; than what?
Wondering what next-
Bob the treeplanter, in middle of nowhere GA
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