REH wrote: > I make no > distinction between life. To me all life has value and purpose and all of > life is equal. My family's life is more precious to me. The deep lessons > of my culture are more precious to me but we are not above you or anyone > else. Neither are you above me. I tell our children when they plant the > little plants in the small garden they are given for learning that the > plants are alive and precious as is all life but we grieve for those closer > to us although the children grieve and question the act of eating to live. > They have to experience a connection of respect that says that one day we > too will be food and will give and become the one who devours us as they > become us in the reverse. Food is never a thing. We can't eat things. The > first Christian theologian that I connected to when coming off of the > reservation was Karl Barth. His since of the paradox of things was > something that I understood. I also understood him taking his time > guarding the border during WWII. All life is equal and precious but our > close life to us is more precious to us personally because of our closeness. > We say that plants and animals that become us during the act of eating give > back their lives as we will do the same when the time we are given is over. > That's our story. You can't prove that it isn't true and I can't prove > that it is but it gives me purpose and intentionality and it ties me to my > environment in ways that science has not been able to imagine much less > document. But I know it.
Let's not beat around the bush, but cut straight to the core: The point of the Cherokee concept of "respect what you eat" is what we today call a _sustainable_ use of resources -- in this case, the hunted animals --, i.e. not to deplete the resources, but to "harvest" only so much that the resource base remains there for the future. However, that's exactly what the billionaires are NOT doing. Their insatiable greed is UNsustainable, also in the literal sense (exponential compound interest). They deplete/destroy the resource -- the economy. So I don't understand why you reply to my critique of billionaire predators that "we are all predators -- we all eat". Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
