Rights of Nature

Not Always As It Seems

Have you noticed round growths on oak trees? I had seen them a few years ago, and looked them up and promptly forgot what I read. Now they’re reappearing and since we’re trained to be alarmed by the unusual, I began reading up on them again. It turns out most authorities agree they are harmless, just unsightly. But unsightly is enough for many people to seek ways to eradicate them.

Apparently, insects and mostly non stinging wasps lay their eggs on the tree and these balls, or more reverently known as galls, develop like a cocoon to protect and to feed the larva. Once the insects mature and fly the coop, the galls dry and drop from the tree. That is, if human beings can wait that long. Most articles state galls are harmless and then give numerous methods of removal. Some include pesticides.

As someone who’s not willing to sacrifice benefit for unsightly, I kept reading until I found a delightful article on these galls, of which there are many types. This article did not even hint at removal. In fact, it talked about the fun to be had with the galls once they drop. It even explained an interesting human use for the galls. It seems some clever wench about the 4th Century AD found a way to make ink from the gall, combining its acid with iron sulfate and gum Arabic. This amazing discovery was used in the writing of the first Bible and continued on to be used in the writing of the Declaration of Independence. Even the original United States Postal Service used it until replacing gall ink with chemicals.

What can be learned here? Let’s forego premature evaluation based on appearance and stop losing our collective memory to superficiality and looking good. Wisdom, it’s in our DNA. Dig a little.

Some say we’re on a learning curve. When it comes to the environment, I’d call it an unlearning curve.

Led by unscrupulous ambition for money and an insatiable devouring of energy, we – the people of the world – are finding ourselves reeling from natural disasters.

Voices of marginalized and front line people are going unnoticed as profiteers of oil and other extractions continue to tear up the earth and reduce ecosystems to wastelands. Waterways are polluted at an alarming rate. Crop failures are leading countless people into hunger and starvation. And all the while leadership turns a blind eye to the ignorance that has brought us to this moment.

There are beliefs that underpin our ignorance. Beliefs like dominion over the earth, beliefs that tout the wealthiest as god’s chosen and relegate the vast majority of the world to do their bidding. Beliefs that say the earth and all her resources are here for the taking with no recognition of those who will come after. We don’t worry about those coming after, because we have tidy beliefs that say it’s all going to end anyway.

In the meantime we’re allowing this most beautiful creation to be destroyed. And make no mistake, we are allowing it.

But there are drops of sanity emerging throughout the earth, beautiful jewels of wisdom and action. I offer tremendous gratitude to the indigenous among us who have not forsaken their traditional ways and have held fast to their recognition of our interconnectedness with the earth and one another. And I offer encouragement to those trying hard to unlearn the ignorance we were born into and are creating new ways of being and co-creation. Let the unlearning begin!

Please sign this petition from Rights of Nature Wisconsin, Wisdom, and Menikanaehkem:

Wisconsin Elected Officials: Adopt Rights of Nature Laws Today

Today, we face global environmental crises – including soaring extinction rates and accelerating climate change. This has happened despite thousands of environmental laws. What those laws have in common is that they regulate the exploitation of nature – treating nature as existing for human use. It’s time for that to change – for our laws to recognize nature — the waters, plants, animals and ecosystems we live among — as a living being with legal rights.

We call upon our elected representatives at the state and local level to adopt rights of nature laws – as communities across the U.S. have, as countries including Ecuador and Panama have, and as many indigenous nations have done – to secure the right of nature to exist, flourish, and be restored.

Sign here https://secure.everyaction.com/DQmEhEf3pE2eFAMwsuwQIw2

for more Center for Environmental Rights

Forged in Ignorance

Two of the deadliest fires in recorded history were the Midwest’s Peshtigo and Hinkley fires in the 1800’s. The causes of both were attributed to unusually dry weather and reckless industrial behaviors.

The Peshtigo fire swept through northeastern Wisconsin and killed over 1200. It’s believed rail workers began a brush fire that got out of control. Survivors recalled the inferno moved “like a tornado”.

Following two months of drought, the Hinkley fire raced through Minnesota’s logging areas, killing 418.

As we await the fate of 1300 human beings unaccounted for in Maui, it’s incumbent for us to understand what went so horribly wrong.

Maui, like Peshtigo and Hinkley became industrialized. The lands were used for extraction of lumber and in the case of Maui, plantations usurped native lands. Those plantations gave way to hardy and flammable non-Native grasses, and undermined the natural wetland.

Add drought conditions and the ferocity of climatic winds and the results are devastating.

These disasters were forged in ignorance. They’re the result of economic development that has ignored indigenous people and have ruthlessly devoured native lands. Colonization overruns common sense with political power and capital.

The roots of these disasters were long in the making and driven by indifference. Today we are living the result of that indifference. But there are hopeful signs. A Montana judge recently handed a legal victory to young activists who sued the state for the right to live in a clean and healthy environment. The argument declared that the state’s support of fossil fuels undermined constitutional rights. The judge agreed.

Let us be the ones who boldly turn away from ignorance. Let us return the garden.

For more:

Vegetation Fuels Fires

Maui Was Once a Wetland

U.S. Coast Guard Hawai’i Pacific District 14: Lahaina, August 8, 202

We Are The Majority

For me International Women’s Day, Earth Day and Human Rights Day all merge together as one. And we might as well add World Water Day and International Workers’ Day to the mix, because it’s getting harder to see where one leaves off and another begins.

And that is the meaning of intersectionality, isn’t it? It is the interconnected, overlapping and interdependent nature of the disadvantaged.

It’s great to have a day to champion our singular causes, and we could add many more honorary days to celebrate and move forward with bold agendas and transformative ideals.

Or we can take this notion of being disadvantaged and turn it upside down. When we realize our combined efforts towards equity and peace are the norms, not the defaults, and that in fact we are the majority, we can all win.

International Women’s Day began over 112 years ago, forgotten by many countries and then twisted into a kind of Mother’s Day by others, and now we witness what has besieged the girls and women of Afghanistan in less than two years.

A nightmare has been allowed to run rampant in humanity for far too long. It is based in competition and the accumulation of wealth at all costs. It’s the accumulation of wealth that promotes slavery and continues in its various forms today. It is the ridiculous competition among leaders that continues to send soldiers and civilians to their graves. And it is the degradation of women, children and the earth that has brought us to this moment of un-civilization.

Thinking, peace driven people must shun the failures of the past. These individuals, who can take the yokes from their own necks, and create new paths forward, can and will ignite the change we know is possible.

Please sign the petition to champion Peace Education

Rethinking Progress

Our township is quaint. Most people have lived here their whole lives. Many were dairy farmers before the time of “Get big or get out”. They’re first hand witnesses to the shortcomings of that adage. To some the small family farm die off of is “progress”. But progress shouldn’t have to come on the backs of people or in the destruction of the earth.

It was progress that drove most indigenous people away. Had they been encouraged to stay, or allowed to teach their ways of stewardship of the earth, things might be different for all of us.

But as it is, I hear the bulldozers cutting new paths for the loggers who are going to cash in on the land. There is no regard for animal life. No regard for the fellowship of the trees. Freshly cut-logging roads in these hills will add to heavy spring runoff and an increase in floods. There’s little regard for life when money is at stake.

In the beginning of autumn colors we will watch the trees come down. It ‘s dark now but I can still hear the bulldozing. There is no legal recourse to stop it and talk is futile when you’re a woman telling men there are better ways.

“This is how we’ve always done it”, ends the conversation. Maybe you have always done it this way, but there are people who understand their relationship to the land and to one another.

The Menominee are internationally heralded for the way they harvest their forests. Care is taken to ensure an ongoing healthy ecosystem. It is never too late to learn.

Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should. I’m weary of living in a world driven by ignorance. Money will not heal unconsciousness.

Category: Rights of Nature