listen to carrion

put your ear close and hear the faint chattering of songs that are to come

[typenull]

[chase-solidago]

I got my Masters and PhD where Leopold taught, I went to his Shack twice a year, I worked in his archives, I've read his letters and journals, I've studied under his biographer, my Masters was partially about him, my PhD is structured around one of his speeches. I feel like I have the Credentials to have Refined Feelings about Leopold

I hate this passage.

Setting aside "alone" ("Only I, the pure and noble white male university scientist can see this pain, unlike the uncultured masses")...

If you have decided that you live in "a world of wounds" then you have already decided the world is damned. If you are looking for wounds, you will always find them. Things like climate change and ecosystem destruction and extinction are "wounds" that can never be "healed." New ways of being, like peregrine falcons on skyscrapers or novel ecosystems can only be seen as "wounds." The metaphorical "body" will never be "whole." If, no matter what you do, the environment will always be damaged/flawed/corrupted, what's the point in even trying?

In Leopold's context, the only Correct ("healed") way for the natural world to exist is to restore it to its corresponding historic pre-settlement ecosystem, the state it was in prior to the "wounding." This is concretely and objectively impossible. We've had 90+ years of ecological restoration as a science (NOT INVENTED BY LEOPOLD, DON'T LISTEN TO HIS PROPAGANDISTS) to firmly establish there is no magic time machine process to "heal" these "wounds." Instead, we can change spaces, help rebuild ecosystems into something new that may have things in common with the past.

I find it a much more useful framing to think in terms of change. There was never a moment in history where an ecosystem was static, things were always changing, they always will be changing. This is especially true in the Indigenous people-driven ecosystems Leopold is talking about here. His writings all assume that these ecosystems were static prior to settlement, the "whole, healthy body" in the metaphor. That "whole, healthy body" never existed in the first place.

This is why I like to thinking of us, environmentally-minded people taking action, as members in a very old community of beings who have made environmental change. Rather than metaphorically putting bandaids on Mother Earth's body that is separate from us, we can take actions as members in the community of ecosystems to help all of us thrive, together.

[wingedeverlasting]

[sunshineslut]

[wingedeverlasting]

On the solstice I went to the dairy farm where I get my weekly yogurt, with my friend, to a work and cheese and pizza making party. It ended up that there were only four people who came, all old friends, all people I like and admire very much. For hours we made sticky mozzarella out of vats of milk in the frigid barn, and visited the long eye-lashed dairy cows, and made pizza and played silly party games in the incredibly messy and cozy farmhouse full of books. We laughed so much, and the cats knocked the pizza onto the floor where there were already piles of coffee grounds and oatmeal.

I felt less of a farmer than ever, because I've been essentially working just part time for two weeks now, and the dairy farmers almost never, ever stop working. But I recognize that sentiment when one of the dairy farmers said, over and over again, looking around at us in wonder, " I never do this. I literally never do this." 'This' being, time with friends, time just farting around with people you like, doing nothing other than being together. It was for her one evening carved out of a life of such singular devotion. I know that devotion, what it's like to forget how sweet it is to have friends over because you just don't have time, and your home is this chaotic mess of a place where you only exist in between giving all your energy and activity to the farm.

The work reinforces the forgetting reinforces the work. You forget how beautiful it is to spend time with friends, you forget how to spend time with friends, you convince yourself you can't spend time with friends because there is too much work, anyways, and you've forgotten how, anyways. You convince yourself the rewards of the work or the consuming need of it at least is enough.

I admire that devotion. There are very noble, very meaningful, very rewarding lessons and experiences that come from that strength of devotion. But when I left that night I felt that warm feeling of knowing, deeply knowing, that if anything were to go wrong, I was among friends. Capable, skilled, extremely wholesome and good hearted people who knew and cared about me. I felt safe in a bigger way than I usually feel in this world. I was in a community. And work never gives you that feeling. So the question is, how do you sustain that incredible singular devotion that it takes to live the farming life, while still remaining a full human being with a community?

[lentilsoupforthesoul]

quilt by Chinami Terai

[luthienne]

Natasha Trethewey, from Thrall: Poems; "Mythology"

[flowerytale]

Mary Oliver, from “We Should Be Well Prepared”, Red Bird

[wetheurban]

I know that one day, when you’re finally in the place you’ve dreamt of, you’ll look back at this period of your life and feel so grateful that you held on and didn't give up.

[probablyasocialecologist]

Shattering the myth of men as hunters and women as gatherers

Analysis of data from dozens of foraging societies around the world shows that women hunt in at least 79% of these societies, opposing the w

Analysis of data from dozens of foraging societies around the world shows that women hunt in at least 79% of these societies, opposing the widespread belief that men exclusively hunt and women exclusively gather. Abigail Anderson of Seattle Pacific University, US, and colleagues presented these findings in the open-access journal PLOS ONE on June 28, 2023. A common belief holds that, among foraging populations, men have typically hunted animals while women gathered plant products for food. However, mounting archaeological evidence from across human history and prehistory is challenging this paradigm; for instance, women in many societies have been found buried alongside big-game hunting tools. Some researchers have suggested that women's role as hunters was confined to the past, with more recent foraging societies following the paradigm of men as hunters and women as gatherers. To investigate that possibility, Anderson and colleagues analyzed data from the past 100 years on 63 foraging societies around the world, including societies in North and South America, Africa, Australia, Asia, and the Oceanic region. They found that women hunt in 79% of the analyzed societies, regardless of their status as mothers. More than 70% of female hunting appears to be intentional—as opposed to opportunistic killing of animals encountered while performing other activities, and intentional hunting by women appears to target game of all sizes, most often large game. The analysis also revealed that women are actively involved in teaching hunting practices and that they often employ a greater variety of weapon choice and hunting strategies than men.

These findings suggest that, in many foraging societies, women are skilled hunters and play an instrumental role in the practice, adding to the evidence opposing long-held perceptions about gender roles in foraging societies. The authors note that these stereotypes have influenced previous archaeological studies, with, for instance, some researchers reluctant to interpret objects buried with women as hunting tools. They call for reevaluation of such evidence and caution against misapplying the idea of men as hunters and women as gatherers in future research. The authors add, "Evidence from around the world shows that women participate in subsistence hunting in the majority of cultures."

[latibule-e-deactivated20231012]

— Simone de Beauvoir, from “The Woman Destroyed.”

[chase-solidago]

tha's it, that's my dissertation

i love how over and over again in the records, you have settlers "discover" that "coincidentally" Indigenous people were living in places that were full of fruit & nut trees. Curious!!!!!!! /s

[zillanovikov]

every year I post this meme and every year people get more mad at me than they did the previous year

[psychotic-gerard]

pro-tip for your mental health but also in general. get involved with your environment. learn the plants that are native. plant them. learn what species are invasive. learn the insects. learn the reptiles. get involved with societies or conservatories (vet them first). eat something you’ve grown. get involved locally. get more nature around you.

[onceness-deactivated20240321]

Etel Adnan

[civilizationkills]

As many have noted, the falsification of "the digital age" have been so successfully inculcated that, despite direct evidence to the contrary, there is a pervasive imaginary of the dematerialized status of digital technology. Material and environmental realities are conveniently veiled by miniaturization, the apparent intangibility of wireless setups, the placelessness of data, and terms like "virtual" or "cloud." One of the many phenomena refuting these illusions is the ceaseless construction of new data centers and server farmers to manage the massive increase in data production. These sprawling single-story structures have staggering energy requirements and generate levels of heat damaging to micro-circuitry, which must be cooled at each unit using millions of gallons of water each day. At current exponential rates of data growth, the required number of server farms fifty years from now would cover vast areas of the land surface of the continental US and other regions. The mythologies of a post-industrial information economy also obscure the persistence of earlier modes of production within the current scramble for resources essential to high-tech weaponry, communication networks, consumer technology products, solar and wind energy systems and much else. Violence to both people and their lands defines these imperial and neocolonial operations, as it has for several centuries. The very possibility of a "digital age" requires the expansion of these destructive industrial practices to world-vanquishing extremes.

Scorched Earth: Beyond the Digital Age to a Post-Capitalist World Jonathan Crary

[sorryforthebonyelbows]

Franz Kafka, The Diaries of Franz Kafka

Allie Ray, Holler

Richard Siken, Crush

[memoryslandscape-deactivated202]

I don’t forget the frailty of bodies, mine, yours – too soon to join beneficent ghosts passing

silently through houses, wafting over gardens or waiting, abashed, with the blueberries, for their turn.

— Kathryn Weld, from “When Oak Leaves Shimmy in the Heath,” Amethyst Review (11 June 2023)