Climate

There was a July in Portland, about 25 years ago, when daily mist and drizzle rotted tomatoes and mildewed squashes. We couldn’t imagine summers hot enough to grow California-size cantaloupe. But this year’s bounty of sweet, Mediterranean foods convinced even skeptics that climate warnings had been accurate. Now reports of still hotter summers elicit mature concern. If watermelons are in our future, what will happen to our forests? And our way of life?

Oregonians sought relief from the stingy sun by building roofs on decks or putting in a swimming pool. The average Joe, who muscled through the 3-4 days of 90+ weather before, retrofitted his house with a window unit. The foot-loose-and-fancy-free flew south to ski. Retirees took a cruise to islands north of Norway. “Just because it’s getting hotter, doesn’t mean I have to suffer.”

We’re in a quandary though, because the things we do to escape the heat contribute to the heat we’re trying to escape. The more we fly and drive and build, the more fossil fuel we burn. Every time we turn on the air conditioner to cool ourselves we heat the outside air just slightly, which nudges one more person to buy an air conditioner, and so on.

“But,” we ask, “what are we supposed to do? After all, none of us pollutes enough to affect the climate. It’s not as if one more car on an already congested freeway makes congestion worse. And filling the last seat on a commercial flight barely increases the plane’s pollution. Am I supposed to stay home while others are getting away and having fun?”

The climate changes because 7.3 billion people go about their lives, in factories, at backyard barbeques, in malls or on water skis. Trillions and trillions of miniscule acts add up. The result: a polluted environment, extinct species, acidified oceans and forecasts of significantly hotter summers.

We need a social structure suited to humankind’s present relationship with Earth. A hundred years ago, we numbered just 2 billion. We were small and vulnerable to Nature. Now we are a threat to Her. Overpopulation and depleted resources affect humans too, as evidenced by mass migrations, calls for tougher borders, squabbles over in-fill, congestion, etc. We’ve filled the Earth with ourselves and our stuff. Now what?

The social structure that got us here can’t carry us forward any more than Columbus’ ships could carry Lewis and Clark across North America. We’re in new circumstances that require a new vessel.

For millennia, as we multiplied and expanded, our ‘vessel’ was captained by the explorers, warriors and conquerors. Male leadership was indisputable. But now, male leaders have no lands to invade except those owned by the 99%. The leaders give themselves tax breaks and block universal health care, saying in effect, “our lives matter and yours don’t.” They take public companies private in order to keep America’s prosperity in their hands. If they’re allowed to buy parts of our National Monuments, wealth inequality worsens. On a filled-up Earth, unchecked male leadership threatens democracy and environmental well-being.

There is another option, which is to see ourselves as part of a community, as part of a global village in which all lives share one destiny.

Community has always been the province of woman. The village was always her domain. Woman needs an equal voice now, especially in politics and business. Vote for woman, for her perspective and her standards.

Septic

LO REview, Aug 2018

It’s outrageous that our city leaders, in this summer of extreme heat, in this decade of drought and conflagration, in this new millennium marked by mass human migrations and accelerated extinctions, in this era of heightened awareness that monster buildings on small pieces of land surrounded by concrete contribute to global warming - it’s outrageous that these educated, forward-thinking, conscientious leaders would propose the elimination of a time-tested, environmentally-beneficial practice that adds not one iota to any of these problems. And what’s even more exasperating - and dismaying – and let me add truly frightening – is that our so-called leaders want to punish the practitioners of this life-enhancing activity, not only by making them stop, but also by charging them tens of thousands of dollars to do so. I’m talking poop, here, folks. I’m talking septic systems. I’m talking about the 2,200 households in Lake Oswego who consistently and safely enhance their soils by organically converting food into nourishment for shade trees. I’m talking about carbon sequestration. I’m talking about less energy needed for air conditioning. I’m talking about thousands of small but meaningful acts that occur automatically and naturally. Energy-neutral acts that keep our city on a path to sustainability. And at the same time, I’m talking about the city’s aim to go after entire neighborhoods of these right-living people, to force them to join the march to irresponsibility and greed.

If the city wants our poop so badly then, damn it, they can pay us for it.

Runners on the Edge

70 years ago, ‘litter’ meant paper, bottles and cans. Unsightly, yes, but hardly able to clog the digestive systems of sea birds or congeal into floating mats. In 1940, there were 2 billion humans. Now 7 ½ billion occupy every habitable acre . . . and extract resources from the rest. The remotest nooks and crannies proffer bits of trash and traces of chemicals, medicines and pollution. We’ve filled the Earth.

Now what?

If a group of runners arrived at the edge of the continent, their experience with running on land couldn’t carry them much further. They’d have three options. 1. They could charge into the waves anyway, flail madly and hope to figure it out soon. 2. They could turn back, which would mean running over the masses who followed them. Or 3. they could party like there were no tomorrow.

This is America’s predicament. We’ve raced across the planet, and in the last half century, challenged the Earth’s limits. As many in the world follow our energy-dependent lead, the amount of life trampled increases. Polluted water, poisoned air, exhausted agricultural acreage, depleted fish stocks, increased rate of extinctions, climate change, rising seas, etc. It’s universal.

We won’t sit and do nothing, but should we go forward or back?

The present administration takes us backward. It rescinds regulations that protect plants, animals and habitats, including air and water. It opens up previously closed areas to extraction and development. It relaxes laws against trophy hunting. Plus many more life-destroying actions.

This should come as no surprise. Expropriating from nature - food, tools, raw materials and essential resources - has been our practice for thousands of years. Our MO is long established: explore new lands, invade territories occupied by others, conquer them, take what we want and leave the mess to others. The drive to selfishly expand and conquer is the key to our success. It’s in our genes and embedded in our culture.

This administration, though, runs over its own people by appropriating lands in Monuments that belong not to nature or to enemies but to us, by taking away health care and Social Security (if it could) and by confiscating our future earnings through tax breaks for the rich that were funded by national debt.

Egad, they destroy nature and society. What to do?

We can look to that vast sea beyond the shore, because we, unlike the ‘runners’, know how to swim. We can wade into the future unafraid of being run over.

The runners, loosely speaking, are men. The fastest are the alpha males, the explorers, adventurers, warriors, killers, conquerors and builders. Wired for conquest, and driven to exploit and dominate, they pushed ahead, exhibiting little to no empathy for the lives lost. “We provide for our own!” they boast. In their wake, humankind multiplied, expanded and thrived.

But their us-against-them attitude could never lead us to peace and sustainability.

Women have always been the producers of life and the nurturers of the vulnerable. If we are to find within our gene pool support for children and protections for nature, we’d have better luck if we looked to female leaders.

Humankind is in transition. We exit a male-dominated, exploitative phase, and enter a female-oriented, life-affirming phase. Women rise and will never again submit. Women speak and will never again be silent. Women and kids and minorities take to the streets fully aware that they build the foundation for a Global Village.