Walls
Civilization constructs numerous physical and mental walls. These barricades, blockades, fences, and facades separate people from themselves, each other, and the greater community of Life. This is best exemplified by the lines drawn in the dirt that people call "nations". Migrating birds, along with 10 million other wild species, don't seem to take notice of political property boundaries. Nations are indeed artifacts of the human imagination. Emma Goldman explains the consequences of these borders,
"Conceit, arrogance and egotism are the essentials of patriotism. Let me illustrate. Patriotism assumes that our globe is divided into little spots, each one surrounded by an iron gate. Those who have had the fortune of being born on some particular spot consider themselves nobler, better, grander, more intelligent than those living beings inhabiting any other spot. It is, therefore, the duty of everyone living on that chosen spot to fight, kill and die in the attempt to impose his superiority upon all the others.
The inhabitants of the other spots reason in like manner, of course, with the result that from early infancy the mind of the child is provided with blood-curdling stories about the Germans, the French, the Italians, Russians, etc. When the child has reached manhood he is thoroughly saturated with the belief that he is chosen by the Lord himself to defend his country against the attack or invasion of any foreigner. It is for that purpose that we are clamoring for a greater army and navy, more battleships and ammunition."
Why does civilization systematically divide and partition? In order to achieve control. With control, the system seizes autonomy and awareness from living things and concentrates it into an artifical centralized authority. Theft is a necessary precursor of all power and property. This is the essence of all hierarchical human relations (i.e. governments, religions, institutions). Elitism and authority are civilized fabrications that do not occur in the natural realm. There are no kings, politicians, or committees that rule the forest, prairie, or swamp. The systems that maintain balance in the natural domain are infinitely complex and rely upon diversity as opposed to the imposed uniformity of civilization. Thus, civilization is counter-evolutionary and clearly a biological catastrophe as it has initiated a new era of extinction.
posted by pteridium @ 6:56 PM
4 comments
4 Comments:
Yes. The world of humans is divided by imaginary lines, in part the result of warring the death and bloodshed. However, somewhere between these lines civilizations occurs. If we are human, and thus being human we are part of the natural world as well. And why are the fabrications of human society (religion, government, ect.) somehow beyond the natural realm? I would venture to say that human civilization depends on diversity and an underlying complexity that is not outside of the natural world.
Isn't the idea of territory indeed that a construct of an animalistic nature. Predatorial species mark and control there territory as we as humans do. Every process humans go through is not one above nature but just one that evolution has provided. We aren't an alien species that has just come to dominate this world but instead we are the outcome of what biological processes we had to adapt to over millions of years.
Good points. However, as humans we've got to distinguish between natural and unnatural if we wish to survive. Ran Prieur sums this up very well in his essay "7 Lies about Civilization" so I'll quote him here,
"3. Everything is natural. Happily most people recognize this as a silly pseudo-philosophical distraction, but I want to knock it down anyway. The argument rests on a semantic distortion, a redefinition of "natural" to include absolutely everything, because I say so. Civilization is natural because humans are animals, toxic waste is natural because it's derived from stuff that comes from the Earth, bla bla bla.
Real people do not use the word "natural" in this way. Maybe it's "natural" if I take this club and bash your head in, but you would prefer that I didn't, so you define words like "murder" to express and defend this preference. In the same way, people define "natural" to express and defend their preference for living trees over plastic trees, meadows over parking lots, rivers of drinkable water over rivers of dioxin. This is what "natural" really means, and if we don't want to die of cancer and turn the Earth into a poisoned desert, we have a responsibility to linguistically separate the natural from the unnatural and choose the natural many times a day.
If you want a tight definition, natural means in symbiosis with nature, and nature means the totality of symbiotic life on Earth, and symbiotic means related in ways that are mutually beneficial and beneficial to the whole, where wider benefit takes precedence. Defining "beneficial" pushes the limits of our impoverished language, but I'm going to say generating autonomous and diverse aliveness. And if you don't know what aliveness means, look harder."
Theft is a necessary precursor of all power and property.
You are so right.
I love your blog!
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