Artificial Productivity

Pocahontas Meets Spoken Word

2010-08-20T15:06:00.000-07:00

I haven't had time at all to write lately, but check out this video...

Amazing!

Another Far too Short Trip North: Night One

2010-07-25T10:18:00.000-07:00

Well, it has taken me a couple of weeks to start typing up my account of being up north, but then again it normally does take me that long. It is hard being away from that place, and sharing with you what I experience up there makes me miss it anew. The following is the account of my first night of my much too short up north adventure. The rest of the weekend’s accounts will follow in the next few days. I took all of the pictures within the posts while I was there.

7-9-10 Night one of my much too short up north adventure It’s strange to me how normal it was pulling up here after three months absent…strange because of how normal it was. Yes I’ve been coming here for twenty years, but only regularly for the last two, and even that is four times a year max. But none-the-less when I pulled up here today I felt like I was HOME, home in a way that I never felt in the house I was raised in, home like I’ve never felt anywhere. This place is where my heart resides (if only my body could catch up to it more often). Isn’t that really what we are all trying to do anyhow? Catch our hearts wherever they have run to? Who holds yours? Is it a woman? A man? A memory of a person that no longer exists due to death—or the changes of life that catch us all off guard sometimes? Is it a city? A pet? A smell—perhaps of lilacs—or of opine brushing between your fingers? For me it is the north—the lakes dark with musky and mysteries they refuse to reveal. The thick snow that keeps even capitalism at bay, the haunting cry of the loon (the north’s very own penguin) mating for life and in peril just the same as their southern counterparts. It’s the white birch, the Indian paintbrush, the otter, the deer, they hold my heart hostage and I must be reunited every few months or I start to slip away—often in very measurable ways. For what is a body without its heart? Heart in the love sense, not the physical. I start to show actual signs of depression, I stop running, sleep during the day and rarely t night, my diet goes to hell, and I STOP WRITING.

It is good that I got back here in time—I was slipping so far and fast I might have totally forgotten that this is what I needed.
~~~~~~~~
Later: I just started a fire to keep the mosquitoes away! I’m so glad I got my parents a fire ring for Christmas. I walked down to the pier to grab my book and notebook and saw a loon, the first one of the year for me up here, not twenty feet from me. He or she was stretching its leg behind it, looking right at me. It felt like I was being waved at. I wonder if it could remember me. I have always felt a strange affinity with loons, and they return to the same lakes each year, so perhaps it was a greeting, from one old friend to another.

I just saw a family of young mergansers and their mother. I got some great pictures. I might have to go inside soon, even the smoke from the fire isn’t keeping the mosquitoes at bay. My constant runs to grab more wood probably aren’t helping either!

~~~~~~
I just witnessed one of the most serene things of my life: a pair of loons came into the bay and proceeded to preen themselves—stretching their wings, cleaning their stomachs, etc and then one of them tucked its head into its feathers and fell asleep! Then the other followed and I watched for over half an hour as they both sat low in the water sleeping! Finally one woke up, yawned and then the other did too. I got video of them sleeping that I’ll try to upload one of these days. Now they are still swimming in front of the pier.

Gobby Goo By: Amelie Lillith

2010-07-16T04:37:00.000-07:00

After nearly three months of oil gushing into the gulf I have finally gotten a poem written about it. Feel free to pass this on if you feel the need.

Gobby Goo
By: Amelie Lillith

4/20 means different things to different people
to me, it is a black day...or it was this year
a day followed by day after day...and yes, even today
of death slowly creeping near
4/20 was a horrid day
a day where men working just to pay their way
lost their lives and their families
lost the only way they had to be free
the beaches and the wetlands tooslowly clogged with that gobby goo
and what did the corporation do?
they did everything they could to hide the very truth.

And so now it's been three long months
and all those families have is more thick black gunk
and air tainted with a poisoned tinge
even angels can't fly with oil soaked wingsand so what is it that we can do
to stop the lies and find the fucking truth
we can clog that gusher with the best thing we've got
the CEOs themselves, the only true junk shot
it will take dozens, hundreds, possibly more
because they are mostly filled with lies and lore
but to stop the creeping death blackening the shores
is something they'll never do with stockholders on board
we can't rely on our government
we're all seeing the difference between what they saidand what they meant
It's time to activate
to tell them all that we'll no longer wait
to take control of the way things are run
I'll bring my voice, you bring your gun
and we'll show those in charge that we are done playing their game
that black beaches in the gulf just are not the same
and tell their EPA that the poisons sprayed
need to stop, because it could already be too late

the dolphins are swimming up onto our shores
hoping for a fast death escaping the oil, but just find even morethe corporations and the government, are just two branches
of the same old camp
and the people are starting to see this truth
tell your friends and your family too
it's time to do more than congregate
time to do more than just relate
it's time for all of us to fight this fight
to show them the difference between wrong and right
and if that lesson comes with guns or marches
I don't care, and neither do the coated marshesthe waterbirds don't care which way we choose
peace or violence or a combination of the two
their legs and wings are still coated with sticky death
and they'll wonder why we aren't fighting with their dying breaths
so grab your weapons be they sword or pen
it's about time that we all begin

it's been three long months since this all started
and all that's changed is the beaches have darkened
the poor and the southern are being ignoredit's time to reclaim our shores
The air is tainted with a poisoned tinge
even angels can't fly with oil soaked wings

You can pray to whatever god you've got
under the current system we'll need the lot
say your prayers and meditate
but your loving kindness will just have to wait
the corporations and their CEOs
and the government and their two party dronesdon't want us to activate
they keep preaching that we should just wait
but even most gods weren't afraid to activate their people
let's part the seas of lies and demand we be equal
to those very corporations and the government
the ones raising our taxes and hiking up rent
we'll yell from oil slick to sandy shore
WE CAN'T TRUST YOU ANYMORE
we can't rely on our government
we're all seeing the difference between what you saidand what you meant.
We see that it's time to activate
And no, we will no longer sit around and wait
we'll take control of the way things are run
We'll bring our voices...they'll bring their guns
and we'll show those in charge that we are done playing their game
that black beaches in the gulf just are not the same
and tell their EPA that the poisons sprayed
need to stop, because it could already be too late.

These three months have been three months too longso I'm going to stop talking and let's get things done.
Tell your friends and neighbors to demand the truth
Let's take the power back, and start to revolute.

A Good Video

2010-06-28T08:04:00.001-07:00

I haven't posted in two weeks...I promise I will soon. But until then, here's a video you should watch:

Liar, Liar, The Ocean's on Fire

2010-06-14T11:39:00.001-07:00

Ever since the blow out occurred in the Gulf of Mexico on the 20th of April I have adopted a mantra that I repeat over and over again to anyone who will listen. It's quite simple: "They are lying". Easy to remember, obviously true, proven time and again, but people still deny it. "Why would BP lie about how much oil is gushing?" Yes, those of you reading this blog probably wonder how someone could ask such an ignorant question, but I get it all of the time.

Why?! Really…okay let's just assume for a second that a question as ignorant as that even deserves an answer. Here are a few: when penalties and fines are assessed after this disaster is no longer getting worse (assuming the flow is ever stopped) the amount of oil leaked is directly proportional to the amount of money BP will owe. This makes the use of dispersants come into clear view: they are using them to hide how bad it is. This should be obvious to most as well, but apparently it is not. BP is a corporation, their obligation is not to the American people, the Gulf of Mexico, the wildlife, or even to their employees (11 of which died when this disaster began). No. Their responsibility is to their share holders. They will do everything possible to make this the smallest FINANCIAL loss to themselves. If anyone still has any illusion that BP cares they should give it up now. They do care, but not for you and not for me, unless you own enough stocks to be on the board…and I have a feeling that if you do own that many stocks you aren't reading this blog.

It isn't just BP that is lying. The government? Oh yes, they are lying too, but so is the media in the indirect way they have of doing so. Mainstream media is ignoring the fact that Obama got more campaign contributions from BP than any other candidate. It is ignoring the fact the BP has spent millions on newly hired lobbyists that it sent out to DC to sway the opinions of politicians. They ignore all of this…and what does CNN have to say about the inaction of the government in this crisis? Obama, apparently, is afraid to take action because angry black men scare people. No joke here. The article can be found here: http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/06/08/rage.obama/index.html

The smoke and mirrors do not fool me and you shouldn't be fooled either. This is a pretty simple case of not betraying the hand that feeds you. From a political standpoint it makes sense for Obama to not scold BP too heavily…they give him money. It makes sense for BP to cover their asses as a corporation in the current system. What doesn't make sense, and what everyone is afraid to say (or so it seems) is that the system that makes these atrocious acts acceptable is inherently flawed. Capitalism…the extraction of resources (be they human, plant, animal, or fossil fuels) for profit results in the destruction of habitats. It makes people look at living beings as resources, not as communities of life that are dependent upon each other for survival. Capitalism creates a dog-eat-dog system that makes it acceptable (and rewarded) to care not for your neighbor (be your neighbor human or otherwise). It is a system based on exploitation and it is broken. People see this brokenness now. They see the flaw of a system made to reward the elite and sentence the poor to a working class existence at best.

So let's rise up and fight. It's time to take the broken system down friends. It's time to demand that the land, the animals, the humans and all life forms are respected in their own rights. It's time for real change, and one that someone who gets money from an oil giant will not facilitate. Take a step back from your microscope and look at the entire system. That is what is broken. Capping the leak is important, obviously, but there will always be more leaks, more death, more corruption if the current way things are run is not changed.

And finally some articles about the leak you should check out:

Are Big Green Groups Protesting Too Little Amid Oil Disaster? http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/06/13-0

BP oil leak aftermath: Slow-motion tragedy unfolds for marine life http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jun/10/bp-oil-leak-marine-life-wildlife

Defenders of Wildlife blog: http://www.defendersblog.org/

BP Censoring Media, Destroying Evidence http://www.huffingtonpost.com/riki-ott/from-the-ground-bp-censor_b_608724.html

Gulf Needs Concrete Actions that Respect Residents' Rights http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kerry-kennedy/gulf-needs-concrete-actions_b_609827.html

Cheney's Push of Deregulators led to BP Disaster http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=5163

Oiled Birds Everywhere, but Little Rescue Crews can do http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Oiled_birds_everywhere_but_little_rescue_crews_can_do_999.html

Oil Leak Counter

2010-06-01T12:01:00.000-07:00

BP has announced that the top kill procedure failed...and they seem to not want to try anything else until the relief wells are done being drilled in AUGUST. So...here's a nice little counter to help you visualize the horrible destruction being done to the oceans by BP each second. I'd go with the high estimates if I were you (we know BP lies).

Let's Find the Spark and Fight Back: Gulf Oil Leak

2010-05-27T06:43:00.000-07:00

“War is when the government tells you who the bad guy is. Revolution is when you decide that for yourself.”

As is apparent from my recent blog posts, I have been thinking a lot about the oil geyser in the Gulf of Mexico lately. Over the last week or so I've been so appalled with all that I've read that I couldn't find the heart to write a post about it. I do know, however, that even though there is decent media coverage of the disaster it is mostly local media and the vast majority of people are getting a watered down version of the crisis that is unfolding.

So, I'd like to begin by providing a few links to stories as well as to news sources where you can find information on the disaster.

Articles:

Yes, Mr. President, It Was Your Katrina - Three Weeks Ago. Now it May Be Your Chernobyl By: Robert Redick http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/05/24-5
Oil Oozing Up On Shore Despite Best Efforts Of BP, Coast Guard To Contain (PR) Fallout: http://news.firedoglake.com/2010/05/19/oil-oozing-up-on-shore-despite-best-efforts-of-bp-coast-guard-to-contain-pr-fallout/
BP Witholds Oil Spill Facts--And Government Lets It: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/05/18/94415/bps-secrecy-keep-facts-on-gulf.html
Norman engineer has own idea about how to stop Gulf oil leak http://www.newsok.com/norman-engineer-has-own-idea-about-how-to-stop-gulf-oil-leak/article/3462317?custom_click=pod_headline_national-finance-news
CT inventor proposes solution to Gulf oil leak: http://www.hartfordbusiness.com/news13241.html

One thing that really strikes me about this whole disaster is that it seems most people are assuming that BP is corrupt and the government is in on it. Citizens who identify themselves as right wing, left wing, or just trying to survive know that the current system (call it capitalism, call it Western Civilization, call it anything you want) takes care of corporations more than it takes care of individuals. This is a given. The author Derrick Jensen asks this very question at many of his talks "How many of you think the American government takes care of people over corporations?" (Approximate quote.) No one ever raises their hand.

So, we are living in a system that doesn't take care of people. This system is quickly filling the gulf with oil, but this isn’t the first time the oceans have been killed by oil. There have been the obvious oil spills, but there are also the indirect effects oil has on the oceans. The pollution, the plastic, the wars, the global warming. Fossil fuels have been killing the oceans for a long time.

Citizens of the United States know that corporations are killing their land and their livelihoods (and even the people themselves in many cases like the cleanup workers in Louisiana getting sick: http://trueslant.com/allisonkilkenny/2010/05/26/oil-spill-clean-up-workers-report-feeling-drugged-disoriented/ )

So what are we going to do? Are we just going to sit back and take the abuse and watch as the planet and we are slowly killed off by profit-hungry criminals? Or are we going to fight? Fight for the land, for our rights, for the rights of non humans? How much sludge will it take on the shore before we not only admit that corporations are taken care of better than individuals but rise up and fight against that fact?

BP can kill an entire coastline and get no punishment, yet an "eco terrorist" can be sent to prison for 20 years for setting an empty SUV on fire. This is insanity. It's time to rise up and fight. Sure, boycott BP, boycott all oil. Demand that no drilling is opened up that isn't already open and that a plan be put in place for shutting down all offshore drilling practices.

But most of all end the system that is destroying the planet.

"A great revolution is never the fault of the people, but of the government" -Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The Real Eco-Terrorists

2010-05-20T05:40:00.000-07:00

Time to Take Action: The Gulf of Mexico Oil Leak

2010-05-12T09:14:00.000-07:00

I know that when it comes to people who typically read this blog I will be preaching to the choir on this issue, but even the choir needs guidance sometimes.

The Gulf of Mexico is dying.

There, I said it. No, I am not exaggerating. It won't be long before everything in the Gulf of Mexico is dead. That is the future we are looking at right now, and a grim future it is.

So, what can you do? The answer, in a nutshell, is do SOMETHING. It seems to me that people on a national scale are doing relatively little to help with this unfolding disaster and to prevent future drilling that will inevitably lead to more disasters of this sort.

It isn't just citizens that are handling this poorly however; the powers that be are failing pretty miserably as well. I am including BP in the 'powers that be' category because, lets face it: the pockets of the power are oily with campaign contributions from BP and other oil giants.

So, as citizens of this dying planet we MUST stand up and fight for it. Protest, boycott, do whatever you have to. Offshore drilling needs to stop now. It is not the only horrible thing that the western way of life results in for the environment, but hey, if you are going to stop one thing at a time, it's a great place to start. Sign all the petitions you want, but until the people take to the streets nothing will change. Why isn't anyone furious enough to start marching? Let's march. I'll join. Will you?

Here's a website about actions taking place across the country on Friday, May 14: http://www.risingtidenorthamerica.org/wordpress/category/front-page/

Okay, so you aren't the marching and candle light vigil type…I get it, but you can do your part too. And no, I don't mean sending your hair down to the gulf to help absorb oil (although it can't hurt, I guess). I mean that we can use our brains to help the situation.

BP and the US Coast Guard need to release to the public EVERYTHING they know about the current situation. The psi of the oil geyser (it isn’t a spill or a leak, a geyser is much more accurate) and all of the technical aspects they know about it. They need to let the public know everything so that the intelligent and educated public can work to come up with solutions. When this accident occurred BP had no plan A. When they came up with their impressive looking (but ultimately ineffective) funnel/containment vessel plan I thought it might work: it didn't. Now the plan is to shoot golf balls and torn up tires into the leaking area. I am no engineer but I'm going to go ahead and say that that probably will not work. I have yet to hear a plan C (except Russia's recommendation to use nuclear weapons). So, why not do more than just open a tip line for the public, how about actually providing them with information to come up with USABLE solutions?

I will end my written rant there, but below I've put pictures of the endangered species BP themselves listed in their Exploration Plan for this location (you can view it in its entirety here: http://www.gomr.mms.gov/PI/PDFImages/PLANS/29/29977.pdf)

"4.7 Threatened or endangered species, critical habitat, and marine mammal information
Twenty-nine species of marine mammals occur in the GOM. There are 28 species of cetaceans (7 mysticete and 21 odontocete species) and 1 sirenian species, the manatee.
Five baleen whales, one toothed whale, and one sirenian occur in the GOM and are listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act (ESA):
-The Northern Right Whale
-The Blue Whale
-The Fin Whale
-The Sei Whale
-The Humpback Whale
-The Sperm Whale
-The West Indian Manatee

The sperm whale is common in oceanic waters of the northern GOM and appears to be a resident species, while the baleen whales are considered rare or extralimital in the Gulf. The West Indian Manatee typically inhabits only coastal marine, brackish, and freshwater areas.

Five sea turtles inhabit the waters of GOM and are listed as endangered: the Leatherback, Green, Hawksbill, Kemp's Ridley, and Loggerhead turtle. These five species are all highly migratory, and no individual members of any of the species are likely to be year-round residents of the proposed area of interest.

There are no critical habitats designated within the Gulf of Mexico for the threatened and endangered species above."

Obama: Breaking One Promise at a Time

2010-05-07T09:14:00.001-07:00

We have all heard the mantra "save the whales", seen the grotesque images that are the results of whaling, and cheered on the fictional "Willy" as he was saved from whalers time and time again in the sequels to Free Willy…I have never met a person that has actually been FOR whaling. I think there are really not many people that are.

Obama said in 2008, when campaigning on a GreenPeace Candidate Questionaire:

As president, I will ensure that the U.S. provides leadership in enforcing international wildlife protection agreements, including strengthening the international moratorium on commercial whaling. Allowing Japan to continue commercial whaling is unacceptable.”

— Barack Obama, March 16, 2008

Here is an excerpt from GreenPeace's response flier that explains the issue with whaling and Obama (the flier can be found here http://us.greenpeace.org/site/DocServer/Photos_to_Save_the_Whales_Toolkit.pdf?docID=521)

"Back in 1975, Greenpeace launched the world’s first-ever Save the Whales campaign. The images we brought back from our maiden anti-whaling voyage sparked an international outcry and moved a generation of environmentalists into action. Eventually, after a decade of intense activism, the International Whaling Commission (IWC) agreed to ban commercial whaling. That was 1986 and it was one of our greatest moments as an organization— it was also one of the greatest moments for activists like you.

We could lose it all this June.

In an altogether shocking move, President Obama’s delegation to the IWC has decided to back a plan that would legitimize commercial whaling for the first time since the ban was passed over 20 years ago. We simply can’t let that happen. President Obama needs to hear from Americans everywhere that we oppose this bad deal and demand that he lives up to his campaign promise to work to end all commercial whaling.

That’s why we’re asking everyone who cares about whales to take action and send a message to the President that supporting any deal that would legitimize commercial whaling is, as he himself said, 'unacceptable.'”

So, wait, you are probably thinking I must be kidding. Someone FOR whaling? That's unheard of…well no, I'm not kidding and GreenPeace isn't crazy. Here's another article on it.

Here is a statement from Edward Dorson (Edward Dorson is Director of Conservation Strategies for the Shark Research Institute) taken from the Huffington Post article here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/carol-muskedukes/a-sea-of-deceit-and-capit_b_551858.html Bold has been added by me.

A Sea of Deceit and Capitulation
by Edward Dorson
April 25, 2010

The trajectory of the International Whaling Commission (IWC), meeting in Morocco this June, is on a disastrous course for the world's whales. A new proposal to resume commercial whaling will be presented at the IWC summit. Simply put, it's an awful deal. In order to foresee the fate of the whales with this proposal on the table, look no further than how all the marine species fared at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) last month, where each and every proposed aquatic species was denied protection. This was a Japanese orchestrated "victory," and the same bullying, vote swapping and "influencing" that Japan deployed at CITES to prevent marine protection is also entrenched to dictate the fate of the whales at the IWC.

The IWC proposal would actually reward the whaling abuses of Japan, Norway, and Iceland. This "compromise" deal allows whaling countries to continue killing for at least the next 10 years, with an unachievable requirement for reduced kill quotas. It offers no true enforcement, it can't hold the whalers to any promises, and it obviously undoes all conservation measures made since the 1986 declaration of a whaling moratorium. Furthermore, it would legitimize Japan's slaughter in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary and promote a Japanese generated ploy wherein "Indigenous" whaling would apply to Japan's coastal whalers, allowing more killing of whales in the North Pacific.

Japan has unfailingly undermined every marine regulatory convention that may affect its ability to plunder the world's oceans -- systematically rolling back years of international conventions and marine protections. Removing the moratorium on commercial whaling would also remove the most recognizable boundary to Japan's hubris and greed, and would assist in the unrestrained taking of the less "cuddly" species such as the highly lucrative tunas and other fish species.

Japan wants a resumption of commercial whaling to divert the focus away from its unsustainable pillage of the seas. Whales are highly sentient beings, and, despite what Japan projects, they aren't universally perceived as a "product." From elaborate scientific study to casual observation, they've proven to be extremely social, communicative, highly intelligent, and able to feel intense emotion and pain. Japan realizes that if the killing of such iconic species is sanctioned, the remainder of what's left of aquatic life will be theirs for the taking.

A recent document by Professor Shohei Yonemoto, titled "Useless Research Whaling Should Be Abolished," gives his pragmatic perspective on Japan's ambitions of dominance of the dwindling life in the oceans. He speaks of trading off "research" whaling only to go unhampered in the whaling closer to Japan. In the last two paragraphs, Dr. Yonemoto reveals Japan's ultimate objective in relentlessly exploiting the more valuable tunas, sharks and other fish:

"It is said that eating whales is Japan's traditional culture. But this is a myth that was started through a PR company during the mid-1970s. Actually, whale meat does not sell well and there is surplus stock. If Japan proposes to the IWC to allow it to engage in coastal whaling in exchange for giving up research whaling, I expect the long-standing opposition to be immediately settled.

Currently, there is a growing trend for strengthening control over marine resources such as tuna on a global scale. Also in order not to raise questions over Japan's scientific data in international forums to discuss regulations on fishing of tuna and other fish, Japan should abolish research whaling as a government project."

Japan now has a formidable ally in its quest to lift the ban on commercial whaling: President Barack Obama. In the March intersessional IWC meeting, the Obama Administration was the chief proponent in advancing the plan to resume commercial whaling and is currently urging other nations to follow. This is clearly based on geopolitical maneuvering and Japan's leverage with our debt obligation; devoid of scientific or ethical consideration.

The U.S. position is a drastic departure from then-Senator Obama's campaign promise made on March 16, 2008, when he stated: "As president, I will ensure that the U.S. provides leadership in enforcing international wildlife protection agreements, including strengthening the international moratorium on commercial whaling. Allowing Japan to continue commercial whaling is unacceptable."

As the current proposal is written, pro-whaling countries will directly benefit with a return to what was described by the president as "unacceptable" commercial whaling. Nearly 25 years of conservation efforts may be swept aside if former staunch allies of the whales, the U.S. and other nations following our lead, capitulate to Japan as they have indicated.

The president's unfulfilled pledge to "ensure that the US provides leadership in enforcing international wildlife protection agreements" could be achieved by compelling Japan to honor all the agreements it has broken with impunity. Japan has violated the Law of the Sea Convention, the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling, the Convention on the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources, the Convention on Biological Diversity, and the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES).

If the president truly wanted to see these agreements upheld, he could seek redress from the rogue whaling nations by using the sanctioning powers available under the Pelly Amendment against Japan, Norway, and Iceland until they stop whaling completely.

The president should be urged to be true to his word and protect the whales -- and not to insure their demise. Over 75% of Americans oppose the barbaric practice of whaling, and the U.S. government should mirror their demands. In order to fulfill his promise of "strengthening the international moratorium on commercial whaling," President Obama should be lending his full support towards the rapid passage of the International Whale Conservation and Protection Act of 2010, sponsored by Senator John Kerry.

Of critical importance: there's absolutely no method to kill a whale "humanely." An explosive harpoon is shot into them, they're then electrocuted through an attached cable, repeatedly shot by high caliber rifles, and drowned by being dragged through the water. Even with this torture, which wouldn't be tolerated in the most hellish slaughterhouse, it's not unusual for a whale to take over an hour to finally die. With a fiendish abuse of language, this atrocity has been labeled by pro-whaling states as "harvest" or "culling," and any dissent is dismissed as "emotional."

It's high time to make all whale species off-limits to slaughter and to acknowledge them as unique beings that are fully deserving of inherent rights. It's now been empirically shown that the cetaceans (whales and dolphins) possess such a high order of sentience that they can't rationally be designated as some "product" to be butchered, bartered, or compromised.

If mankind is going to continue in benefiting from the gifts that the ocean offers, we must recognize that no nation or cartel of nations should be allowed to dominate the seas and deplete its bounty at the expense of the future. Experience and knowledge are there to reveal the boundaries of not only sustainability, but of sentience and sanity as well. We must now realize that this threshold has been breached by Japan with its continuing assault upon the world's whales and its accompanying lust to eliminate what's left of the oceans. This must be stopped, not revived.

It's Time to Connect the (Oily) Dots

2010-04-29T06:18:00.000-07:00

A huge oil rig off Loisiana explodes and sinks causing a gigantic (and growing) oil leak. Wasn't it just a month ago that Obama talked about opening up more locations for off shore drilling (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/31/science/earth/31energy.html)? This went in direct opposition of what he said in 2008: "When I’m president, I intend to keep in place the moratorium here in Florida and around the country that prevents oil companies from drilling off Florida’s coasts. That’s how we can protect our coastline and still make the investments that will reduce our dependence on foreign oil and bring down gas prices for good.”

Well, any sort of illusion that the Obama administration in conjunction with big oil (because let's face it, everyone KNOWS by now that big oil has their fingers deep into the governmental body of America) wanted to pull over Americans' eyes isn't going to be very easy now. Offshore drilling is not only barely regulated, unsafe for workers, and contributing to global warming, it is also HORRIBLY UNSAFE for the environment as a whole.

So, let's connect the dots and see the disastrous effects of off shore drilling once and for all…

Here are some pictures to illustrate the outcomes of an industry not regulated nearly enough…

In this aerial photo (above) taken in the Gulf of Mexico off Louisiana's tip, oil is seen near the site last week's collapse and spill of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig Wednesday, April 28, 2010. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

One thing that mainstream media is doing is saying that this could result in a "possible environmental disaster" if the oil reaches shore. They fail to realize that the ocean is itself an ecosystem and that all of this oil is killing living creatures RIGHT NOW. They should be saying that the oil leak could cause "possible economic disaster"; these are two different and sometimes linked issues. A large portion of the ocean environment is going to be destroyed regardless of what happens in the coming days. Whether or not 'viable fishing industries' will be hurt is yet to be determined.

So make your voice heard. Talk about this issue and let's DEMAND that offshore drilling no longer happens and that opening NEW SITES for it is NOT the answer. Obama has shown Americans that he cannot be trusted at his word on the oil issue and it is incredibly obvious where his interests lie (with oil giants) and where they don't (with the environment and people of the world).

Be the Green Fire

2010-04-25T19:45:00.000-07:00

Alliances have changed the course of history, they have both won and lost battles of the political and the personal. Alliances are key to every victory, and this is no different when it comes to the battle to save the planet. The environment is being destroyed by the current way the planet is run and the people who run it. Saving the ecosystems of this planet can only be done if the current system of power falls. As long as nature is seen in terms of profit and resources it can never be preserved. The capitalist pocketbook is too intricately tied to the system that controls all things, nature included.

So, what am I saying? A radical environmentalist, often referring to herself in the anti-civilization group talking about alliances? I speak of other radicals, with minds much the same as those who cherish the environment. People who care not only for the social aspects of things (workers’ rights, LGBT rights, women’s rights etc.) but also for the natural world. Their causes are causes that most, if not all, environmentalists I have met agree with. Our cause is one that most, if not all of this group I have ever met, agree with as well. The end goal for the environmentalist? A sustainable way of living upon this planet that preserves as much life as possible in both the human and non-human fronts. The end goal of the other group of which I speak is a way of life that could, and should result in attaining the goal of the environmentalists as well. The goals are intricately intertwined and thus, so should our movements be.

What is this other movement I speak of? Socialism. Two months ago I knew what socialism was, but not in an active way. I didn't know much about the modern socialist movement or what their views relating to a modern world were. My beliefs and actions crossed paths with socialists, their movements, and members on occasion but for whatever reason I never delved into a conversation with someone who considered themselves a socialist. That all changed a month or so ago when I bumped into an old friend that through conversation has opened my eyes to not only socialism as a modern practice and future goal for government but has forced me to look at my environmental beliefs through a new lens. On Earth Day I went to a panel hosted by ISO (International Socialist Organization) on the college campus in the city where I live.

That panel resulted in me realizing that the goals of the environmental and socialist movements are quite similar in practice. Numbers are a problem for both movements and the more people involved in either helps the cause. Below I give you excerpts from both socialist-leaning literature and environmental literature. These excerpts help to not only inspire action but also to show the similarities between movements. They help to alleviate the fear that I held (and feel many environmentalists hold) about the lack of ecological focus in the Socialist movement.

First are three excerpts from books that lean toward the Socialist Perspective:

Excerpt from: The Enemy of Nature, The End of Capitalism or The End of the World? By Joel Kovel:

“Ecological thinking concerns relationships, and the structures and flows between them. At one level, this is mere common sense; at another, it turns the world upside down and commits us to a world-view and philosophy of nature very much at odds with the dominant system. Nature as such vastly exceeds the phenomena of life, yet life may be justly regarded as being at the same time both a special case of nature, and, in a way we only dimly perceive, as a potential of nature—something that nature generates under specific circumstances. Life is unitary, in the sense that the basic molecular architectures of humans, redwoods and slime moulds all indicate a common ancestor. Yet life is also inconceivably—to our dim awareness—multiform, in a profusion that has arisen over 3.5 billion years through ceaseless interactions between living creatures, and with their non-living surround. It follows that all ecosystems that contain living beings also relate to the rest of nature, whether this be other creatures, the immediate surround of molecular, atomic or sub-atomic realms, or the extension of nature into the cosmos.” (91)

Here, an excerpt from John Bellamy Foster’s The Ecological Revolution: “It is a sign of the growing influence of environmental issues that in recent years numerous thinkers, from Plato to Gandhi, have had their work reevaluated in relation to ecological analysis. Yet, it is in relation to Marx’s work that the largest and most controversial body of literature can be found, far overshadowing the debate over all other thinkers. This literature (insofar as it takes environmental issues seriously) has fallen into four camps: (1) those who contend that Marx’s thought was anti-ecological from beginning to end and indistinguishable from Soviet practice; (2) those who claim that Marx provided illuminating insights into ecology but ultimately succumbed to “Prometheanism” (pro-technological, anti-ecological views)—a corollary being that he believed that environmental problems should be eliminated as a result of the “abundance” that would characterize postcapitalist society; (3) those who argue that Marx provided an analysis of ecological degradation within agriculture, which remained, however, segregated off from his core social analysis; and (4) those who insist that Marx developed a systematic approach to nature and to environmental degradation (particularly in relation to the fertility of the soil) that was intricately bound to the rest of his thought and raised the question of ecological sustainability.” (167)

Another excerpt from Foster’s book: “The goal of ecological revolution, as I shall present it here, has as its initial premise that we are in the midst of a global environmental crisis of such enormity that the web of life of the entire planet is threatened and with it the future of civilization. This is no longer a very controversial proposition. To be sure, there are different perceptions about the extent of the challenge that this raises. At one extreme, there are those who believe that since these are human problems arising from human causes they are easily solvable. All we need is ingenuity and the will to act. At the other extreme, there are those who believe that the world ecology is deteriorating on a scale and with a rapidity beyond our means to control, giving rise to the gloomiest of forebodings. Although often seen as polar opposites, these views nonetheless share a common basis. As Paul Sweezy observed, they each reflect ‘the belief that if present trends continue to operate, it is only a matter of time until the human species irredeemably fouls its own nest.’” (253)

As you can see from the above examples not only is the environment something that is thought of quite extensively by those that are a part of the socialist movement (and people that are against capitalism in general), but the end views are really not that different from those who consider themselves environmentalists. See the excerpts below for environmentalist perspectives.

An excerpt from Derrick Jensen and George Draffan’s book Strangely Like War: “Nineteen ninety-five was the year I finally understood how the U.S. political system works, and at the same time realized how irredeemable are that system and the culture at large. That was also the year many indigenous friends said to me, ‘What took you so long to figure that out?’ They’d had plenty of experience opposing this system—five hundred and some years of resistance to this culture and its environmental and cultural degradation—and had long since apprehended the truth in Red Cloud’s words: ‘They made us many promises, more than I can remember. But they never kept but one. They promised to take our land and they took it.’…But as is always the case when attempting to stop our culture from destroying some part of wild nature, all losses are permanent, and all factories temporary. Winning a timber-sale appeal doesn’t mean stopping a timber sale. It doesn’t mean protecting a piece of ground. It means protecting a piece of ground for the year or two it takes the Forest Service to write up another EA, this time trying harder to bamboozle us. The score today is less than 5 percent of the ancient forest in the United States remains.”

Here is part of an interview between Derrick Jensen and Dave Foreman (“For more than twenty years Dave Foreman has been at the forefront of the conservation movement, working where political activism intersects with ecological philosophy. In the 1970s, believing that the best way to preserve wilderness was to work within the system, he became the Southwest regional representative of The Wilderness Society. In 1980, disillusioned by the inability of mainstream conservation organizations to halt the destructive forces within our culture, he confounded Earth First! The goal of Earth First! Was to help develop a biocentric worldview and to translate that philosophy into action by fighting with uncompromising passion for the earth”) that appears in the book Listening to the Land By: Derrick Jensen. “Derrick Jensen: What will it take for us to survive? Dave Foreman: Courage. In my speeches I talk about what Aldo Leopold called green fire. When Aldo Leopold was young he used to shoot any Wolf he saw, and years later, in A Sand County Almanac, he wrote how the death of one of those Wolves changed his life. He said, ‘We reached the old wolf in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in her eyes. I realized then, and have known ever since, that there was something new to me in those eyes—something known only to her and to the mountain. I was young then, and full of trigger-itch; I thought that because fewer wolves meant more deer, that no wolves would mean hunters’ paradise. But after seeing that green fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the mountain agreed with such a view.’ We need that green fire in our eyes. Somehow we’ve got to remember how to think like a mountain, and somehow to speak for the Wolf. Each of us is an animal, and a child of this earth. Each of us has responsibility to all other animals and plants and to the process of evolution that created us. All of us alive now are members of the most important generation of human beings who have ever lived, because we’re determining the future, not just for a hundred years, but for a billion years. When we cut a huge limb off the tree of natural diversity, we’re forever halting the evolutionary potential of that branch of life. That’s what it fundamentally comes down to. Nobody has ever lived who is more important.”

So, what’s my point? Don’t write off people because they don’t identify themselves in the same ‘ism’ as you do. Socialism, anarchism, environmentalism…the list goes on and on. Many of these movements have similar goals that include bringing down the destructive and dominant system that is killing personal integrity, freedom, the environment, and many other things. Where would the harm be in aligning ourselves with groups that have similar goals and an overall care for life (be it human animals, plants, or other life forms)? Agreeing on every topic is hardly the point. Hasn’t conserving the environment always been the goal? I’ve heard so many environmentalists say “by whatever means necessary”. Well, here is a means. Here, in the socialists is a group of caring individuals with goals that intertwine in many instances with those of the environmental movement. Why not join ranks, work together, share knowledge and ideas…and bring this fucked up system down once and for all?

Let’s find the green fire that Aldo Leopold spoke of. Let’s be the fire. Revolution is near; the line in the sand is drawn. Capitalism, destructors of the environment, and violators of all things natural and good on one side, we on the other. Let’s grasp hands with our brothers and sisters and fight together.

My Second Up North Adventure, Day 3 of 3

2010-04-14T20:57:00.000-07:00

I’ve only been here two and a half days but it feels like I’ve already lost myself—no, that phrasing is almost entirely wrong—perhaps I have already FOUND myself again. Me—the person who laughs as the quirky chipmunk outside cleans off his tail after stepping through some unsightly matter or another—me—that strains my ears for the haunting call of the loon. Me, who sprints from the house with my binoculars as dusk sets in hard because I see water birds of some sort far out on the bay. Me that spends hours staring intently at deer tracks wondering how old they are…me that is disgusted with myself for loving this place, this land, so much—yet only spending (at most) three weeks a year here. I feel like my soul knows this place but my mind does not—and I’m disgusted with that fact.

I have to leave today in order to be at my childhood home tomorrow for Easter—a holiday I don’t believe in but a family that I do. A family that doesn’t question me when I head to this house up north alone…a family that may silently worry about my perpetual loner status but does not say a word (well, they don’t say MANY words. There are of course the occasional hookup attempts by my mother and the mentions of future nieces and nephews by my father). They put up with me, and sure they only selectively listen when I go on spiels about the environment, but at least they listen at all.

I hate the city for all of the obvious reasons and love this place for all of the obvious reasons as well, but there’s more to it than that (as is always the case with love and hate). I have many great friends in the city, but none of them truly grasp my beliefs (and, well, the facts) about the environment and civilization. SOME will humor me and half listen as I explain my passions, but most won’t even do that.

Here in the woods with no human companionship I find many who agree and understand. Here, be it the chipmunk , the merganser, the birch or the eagle, they all not only understand, but agree. Here the wind wraps me in hugs of understanding. Here my muse is not smothered beneath concrete and light pollution.

I don’t want to go “home” when I know deep down that I am actually leaving it.

I took all of the pictures in this post and added frames using Adobe InDesign.

My Second Up North Adventure, Day 2 of 3

2010-04-09T18:09:00.000-07:00

Second day…morning.

You’d think that small rodents in the forest (squirrels, chipmonks, etc.) would be stealthy to avoid predation, but perhaps in these times they lack predation. (Not perhaps, I guess, they DO lack predation). I can hear them jumping around in last fall’s dried leaves from quite a distance.

People always muse “why didn’t you just stay there?” when talking to a friend about a vacation they took to one paradise or another—I’ve wondered that myself—even planned (preliminarily) to move to some of those places. Well, today I got to thinking—I’m IN one of those places now—Northern Wisconsin, land of more than ten thousand lakes (take THAT Minnesota).

Why is it that people are obviously aware that the places they live in are not “paradises” but instead of trying to make them back into the beautiful places they once were they travel to other places, not yet entirely destroyed?

-----

Sound travels like magic on a northern lake. I hear a common merganser (not common at all on this lake) calling—in a lonely way from a point I can barely make out with binoculars. Perhaps he or she landed on the wrong lake, and cannot find the mate they assumed would be waiting. Perhaps it’s the right lake and they were separated and the other will not make it this year, or ever again.

This is definitely not a bad way to spend a morning—I am sitting a foot away from the lake watching wood ducks and what has now become a pair of common mergansers (no more lonely calls!) I have a water bottle, binoculars, notebook, camera, and two books (Rewild or Die By: Urban Scout and Behind the Dolphin Smile By: Richard O’Barry). The sun is shining warm on me in a tshirt in Northern Wisconsin on April 2^nd. Global warming, a myth you say?

All of the images are pictures I took myself and then added frames to using InDesign:)

My Second (and short) Up North Adventure, Day 1 of 3

2010-04-06T17:28:00.000-07:00

Thursday Afternoon—I arrive in Northern Wisconsin

There’s something magical about the north woods

In early spring.

The snow has wandered slowly away

But the buds on the trees still lack the courage

To make an appearance.

Wind blows through bare birch limbs mimicking

The sound of traffic.

Or, perhaps, reminding all that

Will listen about the evils cars bring.

The birds are back, singing

To one another tales of migration’s perils.

Night:

I am in Northern Wisconsin tonight (a girl can only take so much city). The amount of wildlife (namely birds) here right now is insane. I typically don’t see this many birds in a week—and I’ve seen them in a day. My hypothesis is that this is as far north as the migrating populations have gotten so far. I am no expert at recognizing birds (but I do take an interest and have a bird book next to me right now) and I’m even worse at identifying bird song—but here are the birds I have RECOGNIZED thus far. There are far more than on this list, I have been hearing bird song today like nothing I have ever heard before—

Hooded merganser
Common merganser
Mallard
Wood Duck
Robin
Blue Jay
Crow
Vulture
Mourning Dove

I so wish that I was better with bird song, that’s something I’ll have to find a way to work on when I get back home. I have heard no loons yet, but they were in Madison WI last week,and the mergansers are here—so I assume they will be back soon.

There are all sorts of impossibly small birds flitting about—smaller than sparrows. I wonder what they are called.

I was actually just standing on the deck a few minutes ago with the bird book trying to figure out what was what when a wood duck almost flew right into me. I think we were both just as startled when we realized the close call.

This gets me wondering if this is how things used to be—did birds used to be this plentiful here year round? Are the constant bird songs I’m hearing the conversations between lasts of some species? Now I wish I had brought bird seed along to help them on their journeys.

It’s now time for coffee, a post-run shower and poetry memorization for the poetry slam on April 17 I am competing in! I am so happy for this vacation, even if it is short.

Oh! Before I go, did I mention I saw a BUTTERFLY while I was running today?!

Response from Sea World

2010-03-31T05:18:00.001-07:00

I am sure many of you remember my post on Sea World and their enslavement of animals back in February: http://artificialproductivity.blogspot.com/2010/02/long-past-time-to-free-every-willy-open.html

Well, I sent a copy of it to Sea World. I finally got a response:
Dear Amelie Lillith,
You state your position in blunt terms, so I will not insult you by trying to change your mind. I’ll simply note that the following are irrefutable facts that demonstrate our commitment to animals. SeaWorld has been caring for marine animals for 46 years. Our husbandry, veterinary and training standards are the highest in the world. There is no organization in the world today more committed to the animals in its care than SeaWorld. Nearly 13 million people each year visit a SeaWorld park and every one of those visits includes educational experiences intended to inspire a deeper respect for the natural world we share and the desire to conserve and protect all animals. Our commitment to animals goes far beyond our parks. In addition to direct support of hundreds of environmental, research and conservation groups, we provide millions of dollars in cash, materiel support and human resources to the SeaWorld and Busch Gardens Conservation Fund, a registered non-profit conservation foundation. No organization in the world today rescues, rehabilitates and returns to the wild more marine animals than SeaWorld. This year alone, more than 1,000 mammals, birds, fish and reptiles have been treated by our animal rescue teams and most have already been returned to the wild.

Thank you, again, for your note.

Respectfully,

Rusty Harman
Senior Director
Customer Relations
SeaWorld Parks & Entertainment

Okay, well let's take a look at Mr. Rusty Harman's work history to see if MAYBE he's POTENTIALLY a little slanted by his paychecks for the last 21 years....

Care of LinkedIn:

Rusty Harman’s Experience

Sr. Director

Busch Entertainment Corporation

(Hospitality industry)

Currently holds this position
Sr.Director

Sea World of Florida

(Public Company; Hospitality industry)

2002 — Present (8 years )
Marketing for BEC

Anheuser-Busch

(Public Company; Hospitality industry)

1989 — Present (21 years )
Strategic Marketing Director

SeaWorld Orlando

(Hospitality industry)

2003 — 2007 (4 years )
VP Marketing

SeaWorld Cleveland

(Hospitality industry)

2000 — 2002 (2 years )
VP Marketing

SeaWorld Texas

(Hospitality industry)

2000 — 2002 (2 years )

Microwaves: Not Intended as Flotation Devices

2010-03-29T05:16:00.000-07:00

I seem to keep having the same conversation with people. It goes something like this:

I complain about work.

They complain about work.

I say that western civilization is evil.

They ignore me and say "I wish there was some other way to survive".

I tell them that people used to live in a way where they could survive without paying rent, going to the grocery store, and working a wage-slave job.

They look at me for a second and then say "you are saying you want to live like a Native American?"

I say: "essentially yes"

They look aghast and say something like: "You would give up all of the modern conveniences just to avoid a 40 hour a week job?"

I nod, and say "To avoid the job, yes, and because it might actually save life on the planet if we all did it."

This is when they look worried, about me. They start rambling on and on about modern conveniences, microwaves, air conditioning, etc. etc.

I tend to walk away at that point.

People need to stop holding onto their microwaves as if they were flotation devices. It is amazing to me how worried people get when I mention getting rid of aspects of the typical American lifestyle that are neither necessary nor healthy to use. I have linked a few friends to my other blog, The Plastics Project, to show them how I am working to eliminate plastics from my daily life. When they ask why on earth I would do such a thing I mention the environmental impact as well as the horrible (and often cancerous) effects plastics can have on humans (I mention humans separately from the environment because typically the person I am talking to considers things this way). I have only had one friend that actually wants to know more about the horrible things plastics do. The rest of them told me not to tell them, that "everything causes cancer".

Okay, let's tackle that one for a minute. "Everything causes cancer".

Well--No. Obviously everything does not cause cancer. The fact that this statement has become cliché in Western Society should be a clue as to what the society breeds--acceptance of avoidable diseases. Everything does not cause cancer, outputs of CIVILIZATION cause cancer. Let me repeat that a different way: CIVILIZATION CAUSES CANCER. While living in civilization having a river-side home could result in leukemia, lymphoma, and any number of other horrible health problems. Civilization has made the simple act of eating a piece of fruit risky. "Be sure to wash your fruit with soap and water in order to get the pesticides and waxes off". Umm, why does no one worry about these things? Plants aren't waterproof, external additives (pesticides, etc) leech into them…and we think soap and water will solve the problem?

Everything does not cause cancer. EVERYDAY ITEMS IN WESTERN SOCIETY CAUSE CANCER. Plastic wrap anyone? These cancer causing items are so normalized in our society that it seems that everything causes cancer. Somehow I think there are many things around (or used to be) that didn't cause cancer. Examples?

Well things western society has made disposable (or made profits from) work as good examples:

-I'm sure coral reefs never caused cancer before they had to start trying to survive in a polluted ocean.

-Mercury poisoning from fish never used to be an issue before western civilization took hold.

-Did you know that the chances of miscarriage go up by a large percentage when a woman watches 15 hours or more of television a week? I'm pretty sure that that wasn't the case if she were to watch a camp fire each night, or her community members as they broke into song and dance.

-WATER BOTTLES…everyone was horrified when the neon colored Nalgenes turned out to have BPA in them. I'm pretty sure animal hide canteens didn't have the same effects; gourds were probably pretty safe too.

I recently read a report that said not to be in the same ROOM as a microwave oven while it is running. Why do we fill our homes with such dangers? So many people do not want to hear it when I tell them these things. Why wouldn't you want to know of a danger so close to home? Is happiness so closely tied to Easy Mac that you are willing to risk cancer for it? …Apparently it is.

Everything doesn't cause cancer. However, soon enough if civilization keeps going the way it has been, everything THAT IS LEFT will.

Let go of the flotation devices this society tells you that you need and watch the cancer rates plummet.

Songs of Escape, of Soul, and Truth

2010-03-17T10:04:00.000-07:00

Have you ever had a song or a grouping of songs that you can't listen to too much? Not because they are bad songs, or "just good to dance to" songs. No, a group of songs or a song you can't listen to too much because if you did you might just drop everything that society tells you "matters" and seek out something that really does. A song or songs that speak so directly to your soul that you are afraid it will burst forth and demand that you stop ignoring it. A song you can't listen to too often or you will quit your job, abandon your lease and drive off, only ever to be heard of in passing comments at roadside cafes and wavering memories of those who meet too many and know too few. Have you ever heard a song like that? I have several, and I've put links so you can listen to them below. Enjoy, and if you do run off...let me know first...perhaps I'll come along.

Both songs are from the Into the Wild soundtrack.

Jack Hanna Needs a Smaller Cage

2010-03-08T12:20:00.000-08:00

I am sick and tired of Jack Hanna's PR laden attempt to justify the enslavement of animals at zoos and, most recently, at Sea World. If he reaches for the numbers of visitors to Sea World per year one more time in his misguided attempt to justify the caged animals existing there I might just scream. I may not know Jack, but neither does he.

Justifying the existence of anything based upon the fact that people visit it is flawed at its very core. People went to see gladiators fight lions and tigers in ancient Rome, but it wasn't right. Huge crowds gathered (and still gather in some places) to watch public hangings. Does that make it right? I don't think so. Jack has also taken to mentioning that people, upon exiting Sea World, say they feel educated about marine life. Of course this survey was most likely performed by Sea World, and I wouldn't doubt if the questions weren't a bit leading. Also, even if people WERE educated about marine life in captivity, that still does not prove that captivity is right.

Someone could but Jack Hanna in a cage and sell tickets to see him. People would likely learn a lot about Public Relations and the Zoo industry by going to visit him. Would that make it right to lock him up? No. Would people be claiming that it was justified to enslave Jack Hanna because he can now be a spokesman for zoology? I doubt it.

I challenge Jack Hanna to come up with a compelling reason to keep animals in captivity that actually makes sense. I challenge him to get some actual scientific data to back his theory of captive animals being more educational than those in the wild (I do not mean attendance records for the theme parks with him on their pay roll either). I challenge him to go and try to preserve the natural homes of the animals he is so happy to enslave. Perhaps spend some time seeing them in the wild and not behind bars. Perhaps he should spend less time on talk shows with enslaved animals and more time in their natural habitats stopping poachers and others encroaching on natural habitats.

Using the fact that most people might not be able to afford to see these animals in the wild is not going to fly with me either. I may never be able to afford to travel to Australia, but that does not mean putting someone from Australia in a cage so I can learn from them is permissible. I can pick up a book, or watch a documentary to learn.

Interview with Jack Hanna:

Excerpt:

Hanna: Why do we have Tilly and why do we have whales as well as elephants, other animals in our zoological parts. We have it to educate folks, it's the last chance we have to save these animals…"

Newscaster: Are you doing something unnatural and is it worth the risk?

Hanna "Let's say 20-30 years from now, there's 200 killer whales left in the wild. Let me tell ya where we're going to go. We're going to go to Sea World to see what we're going to do to save this magnificent creature."

Newscaster: But at what point does a whale get too big to be in captivity?

Hanna: I don't know. Some people say they know what the whale is thinking. That's impossible. I don't know what the whale is thinking, I don't know what stress is to the whale. All I know is that we, that Sea World provides the best possible care. I've been going to those parks for 30 something years. I've always seen nothing but animals that seem to be very very happy.

I find it quite funny that he accidentally said "we" when referring to Sea World…

Also, perhaps people should spend some more time learning about their own land and the animals upon it. Perhaps people in the Midwestern United States need to start caring about the whooping cranes they SHOULD see out their back doors but no longer do. Perhaps those on the west coast of America need to start campaigning to save the salmon that no longer swim up streams. Those in Florida need to start campaigning for the preservation of the everglade ecosystem. Are there orcas living naturally in everyone's backyard? No. Does that mean some should be put them in cages? No. There are amazing animals all over the world that live in the wild that need people's help. Covering a giant expanse of land with concrete and dropping whales into swimming pools doesn't solve anything.

Bob Barker meets Jack Hanna on the Issue:

Excerpt:

Hanna: Over 12million people visited Sea World parks last year, and over 90% of those folks say that it's the most incredible experience of their lives…If it wasn't for Sea World, animals like the manatee in Florida might not be in existence right now…180million people last year went to our zoos and aquariums. 180million people. Ingrid has about 2 million members, we have tens of millions of members. The education that we do for folks in the Sea World parks is something that has to be done. As you well know in the wild, what's happening in the wild right now, the creatures out there are suffering from pollution, because of all man made things that we have done…Bob keeps referring to these as tanks, these are artificial habitats. By the way, the whale, has already bred at Sea World and produced many needed killer whales in our parks…

Larry King: but how about that point that that whale killed before, why keep him in the tank.

Hanna: Larry, it has killed before. Larry, didn't our astronauts go up in a space shuttle and we lost them when they came back. It was a terrible thing wasn’t it? They went right back up into space didn't they? Because they want to learn from space want to learn how to help mankind. That's what Sea World does and what we all do. Our business Larry, it's killer whales, these are dangerous animals yes we know that…

Sea World is a business, plain and simple. It is created to make money. If conservation or education were the true goals of the company there wouldn't be choreographed shows to ENTERTAIN. There also would not be a roller coaster in the park. The park would not keep animals that rely on sonar to navigate in concrete pools. They would not chlorinate those pools. Sea World is a business that uses conservation and education as a fall back to justify their bottom line.

Long Past Time to Free Every Willy, an open letter to Sea World

2010-02-26T05:34:00.000-08:00

I write on behalf of every animal you keep in a cage, a pool, or any sort of an enclosure. I write on behalf of the ones that have died, are still alive, and with a force thousands strong for those that have not yet been captured. This letter is for every soul of every animal that was extinguished, coated over, and destroyed by your theme parks. It is also for every animal currently walking or swimming in circles, wondering why they cannot hear or see their families anymore. This letter is for them, but it is from me.

Who am I to write such a letter and declaration to you? I am your ideal customer. I, like the trainer who died at your Orlando park on Wednesday, February 24, used to dream of being a whale trainer at one of your parks. My eyes lit up with wonder when I first saw a killer whale up close, and I wanted to know these creatures, love them, learn from them. For many years I planned to be a marine biologist, but with each of those passing years and studies I realized I could not with a good conscience be a whale trainer.

I learned, for instance, of the complicated family and migration rituals of the killer whale. I heard the songs of a family communicating. I watched documentary after documentary and read study after study about the beautiful black and white creatures. I saw them leap into the air with glee, play with each other, teach their young, love. I saw it all in these wild animals.

Then I returned to Sea World with my family. Instead of beauty surrounding the animals I saw there, I witnessed chains. No, not literal chains, but when you surround an animal with dry land that needs water to survive, you strap them into a small cell as a result. I looked into the eyes of one of your Orcas on your viewing deck, and I saw nothing there but pain, and loss. Could that same whale have been the one that killed the trainer at the same park? Possibly. Whether or not it was, however, is not what matters here. What matters here is the overwhelming sadness present in a place like Sea World.

The entire park is based upon the exploitation of wild animals for human amusement. The animals do not live long happy lives in captivity as is so cleverly marketed to the general public. They become lonely, and often die. They miss their families, their friends, and their homes. Even the children they give birth to in the pools and cages rarely survive.

Whales are amazing creatures. They have highly complicated family groups with communication and cooperation humans are just beginning to understand. When one whale (or dolphin) is removed from their family it is in essence kidnapping. Each whale and dolphin is an individual in their respective family, not just another random living creature. The whales and dolphins recognize each other and thus react differently depending which individual it is. This is not unlike humans. From this thriving community of cooperation and love whales and dolphins are ripped away and placed in small tanks (and any tank is small compared to the ocean) and made to perform for a live audience of humans.

Is it tragic that trainer Dawn Brancheau had to lose her life? Of course it is. It must be remembered, however, that the whales she so loved were trapped against their will and forced to perform for people they did not know. These whales (and dolphins) have many among them that probably still remember life in the wild, with no pavement pools or screaming humans. Many still remember the glimmer on the surface of the water at sunrise and sunset. Many still remember the feeling of freedom beneath their fins.

Sea World takes away the freedom of many of the most intelligent and majestic of all living creatures. Not only do they take away this freedom, but they do it to turn a profit. This is unacceptable, cruel, and wrong.

The public relations specialists for Sea World will probably start promoting all of the "good" the company has done and will do in the coming weeks. They will show the public pictures of their veterinarians going to help wild animals affected by pollution, illness, oil spills. Sea World will do all of this while openly ignoring the fact that they are enslaving animals with their very existence.

What do I propose Sea World should do? They should get their animals ready to live in the wild again. Teach them to fish for themselves, yet again. Do all that is possible to prepare them and then set them free. Will all of them survive? No. Will some? Most definitely. The fact that some will die is one that will happen if they are left in their pools that are chains as well. Sea World also needs to stop paying for animals captured from the wild. They need to halt all activities that hold animals against their will and exploit their natural abilities for profit. Sea World needs to close its gates for good or reinvent for itself an image not based on animal exploitation.

I hope that trainer Dawn Brancheau rests in peace and that the whale Tilikum along with all of the similarly enslaved animals at Sea World will one day see the sunrise and set on the ocean again. I demand that they be set loose to the wild to yet again choose their own fates, and never again perform for a screaming audience for nothing but profit.

UPDATE: I was contacted from James Brown from the BBC Radio show World Have Your Say. They are running a live show this afternoon at 12pm Central Daylight Time (1800gmt) and they might call me to discuss this issue. Please listen in! Here's the link: http://worldhaveyoursay.wordpress.com/2010/02/26/should-animals-be-kept-for-our-entertainment/

Off Target

2010-02-24T07:06:00.000-08:00

I'm going to come right out and say it: Just because you shop at Target doesn't mean you aren't to blame for anything.

I am so sick and tired of people feeling all high and mighty because they spite Wal-Mart's sweat shop items and buy instead the sweat shop items sold at Target. I understand that Target is better to their employees (the employees we see at the stores at least), but does that really mean much? They still sell goods from all over the world to the all consuming hands of westerners. Target is guilty too, and I hate that people think they are not.

Why do people so blindly believe that Target is a better alternative? I think that some people just dislike Wal-Mart, so any alternative is nice. I think that for a lot of others, however, it comes down to some brilliant marketing ploys by Target over the years. Their ads appeal to a young and hip audience, who then feel young and hip shopping at the store. They throw in a couple green washing tactics here and there, and end up with a dedicated consumer base.

Here are some examples of Target commercials and Ads:

2006:

2007:

2008:

2009:

2010:

Greenwashing:

Article Illustrating the fact that Target isn't as "green" as they pretend to be:

http://ohsonline.com/articles/2007/07/company-fined-120000-for-horrible-spooky-effects-on-health-environment.aspx

Excerpt: Target Corp. will pay a civil penalty of $120,000 for distributing and selling Horrible Spooky String, a children's product that is harmful to the environment. EPA had previously ordered five national retail chains to pull cans of illegally imported confetti string products from their shelves. The products contain banned hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs) which deplete the earth's protective stratospheric ozone layer and increase the risk of skin cancer.

Poetry

2010-02-17T07:34:00.001-08:00

I have been writing a lot of poetry lately that is meant to be read aloud. So, in place of posting poetry here in written form I've uploaded myself reading them.

They can be found here: http://www.soundclick.com/amelielillith

I hope you enjoy them.

-Amelie

Pandora is Right Here

2010-02-11T05:54:00.000-08:00

For those of you who have seen the film Avatar, perhaps you are wishing you lived in such a beautiful place. Some people are even experiencing what is being dubbed "Avatar Depression" because they don't have a place like Pandora. Well, I have news for you. Our planet is beautiful, and believe it or not, in need of defense just as Pandora was in the movie. Don't believe me? How about these pictures and facts to convince you.

Have you ever seen the northern lights? They are truly a sight to behold (but one hard to spot when drowned out by city lights).

Did you feel sorrow when home tree fell in Avatar? What about the giant redwoods and hemlocks that are falling today? Or the trees of the rainforests of earth?

The Sky People have sent us a message... That they can take whatever they want. That no one can stop them. Well we will send them a message. You ride out as fast as the wind can carry you... You tell the other clans to come. Tell them Toruk Makto calls to them! You fly now, with me! My brothers! Sisters! And we will show the Sky People... That they can not take whatever they want! And that this... this is our land! (From Avatar)

You say there are unique animals in Pandora, more amazing than any here on earth. With that you are also mistaken, there are many beautiful and amazing creatures on Earth that are in trouble and need your help. Below are a couple of examples.

The mountain lion, cougar or puma: Due to excessive hunting following the European colonization of the Americas, and continuing human development of cougar habitat, populations have dropped in most parts of its historical range. With its vast range, the cougar has dozens of names and various references in the mythology of the indigenous Americans and in contemporary culture. Typical Length: males, about eight to as much as nine feet from the nose to the tip of its tail, and females, about six to seven feet.

The Whooping Crane: Endangered North American Bird. This is one of only two species of crane in the N. America. They can live 22-24 years when healthy and free. There are only 250 left in the wild (at most).They stand up to 5 feet tall with a 7.5 foot wing span.

Salmon: Salmon journeys can be hundreds, even thousands of miles long. The longest known trip was made by a Chinook salmon that went 2,400 miles Inland just to spawn! Salmon are in trouble, though. Pollution, overfishing, and dams are killing them off. The dams need to come down and the pollution needs to stop.

Whales and dolphins: Did you know that some nations are still whaling? Japan continues the practice and thinly veils it as scientific research. There are also hundreds of dolphins killed each year in Japan. With each year the oceans become more and more polluted. They also grow warmer with each passing year. This all leads to the death of these amazing creatures. This must stop now.

Toruk Makto was mighty. He brought the clans together in a time of great sorrow. All Navi people know this story. (From Avatar)

Will you defend the Pandora that's right outside your window?

When Stripes Become Bars

2010-02-10T09:08:00.000-08:00

The Plight of the Tiger

The tiger is in trouble, but you already knew that. It is a predominate civilized practice to systematically wipe out that which scares, mystifies, or avoids man. This practice has been applied to wolves, lions, elephants, mountain lions (pumas) and pretty much every non-human species on the planet.

America, you might quibble, is guilt free, at least, in the plight of the orange and black feline—not so. Did you know that there are more tigers behind bars in the United States than there are living wild in the entire world? And these are barely tigers at all. How can an animal kept in a cage of concrete, steel, and artificial stimulation even come close to mirroring their wild relatives? Tigers in zoos are not tigers at all; they are depressed animals that know nothing but boundaries and limits.

WWF (World Wildlife Fund) has taken this year of the tiger to launch a campaign to try to save them. Link From the website: “The issues highlighted in the trouble spots map (www.worldwildlife.org/troublespots) include:
* Pulp, paper, palm oil and rubber companies are devastating the forests of Indonesia and Malaysia, home to two endangered tiger sub-species;
* Hundreds of new or proposed dams and roads in the Mekong region will fragment tiger habitat;
* Illegal trafficking in tiger bones, skins and meat feeds a continued demand in East and Southeast Asia;
* More tigers are kept in captivity in the U.S. than are left in the wild -- and there are few regulations to keep these tigers from ending up on the black market. The largest numbers of captive tigers are in Texas (an estimated 3,000+), but they are also kept in other states;
* Poaching of tigers and their prey, along with a major increase in logging is taking a heavy toll on Amur, or Siberian, tigers;
* Tigers and humans are increasingly coming into conflict in India as tiger habitats shrink;
* Climate change could reduce tiger habitat in Bangladesh’s Sundarbans mangroves by 96 percent.

Three tiger sub-species have gone extinct since the 1940s and a fourth one, the South China tiger, has not been seen in the wild in 25 years. Tigers occupy just seven percent of their historic range. But they can thrive if they have strong protection from poaching and habitat loss and enough prey to eat.”

Map: Below are two maps of where tigers lived in 1900 and where they live now. Before 1900 I’d assume the territories were much larger.
So what can you do? Well that depends where you live and what you are willing to risk. These animals do not need our help to live; on the contrary, they need our help to avoid their death. Their habitat needs to be preserved and restored. They need to be respected and not put behind bars. Breeding programs in captivity need to result in cups that are rehabilitated and released into the wild, not shipped to another zoo. You can write to your zoo and tell them that. You can write to companies that use products containing palm oil. You can go stand on the front lines of the issue and stop poachers and clear cutters. You can spread the word. You can donate money.

What can’t you do? Ignore the issue.

Iceland: Not Pure, Not Natural, Totally Spoiled

2010-01-29T07:39:00.000-08:00

Did you know that Iceland kills any polar bear that manages to make it onto the island?

Check out this article: http://www.icelandreview.com/icelandreview/daily_news/?cat_id=16567&ew_0_a_id=357093

Some excerpts from it:
The task force’s conclusion was to kill all polar bears spotted in Iceland for three reasons: they are dangerous, they are not at risk of extinction and it is too costly to save them, as Hjalti Gudmundsson from the Environment Agency of Iceland, who was a member of the task force, explained on RÚV’s news magazine Kastljós last night.

The slain polar bear was such a young animal that police fear another bear, an adult, might be on the loose in the area. The Coast Guard will start searching the country's northeastern coastline from air today as soon as there is sufficient daylight. People in the region are asked to be careful.

So, I made a variation of the cover of Iceland's tourist brochure to illustrate the wonderful love for nature the country has.

Here it is (Click to view larger):

The Plastic Project

2010-01-25T08:45:00.001-08:00

For all of you that have been following my posts about eliminating plastic from your lives: I have created a blog just for this issue!

I have reposted all of my previous posts about the issue there and will be updating it regularly!

http://theplasticproject.blogspot.com/

Eliminating Plastics: The Cleaning Edition

2010-01-25T05:40:00.000-08:00

Things covered in this issue: Dishwasher Detergent, Dish Soap, Sponges, Laundry Detergent, Laundry Softener

Dishwasher Detergent:

Many of you have probably never even thought about what you use for detergent in your dishwasher. Most dishwashers themselves are made of plastic, but there are some stainless steel varieties. If you want to continue using your dishwasher regardless of what it’s made out of, using a more natural alternative to store bought dish soap is a great idea. Not only does this home made dishwasher soap save you a lot of money, but it is also not in a plastic bottle.

The recipe:

1 large glass jar (for storage)

1 ½ cups--20 Mule Team Borax (found in the laundry section at most stores)

1 ½ cups—Baking Soda

1 cup—Table Salt

(Mix all together and use ¼ cup per dishwasher load)

Video on how to make.

Dish Soap:

Perhaps you do your dishes by hand. The dish soap that is typically found at stores not only comes in plastic but has all sorts of artificial colors and scents added to it. It’s quite simple to make your own dish soap. First you will need a jar/container of some sort to store the soap in (I have put some links below for stainless steal containers that will not break if you drop them into the sink/hit them with a pan, etc). Below the links is a recipe for making soap

Stainless steel soap dispensers:

Soap Dispenser 1

Soap Dispenser 2 with Sponge Holder

Soap Dispenser 3

Soap Dispenser 4

Several Dish Soap Recipes Found Here.

Dish Sponges:

Many people use dish sponges to wash their dishes (or wipe them off before putting them in the dishwasher). Most of these sponges are made of plastic. There are many alternatives to these potentially harmful sponges. This is not to mention the fact that since most sponges are made of plastic they don’t decompose well (or at all) Dish rags are always a choice. They are relatively easy to make yourself (from old towels you cut to rag size, or by crocheting them). They can also be purchased online. Several companies also have natural sponges available for washing dishes. I have included links to both these sponges and home made dish rags.

Non-Plastic Sponges:

Agave natural fiber dish sponge

Twist Clean Eco-Friendly Biodegradable Naked Sponge

Twist Loofah Dish Scrubber

Agave Dish Scrubber

Home Made Dish Rags:

Crochet Dish Cloths

Crochet Dish Cloths (2)

Crochet Dish Cloths (3)

White Crochet Dish cloth (easy to bleach/clean)

Make your own dish cloths here.

Laundry Detergent:

Just like dishwasher soap and dish soap, laundry detergent comes in a plastic container and often complete with artificial colors, scents, and additives. Making your own is a cost effective alternative that gets you away from plastic. This recipe also works for HE front load washers. It is low suds which is what the “specially made” detergents for these washers are.

What you need: 1 – 55 ounce box of Arm & Hammer® Super Washing Soda1 – 76 ounce box of 20 Mule Team® Borax (The same you used for dishwasher detergent)
1 – 10 pack of 4.5 ounce bars of Ivory® Bar Soap (**note** you can use cheaper soap, I actually had this on hand already. Use whatever tickles your fancy – Other brands of commonly used bar soaps include Pure & Natural®, Fels-Naptha® and/or ZOTE®. Both ZOTE® and Fels-Naptha® are made for and sold as “laundry bar soap.”)

Here’s How

Be sure to store it in a glass jar!

Fabric Softener

The best alternative I have found to store-bought laundry detergent is vinegar. Whenever I tell people this I get a similar response, something to the effect of “Eww, don’t your clothes smell?” or “You end up smelling like an Easter egg though don’t you?” The answer to both of these objections/questions is no. I add approximately a cup of white vinegar to each load I wash (add with detergent, I pour right onto the clothes) and they leave the dryer (or drying rack) with no static and soft as can be.

Store/buy your vinegar in a glass jar.

Eliminating Plastics: The Baby Edition

2010-01-22T05:45:00.000-08:00

Things covered in this issue: diapers, baby bottles, pacifiers

I’m assuming that if you are reading this blog you know that plastic isn’t a healthy thing to have in your life. As you have seen from the last three posts it is everywhere, and hard to avoid while living in the current society. Slowly poisoning yourself from these contaminants is one thing, but harming your children is quite another matter. In this issue I will delve into the world of babies and try to provide alternatives to the plastic “necessities” all new parents are marketing from long before conception.

Diapers:
Disposable diapers are a bad idea. I said it, and I’m sure that you have heard it before. They take AT LEAST 100 years to decompose in a landfill. As a rule I try to avoid using anything that would take 100 years to decompose (things of this nature tend to be full of many a thing that is unnatural). The first disposable diaper was created around 1950 which means that all disposable diapers ever created are still in existence (this holds true for most plastic products). You don’t care about the environment? Well that’s just too bad and I don’t know why you are reading my blog in the first place, but let’s assume you care for your child.

Here’s a link to a WebMD article that talks about disposable diapers being linked to increased asthma rates: Link

An Associated Content article about chemicals in disposable diapers: Link

So, you are convinced. You will use cloth diapers. Now where on earth do you buy them? Here are a few places. Try to avoid diapers with Velcro as that is also a type of plastic (snaps or pins are ideal). It was hard for me to find many snap diapers that used medal snaps however, but plastic snaps are a much better choice when compared to disposable diapers.

Mother-Ease USA
Mother-Ease Europe
Choosey Diapers
Green Mountain Diapers
More Cloth Diapers

Make your own cloth diapers!

Baby Bottles:
It’s almost understandable when you think of the development of the plastic baby bottle. No newly initiated mother or father wants to deal with a dropped and shattered glass bottle in the middle of the night. I’d say, however, that they’d rather deal with that than a sick child. The chemicals that are in all plastics are also in baby bottles. The nipples of bottles are also made of latex which can cause allergic reaction, but they CAN be found made out of silicone or rubber, which is what I have tried to track down. So here are some alternatives to the plastic variety. If there are any parents reading this that have comments/suggestions let me know!

Natural Rubber Bottle Nipples:
Link 1
Link 2
Link 3 (Google Shopping Search Result)

Glass bottles with silicone nipples
Glass bottles with silicone nipples and thermal hugger
A few kinds of glass baby bottles (and free shipping)

Handmade crochet baby bottle covers:
Link 1
Link 2

Make your own baby bottle cover (crochet)

Pacifiers:
Since we’ve established that giving your baby something made of plastic to suck on is a bad idea, I have provided links below to natural alternatives to the latex pacifier. In even silicone pacifiers the part that touches your baby’s face is plastic, this is why I have stayed with rubber pacifier links.

Natural rubber pacifiers:
Link 1
Link 2
Link 3
Link 4

Eliminating Plastics from your Daily Life, Installment 3

2010-01-21T05:21:00.000-08:00

Things Covered in this Issue: Buckets, Lunch Bags/Boxes and Grocery Bags

5 gallon buckets for storage/hauling liquids:

Canvas Buckets: Bucket 1 , Bucket 2

Steel 5 Gallon Bucket (no lid)

Steel 5 Gallon Bucket (With lid)

I am trying to track down a pattern for making your own canvas bucket but have yet to find one. If anyone has one, or has made one and wants to share please email me/post a comment.

Lunch Box/Bag

If you are anything like me you take a lunch to work/school (or maybe your children/wife/husband/significant other do) nearly every day. Did you ever stop to think about what your lunch box is made out of? Most are made out of plastic (or at least lined with it). Belo

w are some options to purchase lunch boxes that are not made of or lined with plastic. There is also a link to making your own lunch bag.

Stainless Steel Lunch Tin Set with recycled cotton bag

Stainless Steel Stackable Lunch Box

Recycled Cotton Lunch Bag

Make your own Lunch bag. Note: This design calls for a thin plastic lining in the bag. I would skip using that as a lining and just use cotton. You could wash the bag once a week or so to keep it clean if need be.

Grocery Bags

I’m sure that by now you have all heard that plastic grocery bags are horrible for the environment (if you are reading this blog you likely use reusable bags already). I figured I would put this section on here anyhow, however, since most store bought reusable grocery bags have plastic in them. Below are links that you can purchase cotton bags from and also how to make your own reusable grocery bags. If you wish to have more choices for purchasing reusable bags, simply search “reusable cotton grocery bag” or “reusable hemp grocery bag”.

Reusable Bags made from Cotton and/or hemp

“Thank You” Reusable Canvas Bag

35 Reusable Grocery Bags you can make

Eliminating Plastics From Your Life, Installment 2

2010-01-20T05:52:00.000-08:00

I’d like to thank everyone for their interest thus far in this project along with all of the recommendations I have received. I have been looking around me with a new set of eyes since I started working on this yesterday and I see that plastic is literally everywhere. I am going to work to provide not only alternatives that you can purchase, but also (when possible) alternatives you can make yourself. I am also going to try to recommend (also when possible) alternatives for purchase that are hand crafted by someone else for those not inclined to craft themselves.

Things covered in this issue: Tea Kettles, Coffeemakers, Rice Cooker, Plastic Wrap

Tea Kettles/Tea Pots
I was looking around my kitchen last night when I realized that even my tea pot has a plastic handle and a plastic cover over the spout. I have, thankfully, been able to locate some tea pots that do not include plastics. I have links for them below.

Ceramic Asian Stove Top Tea Pot

Duo Glass Tea Pot/Infuser

Staub Cast Iron Tea Pot

Tea For One Tea Pot

Coffeemaker

Take a look at your coffeemaker. Most have plastic everywhere. Even if you use a reusable mesh filter, the basket itself is still likely plastic, not to mention the body of the coffee maker, the handle and top of your pot, etc. I have found some alternatives that avoid the use of plastic and still produce a tasty pot of coffee!

Chemex Coffee Makers and Filters (From their website: “The Chemex® coffeemaker is an elegant, one-piece, hourglass shaped vessel made of high quality, heat resistant glass. The traditional model comes to you with a polished wood collar and leather tie. The collar serves as an insulated handle around the middle of the coffeemaker.”) Note: be sure to use unbleached coffee filters with this.

Stove top espresso maker

Porcelain Percolator

Stainless Steel Percolator

Stainless Steel French Press

1 Cup Stainless Coffee Maker & Porcelain Drip Coffee Makers (Scroll Down on the Page to find them)

Rice Cooker

Rice can be a staple, especially in budget living. A rice cooker can come in handy to get that perfect rice (they also work very well for quinoa). Finding a rice cooker that doesn’t have plastic is hard work however. Below is what I’ve found. The most natural option is pretty obvious and that is to make the rice in a pot on your own. If you don’t have the time for that option however (or skill) there are some alternatives where plastic doesn’t touch the rice directly.

Miracle Rice Cooker (It looks like the outer areas of this cooker are plastic, but everything that touches your food is stainless steel)

Clay pot 5 cup rice cooker (It looks like the outer areas of this cooker are plastic, but everything that touches your food is clay)

VitaClay Rice Cooker (It looks like the outer areas of this cooker are plastic, but everything that touches your food is clay)

Plastic Wrap

Many people use plastic wrap to cover foods and to wrap up items for their lunches. Until yesterday I didn’t know of any good alternatives to this. On a forum I am a member of however someone mentioned beeswax coated cloths. After a brief search I found them!

Abeego Wraps. From the website “Abeego came to life one year ago as a result of my fascination with nature and my growing dissatisfaction with plastic. Through months of trial and error I discovered the perfect blend of natural ingredients, closely mimicking the us eful qualities of plastic while eliminating the unsavory attributes. Creating an original, handcrafted, natural alternative to plastic food wrap has been a wonderful and rewarding experience. Enjoy!”

Eliminating Plastics From Your Life

2010-01-19T06:59:00.000-08:00

My mother, who is still heavily entrenched in civilization, surprised me when she told me her new year’s resolution this year. Her goal? She wants to eliminate plastics, to the greatest extent possible, from her daily life.

Why avoid plastics? Well there are many reasons. Here are some links to articles about the evils of plastic both to human health and to the environment:

Critical Health Risks From Plastics

Plastic in the Oceans

Adverse Health Effects of Plastics

Chemicals in Plastic Water Bottles May Pose Health Hazard

I tried to do some research and find her some websites about doing this, but was sorely disappointed to find minimal help and information on doing this. (However, I wasn’t too surprised). So I have decided to dedicate the next few blog posts to things that someone can do to eliminate plastics from their lives. I am also going to provide links to products that can replace the plastic ones people typically use.

It is obviously impossible to totally eliminate plastics while still living within civilization. (Switching to glass jars for storage will still leave you with plastics on the lid, for instance). I think that taking some of these steps is helpful, in the least.

Today’s tips:

Prescription Medicines:
It really is disturbing when you think about how much plastic medicine comes in contact with. The large jars they are in at the pharmacy are plastic (you cannot control this). The machines they are produced in are riddled with plastic as well (also cannot control this). The one thing you can control is what they are stored in when you receive them. Ask your pharmacy if they have glass jars available. If they do not, transfer your medications yourself into glass jars when you get home. You can buy jars from any of the following sites:

Jars:

Link 1

Link 2

Link 3

Bottles:

You can also sort your pills into a daily pill sorter/organizer that isn’t plastic. Here are places you can purchase those:

Pill Sorter 1

Pill Sorter 2

Food Storage:
Over the last couple decades people have become accustomed to storing food in plastic containers (Gladware, Tupperware, etc.) It may seem like an awkward transition to switch from plastic to glass, but it is much easier than might be anticipated.

Avoid plastic wrap if at all possible.

For small storage containers save the jars that you already use. Jelly jars, spegetti sauce jars, etc. make great containers to store leftovers (and even freeze soup in!)

If you want to purchase jars for storage the hard part is finding them that do not use plastic covers. Ceramic jars work well for storing things like sugar, flour, etc. Jars that close more tightly can be used for other things.

Here are some websites:

Bake 'N Keep Storage Container with glass lid

2-c. Glass Refrigerator Storage Container 81884S with glass lid

Glass Spice Rack

Square 40oz glass canister with lid

Glass Canning Jar/Gasket Set

Coffee/Tea To Go:

Did you know that paper cups from places like Starbucks are actually lined with plastic? Besides generating unnecessary waste, you are also drinking coffee out of warmed up plastic, yuck.

If you are staying at the coffee shop to drink your coffee, ask them if they have mugs for customers staying there. Many shops have this.

A reusable mug is a great solution if you aren’t staying at the coffee shop, but be sure to find one that isn’t lined with plastic. Also, most mugs have plastic covers, avoiding these is pretty difficult. I found some with silicone covers, which seems like cheating but it is better than plastic (Silicone is chemically inert and poses no known health risk. It is completely safe to use as cookware and will not leech into your food. It is technically not a plastic, although it displays properties of plasticity.)

Here are some links:

Cups with silicone lids:

Silicone lid 1

Silicone Lid Cup 2

If you aren’t going far and aren’t apt to spill much, a ceramic mug with a ceramic cover might work for you. Here are some:

Ceramic Mug with lid and infuser (for tea)

Coffee Mugs with Lid 1

Coffee Mug with Lid 2

Living with the Land, a critique of the ride at Walt Disney World

2010-01-10T17:14:00.001-08:00

Disney World. One of the most dreamt about places on the planet. The Make a Wish foundation probably takes more children there than anywhere else an earth. It’s “where dreams come true” and all of that jazz. It is also run by a company that seeks to make profits, a company that misleads thousands of college students into internships in which they end up picking up garbage each year, among a ton of other (more horrible) atrocities.

I didn’t want to go to Disney World. I’d been to the Magic Kingdom when I was 18 and hated it then, but on a family vacation to Florida everyone agreed (minus me) to go to Epcot. It sounded like the park that would make me the least sick to my stomach (which isn’t saying much) and my parents were paying so I went. I thought that maybe the miniature versions of different countries around the world might be interesting and educational. I figured that at worst I would just grit my teeth and make it through the day. That was until I saw the “Living with the Land” ride.

Let’s start by describing where the ride is located in the park. It would, of course, make sense for it to be surrounded by native plants and greenery and packed dirt paths (not destroying the land with concrete). This was not the case. The ride was in a mall like complex complete with a food court. I could not even catch a glimpse of the sky as I got into line for it.

My family was excited, thinking that this ride would cheer me up. They think of me as some sort or another of an “environmentalist” and spend most of their time rolling their eyes at me. I stood in line drinking out of my reusable water bottle and taking in my surroundings. Throughout the day I saw no one else NO ONE ELSE at the entire park with a reusable water bottle of any sort. Granted this isn’t a direct reflection on people’s character, but when combined with the fact that they were smiling blindly at Disney World it didn’t add to my mood. The zig-zagging line for the ride had only a 5 minute wait (another testament to the interest of people when you figure the Test Track car ride had a 20min wait at that time). The walls of the waiting area were covered with painted quotations of the environmental variety. I was reading them thinking that most of the authors would have likely disagreed with being quoted on a Disney World wall when I saw a quotation from an unlikely source. George Bush. YES, GEORGE BUSH. I about fell over. I took a picture of it just to prove it because I assumed no one would believe me.

The ride was a boat ride, in chlorinated water (I said, right when the ride started “well avoiding chlorination would be one way to live with the land”). The boats traveled through tunnel type areas with video screens that showed agriculture through history. It then said that our current ways of agriculture aren’t the best and that new ways of agriculture have to be established. That’s when we were taken into Epcot’s greenhouses. Below are pictures of these. One of the things they are doing in the greenhouse is growing plants that aren’t even in soil, where they merely spray the roots with the nutrients needed. Correction, they don’t spray anything, a machine does.

We learn of course the fish farms are a healthy way to raise fish that cannot live in the wild any longer (don’t these fish look healthy?) Why they have captive alligators is beyond me also (except maybe as a food source as well).

The end of the automated ride talked about how with these advances people are sure to find a way to sustain themselves with new advanced technologies in agriculture and everyone walked out of the boats with a ‘feel good’ impression. They even share that the fruit raised in the green house is used as food throughout Epcot (well I’d HOPE so) though what percentage it contributes they fail to mention.

Here’s Disney’s description of the ride: Living with the Land is a 14-minute boat ride in Future World at Epcot theme park that explores agricultural advances in the rain forest, Africa and beyond.

Set sail on a voyage of discovery through living laboratories as you cruise past the American plains, a tropical rain forest and the African desert to witness the latest developments in aquaculture and desert farming. Float by experimental greenhouses—where produce is grown for Epcot restaurants—and take a fascinating first-hand look at an aqua environment, the Aquacell, with alligators and fish. The greenhouses grow crops native to many cultures, including rice, sugar cane and bananas.

This thought-provoking ride will leave you amazed at the wondrous ways scientists are helping farmers prepare for the food needs of our world's nations.

Here’s a video that shows the building the ride is in and the ride itself I have transcribed the audio of the ride below. Comments in parentheses are mine.: link

Welcome to a voyage of discovery and awareness of the richness, the diversity, and the often surprising nature of living with the land. Our journey begins as dramatic and sudden changes are sweeping over the land. The approaching storm may seem violent and destructive to us, but to nature (because we of course aren’t a part of nature) it’s a new beginning in the cycle of life. Beneath the surface of the land roots trap water extracting precious nutrients and minerals. These elements, when combined with sunlight, create the diverse and living systems of our planet. One of those living systems is the rainforest, home to one of the most amazing concentrations of life on our planet. These dense and beautiful forests cover only a tiny portion of the earth’s surface but they contain more than half of its plant and animal species. Rainforests are also extremely rich and productive living systems providing us (only us, of course not animals or other living things) with oxygen, food, medicine, and other elements essential to our lives (yet again, only our lives, not other species or the planet as a whole). (I love how they fail to mention here the fact that the rainforests are being destroyed at an alarming rate, because you know, this is Disney’d environmentalism and there is no sadness allowed here). In the dessert, nature has created a very different, but no less beautiful living system. And although this arid landscape may seem lifeless, it is very much alive. The plants and animals that have learned to survive in these harsh conditions make use of what little water they can find and avoid the scorching rays of the relentless sun. (A mention of the destruction and irrigation of the desert would fit well here as well, but yet again, it doesn’t happen). The American prairie once appeared as desolate as the desert, but over time the rainwater and nutrients gradually penetrated the hard surface of this land. The hooves of the mighty buffalo helped create the rich soil that would one day become home to the American farm. (Way to selectively forget to mention the Native Americans that were driven off the land [along with the buffalo] to make way for the farm). Of all the forces at work on the land humans have had one of the most profound effects. The need to produce food for a growing world led to the enormous use and sometimes overuse (sometimes?) of the land. In our search to grow food, we often fail to realize the impact of our methods. Today we are learning to live with the land. Discovering better ways to grow food that will assure both human and environmental well being. We are growing food on desert seacoasts by developing and growing plants that thrive on salt water. Here at Epcot we are learning to reduce the need for pesticides by using natural predators like ladybugs and wasps to control pests. In Japan we’re learning that by adding …(couldn’t hear here)…How will we meet tomorrow’s needs for food production and still respect the needs of the land? Some of the answers are just ahead. (There was not an announcer person talking in the ride when I rode it. The automated voice just described the plants and fish we were seeing). (The end of the ride was also the automated voice talking about behind the scenes tours of the green house at Epcot).

Convenience, Black Blood, and War

2009-12-29T10:22:00.000-08:00

I’m sure by now that you have all heard the story about the “attempted terrorist attack” on the Northwest Airlines jet that was bound for Detroit. This was an attack that was apparently only NOT SUCCESSFUL because the bomb didn’t go off properly.

From the moment I heard about this my skeptics glasses went on; this just seems too, what’s the word? CONVENIENT. It seems to me that whenever public opinion of the war(s) goes down, something happens to reinstate the fear that lets people forget their rights, personal freedoms, and opposition to wars.

I was skeptical before I started reading about Yemen and the United States. Yemen is where the accused terrorist, Abdulmatallab, reportedly made contact with Al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda has taken responsibility for the botched terrorist attack and says it was in response to attacks on them in Yemen. The US did actually attack Yemen. This is what ABC news had to say about the attack:

On orders from President Barack Obama, the U.S. military launched cruise missiles early Thursday against two suspected al-Qaeda sites in Yemen, administration officials told ABC News in a report broadcast on ABC World News with Charles Gibson.

ABC's Brian Ross details missile strike on al-Qaeda militants in Afghanistan.

One of the targeted sites was a suspected al Qaeda training camp north of the capitol, Sanaa, and the second target was a location where officials said "an imminent attack against a U.S. asset was being planned."

The Yemen attacks by the U.S. military represent a major escalation of the Obama administration's campaign against al Qaeda.

In his speech about added troops for Afghanistan earlier this month, President Obama made a brief reference to Yemen, saying, "Where al Qaeda and its allies attempt to establish a foothold -- whether in Somalia or Yemen or elsewhere -- they must be confronted by growing pressure and strong partnerships."

The entire article can be found here: http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/cruise-missiles-strike-yemen/story?id=9375236&page=1

Okay, so in the war on terror America is going to find the terrorists wherever they are hiding. This is old news, Bush loved saying stuff like this, and apparently Obama does too. There is another similarity besides terrorists between Yemen and the other countries America is attacking however. What is this similarity?

OIL.

Here’s some information on Yemen’s oil industry: http://www.mbendi.com/indy/oilg/as/ye/p0005.htm

Yemen is a small, non-OPEC oil producer. The country’s economy is highly dependent on oil production, with the country’s oil exports accounting for around 85 percent of export revenues and 33 percent of gross domestic product. According to the 2008 BP Statistical Energy Survey, Yemen had proved oil reserves of 2.78 billion barrels at the end of 2007 or 0.22 % of the world's reserves and produced an average of 336 thousand barrels of crude oil per day, 0.4% of the world total and a change of -11.5 % compared to 2006.

Though the government of Yemen is fairly stable following the re-election of President Ali Abdullah Saleh in 2006, security remains a concern of foreign firms doing business in Yemen. Yemen is divided into 87 blocks, of which 12 actually produce oil.

The oil is concentrated in five areas: Marib-Jawf in the north, Masila in the south and East Shabwa, Jannah and Iyad in central Yemen. Oil production in Yemen is heavily reliant on private foreign companies, with more than 20 foreign firms currently operating concessions. International companies currently operating in Yemen include Canada’s Nexen, Hunt Oil, Total, Occidental and DNO.

The national oil company, Yemen General Corporation for Oil & Gas/Mineral Resources, is an affiliation of several state-owned subsidiaries including: the Yemen Oil Company (YOC); the Yemen Refining Company (YRC); the Petroleum Exploration and Production Authority (PEPA) and the General Department of Crude Oil Marketing (GDCOM). All branches report to the MOMR. The national oil company is responsible for managing the industry contracts and relations with operators and partners, as well as the government's share of crude exports.

According to the 2008 BP Statistical Energy Survey, Yemen had 2007 proved natural gas reserves of 0.48 trillion cubic metres, the bulk of which are concentrated in the Marib-Jawf fields. Despite Yemen’s longstanding plans to develop an export-based natural gas industry, Yemen has yet to produce any natural gas.

What is an OPEC producer vs a non-OPEC oil producer? Here’s the answer http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/ftproot/presentations/ieo99_3im/sld010.htm :

By the middle of 1998, declining world oil prices caused renewed efforts to lower oil production under the sponsorship of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC). In both March and June, OPEC and key non-OPEC producers Mexico and Norway agreed to restrict crude oil sales, and there were indications from several other producers that they would cut back production. Their efforts were not supported by Iraq, which wanted to increase oil sales. As a result, oil production management efforts had only modest success.

WAIT A MINUTE! So IRAQ is non-OPEC too…hmm. Just thinking here…

Stand By Me

2009-12-21T17:39:00.001-08:00

Stand By Me by: Ben E. King (with photos added by me)

When the night has come

And the land is dark

And the moon is the only light we'll see

No I won't be afraid, no I won't be afraid

Just as long as you stand, stand by me

And darlin', darlin', stand by me

Oh now now stand by me

Stand by me, stand by me

If the sky that we look upon

Should tumble and fall

Acid Rain Damage

And the mountains should crumble to the sea

I won't cry, I won't cry, no I won't shed a tear
Just as long as you stand, stand by me

Link

And darlin', darlin', stand by me, oh stand by me
Stand by me, stand by me, stand by me-e, yeah

Whenever you're in trouble won't you stand by me, oh now now stand by me
Oh stand by me, stand by me, stand by me

Darlin', darlin', stand by me-e, stand by me
Oh stand by me, stand by me, stand by me

The Navy Does it Again

2009-12-16T08:28:00.000-08:00

As if killing marine life with sonar wasn’t enough, the US Navy now has plans to take out Manatees too.

I read an article today that is (obviously slanted in the way I lean) pointing out the incredibly destructive nature of the U.S. Navy along with how little it cares for any living creature but the American Human (and is shortsighted even in their care for them). Below is the entire article, originally appearing here.

“Having defeated the Japanese fleet and faced down the Soviets, the U.S. Navy faces a new obstacle, one that hides behind a deceptively gentle, seagrass-munching façade.

Manatees may rank lower than such traditional menaces as torpedoes and air-to-sea missiles. But a proposal to protect additional habitat for them, the Navy says, could end up reducing habitat for destroyers, aircraft carriers and nuclear submarines.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service soon will make a decision on whether to expand what's called critical habitat for the manatee in Florida and southern Georgia, in response to a petition from several environmental groups.

The coastlines of these states bristle with naval installations, such as the historic Pensacola Naval Air Station, where World War II aviators trained; Kings Bay in southern Georgia, home to nuclear-armed Ohio-class submarines; and the South Florida Ocean Testing Facility in Dania Beach, where the Navy operates an undersea range to determine ships' acoustical signatures.

Although the Navy doesn't object in principal to an increase in protected areas — and indeed points out the many measures it takes to prevent harm to endangered species — it says too broad an expansion could have "significant impacts" on Navy operations.

"Manatees and their habitats overlap Navy training and operation areas through the southeast," states the letter from C.R. Destafney, regional environmental program director, Navy Region Southeast, in Jacksonville. "Navy's training involves activities necessary to maintain proficiency in mission-essential areas such as mine warfare, strike warfare, electronic combat and maritime security."

Among the concerns: Security arrangements for Ohio-class submarines entering and exiting their base at Kings Bay. The Navy does not want protections for a marine mammal, no matter how loveable, to compromise security arrangements for submarines approaching shore armed with nuclear weapons.

Another concern is the Navy's ability to dredge channels for deep-draft ships .

Navy spokesman Steve Strickland said the Navy works hard to leave a minimal environmental footprint. For example, he said the Navy conducts aerial surveys of endangered right whales off North Florida to alert Navy ships.

"Certainly the Navy coexists with various endangered species," he said. "We do all kinds of things to help minimize the impact."

The habitat expansion proposal came in a 2008 petition from the Center for Biological Diversity, Defenders of Wildlife, Save the Manatee Club and Wildlife Advocacy Project.

These groups argued that the current critical habitat, drawn up in 1976, is outdated. Since then, they said, a skyrocketing population has brought more boats and more waterfront development, worsening habitat for one of the state's best-loved endangered species, an emblem of Florida's natural heritage.

A critical habitat designation doesn't prohibit construction or other activities. But it does require the wildlife service to review federal activities or decisions that could affect it, such as permitting development, oil drilling, boating or shipping.

Katie Tripp, science and conservation director of The Save the Manatee Club, said there may be ways the Navy could alter operations to protect manatees without any impact on naval operations or training.

"In the past, manatees have not kept the Navy from doing what they need to do," she said. "In this state, endangered species and the military have coexisted."

The petition calls for the protection of dozens of natural springs, seagrass beds, travel corridors and coastlines throughout manatee habitat.

In Broward County, where no critical habitat is currently designated, that includes the entire Intracoastal Waterway, New River system, Whiskey Creek and many other waterways. In Palm Beach County, which already has critical habitat designated in Lake Worth and the northern part of the Intracoastal Waterway, it includes the entire Intracoastal Waterway and connected waterways.

In September the Fish and Wildlife Service made a preliminary determination that a revision of manatee critical habitat "may be warranted." It is now completing a more extensive review, with a decision expected within the next few days or weeks.

Rules to protect manatees have irritated boaters and the marine construction industry for years, and the proposal could face a fight if it moves forward.

Chuck Underwood, spokesman for the Fish and Wildlife Service, said any increase in critical habitat would almost certainly be a fraction of the habitat proposed by the wildlife groups.

He down-played the significance of expanding the species' critical habitat, saying any changes would simply reinforce protections already in place. Of the Navy's comments, he said, "We understand they have concerns, and they're legitimate concerns."’

Okay, so the navy is concerned because of: nuclear weapons, dredging the ocean floor for large ships, and possibly being unable to maintain readiness for warfare. Perhaps if ONE of their reasons was based upon anything but economics and the destruction of environments for warfare and corporate (governmental) greed I would be willing to listen. The navy keeps claiming they are environmental while they continue to destroy the environment (or refuse to let others protect it).

Stop Shooting the "Big Bad Wolf"

2009-12-16T06:04:00.000-08:00

The superiority complex of humans is truly remarkable. Our species has driven hundreds of animals extinct and will drive more to that horrible fate before this week is out. In America, the gray wolf was almost gone for good due to an unwarranted fear and hatred for the animal. “Kill what you don’t understand” seems to be the human way of things.

Even with advances in biological studies of wolves and reintroduction of many groups into the wild there is still such ignorance that I want to scream. Just when the wolves looked like they were making a (partial) comeback, hunting of them was legalized (again). I say partial comeback because it is impossible for them to truly come back to what they once were when most of their lands have been “claimed” by farmers that need to protect “their” livestock.

Billings Gazette: “An examination of Montana’s first public gray-wolf hunt showed at least nine of the animals were killed in an area prone to livestock attacks — a finding that could blunt criticism that the hunt was ineffective.

Confident state wildlife officials said they could increase the quota on the predators next year. They want to zero in on a number that would strike a balance between protecting the wolf population and stopping increasing attacks on livestock and big-game herds.”

Let me get this straight, not only are farmers mad about wolves killing cows that are not a natural food source for wolves, but “big game herds”? What exactly is a big game herd you ask? Typically this refers to herds of elk, a food staple for wolves. Referring to them as “game” only illustrates the point that only human hunting is being taken into effect here. Everything is NOT just for humans. The wolves can’t kill cattle because they are our source of food and money, yet they can’t kill elk, because we want to hunt them. What can they eat may I ask?

A counterpoint to the Montana article, from the USA Today : “The Yellowstone pack hardest hit by the hunt is nicknamed Cottonwood. Hunters killed four members of the pack, including the breeding female, her mate and her daughter in a Montana wilderness area bordering the park.

"The wolves have it hard enough inside the park," says Rolf Peterson, a wildlife biologist at Michigan Technical University "The Yellowstone wolves should be treated like national treasures and protected."’

It is not the fault of a wolf if another species (humans) have singlehandedly killed off almost every indigenous food source and taken over most of their lands. There is no choice when put in a situation of survival to eat things that aren’t normally on the food pyramid (for example the cattle that are grazing on the land stolen from the wolves and all of their indigenous brethren).

From one of the ignorant people care of the Billings Gazette (link earlier in post) in Montana: “Ranchers like Jerry Ehmann, 63, counter that the state’s hunt is not doing enough. Ehmann said he used to run about 200 head of cattle on 25,000 acres of public land in southwestern Montana’s Bitterroot Range. After wolves started harassing his animals this year and five calves went missing, Ehmann decided to cut back to only 72 animals and keep them fenced in on his ranch near Sula. He sold off the remaining cattle in November.”

Heaven forbid that someone needs to limit their stock of animals that are not natural to the environment they live on!

WISDOM

Seek always, for by looking for one thing you will surely find another

-this is the path to wisdom.

Finding Nemo is Getting Tough

2009-12-15T05:07:00.000-08:00

“The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) chose a top ten of animals in danger in order to highlight to leaders attending the Copenhagen climate summit the consequences of global warming.

Top of the list in the report is the clownfish that live in the Indian and Pacific oceans. The bright orange fish became famous following the Disney film Finding Nemo but it is less well known that they are in danger of extinction because of rising carbon dioxide levels. According to the IUCN, as the sea absorbs CO2 the oceans turn acid which disrupts the clownfishes’ sense of smell and their ability to find the anemones they rely on for protection. Ocean acidification will also bleach staghorn corals, which include some 160 species, as the acid weakens the skeletons.”

Link to article.

It’s really starting to piss me off that people are so damn blind when it comes to the environment. It shouldn’t surprise anyone that the oceans are dying; it’s been obvious for over a decade. Marine Biologist Sylvia Earle wrote about it in a book over ten years ago (Sea Change).

I’m trying desperately to figure out who the mysterious “they” are that everyone keeps counting on to solve the problems we failed to stop while they were happening (and happen for that matter). We buy our 100% recycled pulp toilet paper and produce at farmers’ markets and are taught by the wondrous media and the propaganda surrounding us that we will somehow save the world by doing this.

Meanwhile Disney makes a movie about a fish that is caught out of the ocean for an aquarium while keeping dolphins in tanks at Epcot and selling tickets.

Meanwhile unwanted zoo animals and pets that never should have been are sold in an underground market that is not policed.

Yet people watch Animal Precinct and feel informed and like they are doing something good for society.

Perhaps it’s the children I need to talk to, because the adults sure as hell aren’t listening. Parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, sisters, brothers, everyone out there, here’s what I want you to do:

Pull up a chair next to the child in your life and watch Finding Nemo with them. When you are done and the child is happy, content, and excited about oceans, tell them that nearly every (if not all) type of animal in there might be gone from the oceans forever in a matter of years. Tell them that unless we stop destroying their homes this will happen for sure. Then ask the child what to do. They will likely have more insight on the matter than you know.

Let’s not make it any harder to find Nemo than it already is.

Stop Protesting and Start Doing Something

2009-12-15T04:47:00.000-08:00

I am starting to get (well, okay let’s face it, I have been) really annoyed with people who are convinced they can change the world with peaceful protests. When I was in college I was in a “peace” group, but we did a lot more than protest. We were more a group that spread the opposing viewpoint’s opinion on major issues (Veterans Against the Iraq War, etc). But now I talk to my friends who are still in college and all they seem to do is plan marches, and march against war, for LGBT rights, and many other things. I am quite frustrated. These are some of the most intelligent people I know, and they are wasting their time walking down streets with signs when they could be doing something that might actually change the world.

GreenPeace can hang all of the banners they want off of the sides of buildings and bridges but if they believe that the hardened heartless CEOs and politicians are going to change their consumer driven goals because of a banner they see, they are sorely mistaken.

The fact that we even “need” an Animal Planet channel is sad in and of itself. If the network thinks they will change things by spreading the word and knowledge about endangered and extinct animals that lived half a country (or even half a block) away from the couch the viewer is sitting on they are wrong.

These silent campaigns are far too easily ignored by both the general public and the leaders of Western civilization. Activists and protestors that go far enough to actually start to change something are promptly silenced and most of the world continues on without even realizing it happened. The news media will cover a business opening (or re-opening) before it will cover the loving soul who is living in the branches of a doomed redwood.

So, what should you do? Well you can continue signing your petitions and making your signs and practicing your chants for your marches, or you can actually change the world. You can join that activist in the tree, and bring a camera along. You can stop the pollution that is constantly streaming into our already quite toxic waterways. You can plant a garden for yourself. You can do all of these things but still it is not enough. It is never going to BE enough when our planet is dying before our eyes. Let me rephrase that, our planet is being murdered before our eyes and we pay less attention than we do to a mid season recap of American Idol.

This world will change all on its own in time, as the oil runs out and the infrastructure crumbles. I, personally, am not willing to wait for it to happen on its own. Humanity may not even be around to see it. 90% of large ocean fish are definitely not going to be around to see it. 23,000 dolphins a year will not be around to see it. The salmon, koala bears, arctic foxes, polar bears, emperor penguins, and clownfish might be gone as well, along with so many other beautiful and intricately necessary species.

So what are you going to do?

Book Review

2009-12-07T08:07:00.000-08:00

Walking on Water

By: Derrick Jensen

As I am sure most of you know by now, I am a huge fan of Derrick Jensen. I have read several of his books and each time I am enthralled. I start sending quotations and statistics from them to friends who (typically) ignore me and hope I’ll finish reading soon. The most recent book I read by him, however, is one that even my least liberal of friends would appreciate: Walking on Water.

This book is, on the surface, about the education systems in western civilization and how they form children into the wage slaves they will need to be in the “real world”. Derrick Jensen reflects on his own experiences as a student as well as those as a teacher at both a prison and a university. He mentions numerous times that the places didn’t vary “as much as you’d think” when it came to the classrooms.

What interested me the most about the book were the descriptions of how he taught creative writing classes in both the university and the prison. As an English major myself there were many aspects of his teaching that I recognized from my own experiences (arranging the desks in circles and being respectful while using praise in work-shopping to name a few). There were, however, many examples of things he did in his classrooms that I wish would have been done in mine.

He made sure that throughout the course he read an example of everyone’s writing. (He points out the fact that we have all felt left out at one point or another waiting for a teacher to read a “great” example of something we did only to have them reach the bottom of their good examples pile and read nothing of yours).

The level of respect he fosters in his classrooms is also a commendable thing. Although his views vary greatly from some of his students he finds a way to not let that effect his grading practices. The answer: don’t have grades. The struggle of creating a classroom with no grades when he is required to give them by the university is played out well in the beginning of the book.

All of these things were fantastic in the book, but the most important and powerful thing Jensen did within it is to teach readers how to find who they are. He talks about exercises he did with his classes not to make them better at grammar or to teach them the forms of poems, but rather to have them find out who they are. He challenges his class (at the end of the book) to “walk on water”. What he means by this should be clear to you by the time you get to the conclusion.

I read the entire thing cover to cover in less than a day, refusing to set it down for anything. This is a faster (and shorter) read than most of Jensen’s other works and I’d definitely recommend it. For those readers who are less radically-minded than me this is a good place to jump into Jensen’s works, for those that generally agree with me it will be an amazing supplement to your current reading base.

City Sidewalks

2009-12-03T19:05:00.000-08:00

Today was a hard day for me to live in the city.

There's something magical about the first snow of the year here in Wisconsin. Something...sacred, special, and unique. The first snow in the city however, is just sad.

I went for my yearly walk to take pictures of trees and snow and cold and the progression of seasons, and found myself more worried about getting hit by people driving recklessly than noticing the season shift. I found some trees, but they looked lonely with only houses to keep them company. The snow seemed to hang sadly in their branches, upset that it was mostly buildings that caught it in its fall to the ground. A roof is a far more depressing resting place than the crook of a tree.

Two years ago I slipped on slick pavement and broke my wrist in several places. Ever since, even with proper footwear, I find myself grimacing whenever walking on slick sidewalks. I longed for the happy crunch of freshly frozen grass, the way I could feel the mud beneath refusing to freeze just yet. Moonlight and snow are amazing things when combined correctly. A winter's night in Wisconsin can be nearly as bright as a summer morning if the moon is out and the ground is coated with the right kind of snow. I'm talking of that kind with the crust of ice on top and thin fluffy flurries underneath. The type that dogs and cats try to balance on, and look devastated as they fall through.

Winter in the city just reflects the street lights, drivers' fear accidents, and everyone praying to make it through.

I'm going to join the prayer. The city is not for me.

Architecture's Hidden Truths

2009-12-01T06:29:00.000-08:00

I have been struggling to think of something to write about since I got back from visiting my home town for Thanksgiving…I’ve decided to expand on a topic I brought up in a forum I’m a member of.

Architecture.

It amazes me that some of the most valuable architecture in the country (houses, office buildings, etc.) is modeled after the nature it inherently destroys. The more windows, skylights, patio doors, balconies, wood flooring, exposed trusses, the better.

It is true that having the feeling of being outside is comforting (consciously to me) apparently unconsciously to most. This civilization has so skewed the way people look at where they live that they have made the indoors as much like the outdoors as possible without it being “wild” or “uncontrollable”. In a mansion covered with windows you can successfully disconnect from nature while still watching and hearing the rain.

“Buildings, too, are children of Earth and Sun.” –Frank Lloyd Wright

Yet what is a spring shower without the drops pummeling off your face as you grin from puddle to puddle?

Folks will sit out on their balconies and patios for hours reading, writing, watching…yet they do not sit in their (often well manicured) yards, or go explore the last remaining stand of wood in their communities.

Property sells for more when located next to a city park than it does when located next to barely charted wilderness. This is a good thing for those like me that love the wilderness, but it’s strange to me at the same time. People want only concentrated and well controlled doses of nature in this society.

A potted plant, a skylight. Mention a large expanse of unfenced wood or a day out in rain gear splashing through mud and these same people who paid top dollar to feel close to nature will cringe in fear.

“God is the great mysterious motivator of what we call nature, and it has often been said by philosophers, that nature is the will of God. And I prefer to say that nature is the only body of God that we shall ever see.” –Frank Lloyd Wright

This applies on a large scale as well. Let’s take central park for instance. Humans need greenery, nature, life, and so we put it in the middle of our zones of destruction and death (cities). The apartments/condos overlooking the park sell for more money than I and ten of my friends will likely make in a lifetime.

The Smothered Scream of a Wage Slave

2009-11-18T05:06:00.000-08:00

I’ve been thinking today about passions, dreams, goals (all of the things our society sugar coats into meaning success, money, and promotions). What really and truly makes me happy? Well, writing of course. Not the manual writing I do for my job or the editing I do for extra money….ACTUAL writing. Soul bending, heart tearing writing. Writing that stops me dead in my tracks as the muse takes over and I stare, dumbfounded, at the page.

If I were to break it down in a more scientific sense I would say that the higher the percentage of concrete is when compared to the percentage of trees is in an area the lower my productivity falls. Basically, cities suck the soul right out of me. It’s hard to write when I look around and no longer hold any hope for humanity and limited hope for the earth as a whole.

“Poetry has been able to function quite directly as human interpretation of the raw, loose universe. It is a mixture, if you will, of journalism and metaphysics, or of science and religion.” –Annie Dillard

It’s in and surrounded by nature that I feel at peace. Not so at peace, mind you, that I would only write sappy love sonnets and the like, but at peace enough that my heart isn’t racing in such fear that putting pen to paper is inconceivable. Sunlight helps, as do stars that aren’t diluted by city lights. Crickets (not of the sound machine variety) calm me like no lullaby ever could.

So, I suppose the problem isn’t knowing what I need to be happy and to write—it’s getting what I need. I won’t get it working my 9-5 job (now complete with overtime) in a building with one window surrounded by the most “city like” parts of my city (pavement, too much traffic, and industry everywhere). Yet how do I go live closer to nature and still make enough money to survive in this society?

I really don’t know the answer to that.

“Yes, there is a Nirvana; it is in leading your sheep to a green pasture, and in putting your child to sleep, and in writing the last line of your poem.” –Kahlil Gibran

My daily schedule is enough to drive anyone insane. I wake up at 5:20am (and it’s dark) get to work by 6am and don’t leave until 5:30pm (when it is also dark). If I want to see daylight at all I need to leave at lunch, where I can get a 30 minute dose of daylight. I get home and all I do is sit, or lay, since I’m so exhausted from staring at a screen all day. Sometimes I try to read, but typically I just fall asleep.

Am I happy with this job? Of course not. How could I be? Yet I sell my life away…

The only semi-agreeable option I know of right now is to go to grad school for my MFA in creative writing. The problem is the school itself is in a city. Yet, at least I won’t be working an office job anymore…

“You are a child of the universe,
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.”
-Desiderata

To Cage a King

2009-11-10T13:32:00.000-08:00

An interesting article I read today reads as follows: LINK

SILVER SPRING, Md. (WUSA) -- Rob Ephraim was holding a small point-and-shoot digital camera as he walked around the National Zoo in Washington with his girlfriend on Sunday.

While the pair were passing through the lion exhibit, Ephraim said there were shouts and a splash as something fell off a 13-foot high concrete wall above the moat surrounding the enclosure where two female lions were lounging in the sun.

"Everybody is freaking out thinking that a kid has just fallen into the lion exhibit and all of a sudden, out pops a little deer head," Ephraim recalled.

Relieved to see a deer rather than a child swimming in the moat below, attention went immediately to the lions.

"They reacted right away," Ephraim said. And the 25-year-old was prepared with the camera.

The resulting video, posted to YouTube, has been seen around the world.

First, the lions shadow the deer as it swims to one end of the moat. One lion jumps in to get the deer, but breaks off the attack.

Later, the lions corner the deer in a stairwell as concerned zookeepers look out a window safely behind steel doors.

"Everybody pretty much thought the deer was done but maybe five minutes went by and you all of a sudden heard some yelps and the deer literally came flying out," Ephraim said. The lions again chased the deer across their yard as it jumped back in the water.

"They were like big house cats toying with a bird that flew in the house," Ephraim said.

Shortly thereafter, police showed up and cleared the area.

Zoo officials say the lion keepers were then able to lure the cats to their secure indoor enclosure.

With the yard safe, staffers tried to rescue the deer.

It was so badly injured, a veterinarian was forced to euthanize it.

The deer most likely entered the zoo property from the adjacent Rock Creek Park and took a wrong turn in a panic, according to zoo officials.

Ephraim said the deer "appeared out of nowhere" and jumped through a crowd of people as it leapt over the concrete barrier blindly down to the moat.

"This is what they do," Ephraim said about the lions. "Seeing them in a caged enclosure is not that interesting. Seeing them actually go after something in the wild and use their instincts is very interesting. I'd pay to go to Africa to see this!"

Written by Scott Broom 9NEWS NOW & wusa9.com

I had to think about this for awhile to figure out what my take on it was. I obviously felt horrible for the lions, as I do for any animal kept unwillingly in a captive situation. I also felt bad for the deer, since its own natural habitat had obviously been so encroached upon that, horrified, it ended up in a zoo and ultimately in a lion’s cage.

I don’t think that there’s an easy answer for what should have been done by humans in this situation since creating the situation in the first place was a mistake.

I find it sad that the lions still remembered (at least slightly) how to hunt, but not how to kill their pray. The deer still knew to try to run, but not to avoid humans in the first place (which would have kept it out of the zoo). Euthanizing the deer after the lions had attacked it seems like a strange move. Many people that commented on the article said that there were “children watching” who didn’t need to see an animal killed and eaten by wild animals.

How sheltered are children these days? It’s okay for them to watch it on Animal Planet but not in real life? Children need to know that in what’s left of the wild animals don’t go shopping at Pick N’ Save for meat, they hunt it.

I guess I’m pretty much disgusted by the whole situation. I don’t think that killing the deer and tossing its body was the solution. Letting the lions at least eat what they had hunted would have been fine.

What the Caged Bird Isn't Singing

2009-11-04T12:22:00.001-08:00

Why our nation is doomed....

Two words:

Big Bird.

Now you may all be laughing right now, shaking your heads and wondering how on earth a cuddly yellow bird could possibly be responsible for the eventual downfall of America. Well, friends, I intend to tell you.

It’s really quite obvious when you think about it. Sesame Street has been around since 1969. That should make the characters that have been on it the entire time (Big Bird included) 40 years old this year. Did the beloved birdie turn 40 however? Definitely not.

Instead of having their characters age like normal individuals on any other street that isn’t Sesamied on earth the Sesame Street gang have decided that Big Bird should turn the same age each year. Until 1991 Big Bird had been four years old for quite some time. In 1991 he turned six (jumping two years somehow). So now, there’s a 40 year old giant bird with a creepy sounding voice pretending that he’s 6 influencing the children of America and around the world.

No wonder our country is going to hell! We have entire generations of children growing up thinking that aging doesn’t happen. When I was young and pointed the enraging fact of Big Bird not aging out to my mother, do you know what she did? She sent me to my room for a nap! We keep sleeping on this major issue and LOOK WHAT HAPPENS. Ice caps melting, rainforests, gone, unnecessary wars!

Don’t even get me started on the fact that the poor bird lives in a city with barely any grass in sight…

When Ethics is Taught by Capitalists...

2009-10-26T07:36:00.000-07:00

Is a life without pain any more of a life than one without pleasure?

I read this article the other day and was truly amazed that this is even a consideration. People are so cold sometimes, most times, I suppose. It still amazes me that there is such a disconnect between the individual in modern society and other living beings on this planet, both human and non human.

Pain free animals? You have got to be kidding me. Couldn’t we just strive not to hurt animals? Making them not feel pain is in many ways a higher level of cruelity than inflicting the pain to begin with.

From the Article:
"If we can't do away with factory farming, we should at least take steps to minimize the amount of suffering that is caused," says Adam Shriver, a philosopher at Washington University in St Louis, Missouri. In a provocative paper published this month, Shriver contends that genetically engineered pain-free animals are the most acceptable alternative (Neuroethics, DOI: 10.1007/s12152-009-9048-6). "I'm offering a solution where you could still eat meat but avoid animal suffering."

The fact that this “philosopher” just assumes there is no alternative to factory farming makes me wonder how much research he has done. He acts like there really is no other choice but to torture animals, and that to ‘improve’ this ‘unavoidable’ situation he wants to genetically take away the ability to feel.

Perhaps looking at the human equivalent of this phenomenon will shed some light. Let’s take a look at Gabby Gingras. Here’s a CNN article on her.

From the article:

She has a disorder known as CIPA -- congenital insensitivity to pain with anhidrosis. Although she can feel touch, her brain doesn't receive signals that she's experiencing pain, and she hardly sweats. If Gabby broke her leg, or put her hand on a hot plate, or if her body was overheating, she wouldn't know.

It is an extremely dangerous condition, and very rare. Gabby's doctor, Dr. Peter Dyck at the Mayo Clinic, in Rochester, Minnesota, estimates there are only 100 documented cases of CIPA in the world.

"Not being able to feel pain is a terrible disadvantage," Dyck said.

Steve and Trish Gingras first noticed something was wrong when Gabby was 4 months old. She was biting her fingers until they bled. By the time she was 2, her teeth had to be removed so she wouldn't hurt herself. Now, she must eat very small bites of soft food -- and like everything else she does, she eats with gusto.

The problems with not being able to feel pain start small but grow into a huge issue. At least in Gabby’s case her parents can communicate with her and when she was 5, in 2006, she understood (at least to an extent) her condition.

Taking away an animal’s ability to feel pain is a danger to both the animal and to the handlers of the animals. Lameness will be much more difficult to detect in animals along with other medical conditions. I have no idea how the lack of pain would effect birthing in mammal breeds.

There is something terribly morbid in the modern sympathy with pain. One should sympathize with the colour, the beauty, the joy of life. The less said about life's sores the better. --Oscar Wilde

All of those practical problems hold nothing compared to the fact that removing pain from any living thing is fundamentally wrong and not humanity’s right. Humans would never truly know if the animals’ ability to feel pain was gone. I had a discussion with a woman that lives and works on a dairy farm a little over a week ago and she was convinced that non-modified cows do not feel pain. There is no limit to the ability of people to blind themselves to things when they choose to. Genetically eliminating the ability to feel pain will probably do nothing more but increase the unfit conditions that are factory farms.

Direct Deposit

2009-10-23T05:02:00.000-07:00

Only in Western Civilization would this article ever exist: Should You Sacrifice Love for Work?

The fact that such an article not only exists, but that a “reputable” news agency like CNN ran it makes me sick. Love or work? Really?! There are very few people I know that actually love their jobs. Most of them are simply putting up with them so they can pay their bills and finance happy hour. Some people I know actually hate their jobs. The ones that love them are few and far between and seem to mostly be business owners.

(Most)People get jobs for one underlying reason, to make money. People want to make money for all sorts of reasons. To pay off school debt (my main reason), have a nice house, a nice car, show off, travel (which I do wish I could do more of), and many others. Why people justify their jobs is not what I’m particularly interested in however. What I am interested in/disgusted with is the fact that it is mainstream to choose a job that you likely don’t even love over a person you do.

I don’t care if you work for a fortune 500 company and have an office with a view. If you meet the man/woman that you love it shouldn’t matter. If having them in your life requires you to drop the job that pays you six figures, do it. I could pull on about 1,000 clichés right now discussing never putting money over love. I won’t do that, but keep in mind that old wisdom often becomes cliché over time.

This society is so based on being solitary. It’s quite frowned upon for people to work together that have a romantic relationship, yet this is something that essentially used to happen all of the time. In many, if not most, indigenous societies people lived in thriving, functioning communities unlike anything we see often today. Men and women in love and not in love worked side by side. They may have had different tasks that separated them on some days by several miles, but they were a community, and were never too far apart. I highly doubt they had any discussions about whether to go gather food or be in love, they were things that existed together and wouldn’t make any sense to separate.

The careers of the twenty first century, however, are all about separation. Separation from ownership and the employees. Separation between the office workers and those in the factories. Separation from the factories and the results of their production.

Profiting off of both human and non human pain and suffering REQUIRES separation.

This separation then leaks into other areas of our lives, including relationships.

Don’t let it. Never be the one who gave up love for a dependable direct deposit.

Artificial Communities

2009-10-21T05:12:00.000-07:00

I was driving to work, per the usual, early this morning when I realized that I see the same group of cars/people at a certain intersection during each commute. There’s the large mail truck that takes the turn too slowly, the biker in all yellow who looks nervously at the cars, the woman in the black coup doing her makeup. As this realization struck me I felt comforted that I held a place in this commuting community. I felt comforted, that is, until I put some more thought into it.

This “community” I’d experienced was an artificial one. Our society is full of such artificial communities and even goes so far as to market them as real ones. As humans it is natural for us to want to belong, to have a network of people that make us feel safe. I live with two roommates I found on Craigslist. I did this partially to save money, but mostly to establish a living community that I’d been missing while living alone. While I do converse with the two women I live with, they barely know me. Compared to the people that live downstairs, however, they know a lot. My downstairs neighbors make us women feel safe. There are there men that we occasionally say hi to on passing. We take comfort in knowing they are there. We feel like they are part of our community, but they aren’t. All that we know about them is that they seem to bike everywhere and listen to music with a lot of bass until around 10:30pm.

"We were born to unite with our fellow men, and to join in community with the human race." -Cicero

Genuine communities don’t seem to exist much anymore, at least not in cities. People can live for years next to one another and never spend more than ten minutes in conversation. This disconnect wasn’t always the case and I’m sure in some smaller communities that it doesn’t exist at all.

I grew up in a small town in Wisconsin. I knew my neighbors, as did my parents, and it wasn’t unheard of to run to one of their houses within a two block radius and ask to borrow something. Be it the cliché cup of sugar or an air compressor or tool of some sort. We all borrowed things to one another without question. I would spend hours playing with the neighborhood children, laughing, having a blast. We varied in age by over five years but we were still the best of friends. But now, over 15 years later, we have all drifted apart. The neighbors my parents would spend hours talking to on back porches have moved away, their houses have been torn down. New houses all from the same mold and builder have taken their place with neighbors they might mumble a hello to in passing.

What destroyed the community? What is the culprit? I could go ahead and blame Western Society without even blinking as I so often do for problems such as this, but I believe it’s necessary to go deeper. It would be naive to say that Western Society wasn’t around 15 years ago when I was busy playing sports with my neighbors. I’m sure that some children still have similar experiences, somewhere, today. What I think it comes down to is understanding Western Culture as a disease. The disease has many stages that slowly progress to total decimation. When I was a child we were in a stage several before the stage we now sit in. Although a community existed then it was still quite watered down compared to communities in the 1800’s, which were watered down compared to communities 200 years before, and so on and so forth.

"There can be no vulnerability without risk; there can be no community without vulnerability; there can be no peace, and ultimately no life, without community." -M. Scott Peck

This society is slowly sweeping away our connections with each other and with the land we live on. We no longer blink when we find out a low income housing complex will be torn down to build condos. We do not borrow sugar from our neighbors, we chain our doors against them. We establish artificial communities in our commutes, online, and in our minds.

Let’s get over this block we’ve created (or had created for us) against meeting and knowing people. Perhaps I’ll go visit my downstairs neighbors today, bring them some cookies and get to know them. It would be a start, at least.

Good, Better, Best, Never Let it Rest, Until the Good is the Better and the Better is the Best!

2009-10-20T06:34:00.000-07:00

As most of you know, I ran Cross Country and Track in high school, but when I decided to start running competitively again this summer it had been five years since my last race. I had no idea what to expect, all I knew is that my competitive spirit was still very much intact and that I’d keep pushing myself.

"Every morning in Africa a gazelle wakes up. It knows it must move faster than the lion or it will not survive. Every morning a lion wakes up and it knows it must move faster than the slowest gazelle or it will starve. It doesn't matter if you are the lion or the gazelle, when the sun comes up, you better be moving." - Maurice Greene

I entered my first race, a 5k to push myself to start running regularly again. I didn’t anticipate being competitive in the overall top finishers, and had no idea what to expect for a goal time. I ended up being second in my age category and winning a hat (random I know). We mapped the course to figure out our slow times and realized it was an extra 1k! After that, I was hooked. I remembered everything I loved about running in high school and knew that not much would tear me away now.

"I always loved running...it was something you could do by yourself, and under your own power. You could go in any direction, fast or slow as you wanted, fighting the wind if you felt like it, seeking out new sights just on the strength of your feet and the courage of your lungs." - Jesse Owens

Over the course of the summer I ran several more races, placing each time and getting more and more hooked. I ordered some awesome road race shoes and realized that even without a team like the one I loved in high school I could have a blast running.

The last race I ran was on October 7 and I ended up getting a PR. Granted I’ve only been running 5ks this season, but improvement is improvement.

"The woods are lovely dark and deep, but I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep, and miles to go before I sleep." - Robert Frost

My goal now? Well, I signed up for two trail races in November, the much loved Turkey Trots. One is in my current city, the other in my home town on the trails I ran in high school. I will be breaking out the spikes that haven’t seen the light of day in five years and pushing out what I hope will be the best times of my 5k career. I am going to start concentrating on training how I should be. No more 3mi runs each day and calling it quits. I will incorporate intervals, long slow distance days, hills, and even some 800 repeats (just need to find a track around here to use for that).

Knees: All through high school I had horrible issues with tendinitis in my knees. It’s still there, for sure. I have been wearing Cho-Pat straps under the kneecaps however and that seems to be solving most of my problems. If they really start to bother me I’ll take a day or two off (something I would never have dreamed of doing in high school). Hopefully they will continue to hold up, I’m not sure I could give up running again.

Birch and Fern

2009-10-12T07:05:00.000-07:00

I miss the stars of the north. The way that they were everywhere I looked at night, bright and shining as if they could still remember their purpose when not disturbed by city lights.

I’ve always loved northern Wisconsin. I’ve longed to go there from time to time since my life got so busy that it never seemed to happen more than once or twice a year. Until a month ago I hadn’t spent more than three days in a row up there since I was 14. I think the three day limit was keeping me safe from the constant longing I’m now struggling with. Three days was okay, it was enough to continue my affair with the birch and fern, but not enough to lead to true love. The north was a mistress and nothing more. But the nine days I spent up there in September led to love—and love leads to irrationality.

"In the woods we return to reason and faith. There I feel that nothing can befall me in life--no disgrace, no calamity (leaving me my eyes), which nature cannot repair."

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Last week Tuesday I took a sick day and actually considered driving four hours north at 6am, spending the day at my parent’s place up there, and driving back at around 8pm. After quite the struggle I talked myself out of this gas and money-guzzling adventure. The fact that I even considered something as irresponsible as this, however, shows how much I miss it there.

I wonder sometimes how it is that I ended up living in the city. I love the culture of this town and the accepting nature of most people here…but all I want is to live in the country these days. Although I’m sure as soon as I got there I’d miss everything being so close. I remember when I was around twelve I wrote a poem called Country and City Girl showing my conflicting viewpoints on where I’d like to live. Those conflicts haven’t really been resolved.

I want to go to grad school next year but I’m not sure the idea of living in an even bigger city than the one I’m in now is a good one. I will be further north, but a north filled with sound barricades and traffic isn’t one I particularly look forward to. I guess I have some more thinking to do.

“The richness I achieve comes from Nature, the source of my inspiration.”

-Claude Monet

When Peace Isn't Given A Chance

2009-10-09T05:23:00.000-07:00

Alright everyone—this morning I am confused. As I’m sure most of you have already heard, the President of the United States, Barack Obama, has won the Nobel Peace Prize.

I’m trying to wrap my head around how any United States President (or any governmental leader in any country) could win this award.

OSLO (Reuters) “The Norwegian Nobel Committee praised Obama for ‘his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.’ But critics -- especially in parts of the Arab and Muslim world -- called its decision premature.”

Maybe I’m missing something but I thought that America was AT WAR? Perhaps a short review of things America has done (and is doing) since Obama has been in office will shed some light on this?

Maybe we need to look at the Nobel Peace Prize itself, and what it is supposed to represent? According to their website On 27 November 1895, Alfred Nobel signed his last will and testament, giving the largest share of his fortune to a series of prizes, the Nobel Prizes. As described in Nobel's will, one part was dedicated to "the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses".

10/4/09 “President Obama is overseeing a review of U.S. strategy in Afghanistan, with his top general in that country, some other military leaders and opposition Republicans pressing him to act quickly to increase the present 68,000-troop level by up to 40,000 troops.”

Deaths in Afghanistan :

There have been 1,435 coalition deaths -- 865 Americans, 11 Australians, one Belgian, 219 Britons, 131 Canadians, three Czech, 25 Danes, 21 Dutch, six Estonians, one Finn, 35 French, 30 Germans, two Hungarians, 20 Italians, three Latvian, one Lithuanian, four Norwegians, 13 Poles, two Portuguese, 11 Romanians, one South Korean, 25 Spaniards, two Swedes, two Turks and one NATO/ISAF -- in the war on terror as of October 8, 2009, according to a CNN count. Below are the names of the soldiers, Marines, airmen and sailors whose deaths have been reported by their nation's governments. The list also includes one U.S. Defense Department civilian employee. The troops died in support of the U.S.-led Operation Enduring Freedom or the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan. At least 4,178 U.S. personnel have been wounded in action, according to the Pentagon.

Obviously not all of these deaths occurred while Obama was in office, but he has failed to end this war and the death toll continues to grow. In September of 2009 alone CNN lists 70 deaths in Afghanistan. Obama is not directly responsible for any of these deaths but his leadership and continuing the war did lead to most of them. Yet he deserves a peace prize?

Perhaps we should define peace. Here’s what Merriam Webster has to say on the topic: Main Entry: ¹peace

Pronunciation: \ˈpēs\

Function: noun

1 : a state of tranquility or quiet: as a : freedom from civil disturbance b : a state of security or order within a community provided for by law or custom
2 : freedom from disquieting or oppressive thoughts or emotions
3 : harmony in personal relations
4 a : a state or period of mutual concord between governments b : a pact or agreement to end hostilities between those who have been at war or in a state of enmity
5 —used interjectionally to ask for silence or calm or as a greeting or farewell

It’s possible I’m missing something, but I don’t think America in the last year (or Obama’s leadership of it) fits into any of these definitions. Let’s go through examples of why (and where) it hasn’t.

State of tranquility or quiet, freedom from civil disturbance (Iraq, Afghanistan)
Freedom from disquieting or oppressive thoughts or emotions (G20 Protests )
Harmony in personal relations (I don’t know much about Obama’s family life, MAYBE he qualifies here).
a. A state or period of mutual concord between governments (it doesn’t say it needs to be ALL governments here, so maybe Obama squeaks past with America’s “allies”.

b. a pact or agreement to end hostilities between those who have been at war or in a state of enmity (hasn’t happened with Iraq or Afghanistan)

5. Used interjectionally to ask for silence or calm or as a greeting or farewell. (I don’t think this much applies, but perhaps Obama would qualify here).

I better congratulate Obama however, I wouldn’t want all of his “Peace Keeping Forces” (with guns) to get mad at me or anything.

What the Fuck, Chuck?

2009-10-01T06:29:00.000-07:00

So, I decided to take a non-credit creative writing class this fall at a local technical college. I wasn’t expecting much when I signed up, was just hoping for a few good prompts to get me writing regularly again. I was pleasantly surprised to find a group of intelligent people in the class and an awesome professor with a respectable syllabus. We even had homework! (The nerd in me was definitively in heaven).

There is only one problem with the respectful awesome class—and that problem is Chuck. Chuck has an MFA in writing, which at first made me excited to have a classmate that had experience writing in the professional realm. That was, of course, until I found out that he was the gloating type. Not only did he try to take over the class (interrupting the professor and preaching about how she should teach) but he also managed to wave his own book around so that we’d all notice he had one.

The first class period we had a writing prompt where we had to write a list-type thing. Most of us shared ours—I’ll probably post mine on here as an example when I get home. He, of course, shared his. I hate to be judgmental, but it’s all too easy to judge a guy who is obviously judging everyone else. I said a nice comment about what he read because he complimented what I wrote—but his writing isn’t all that good.

Last night was the second class, and true to form Chuck was his own pretentious self. Our assignment was to read a paragraph or two from our favorite author and talk about why we liked them. It was great at first. People sharing from authors I’d never heard of but definitely wanted to read. It was great, of course, until Chuck decided he needed to interject. He started name dropping authors and analyzing what each person said. If he didn’t ‘approve’ of people’s choices he would look obviously annoyed. His comments made us almost not finish in time before the class ended. People in the class were obviously just as annoyed as me. I wish the teacher had said something. The woman across from me was covering her mouth to keep from laughing.

When it was Chuck’s turn to share, his holier than thou attitude continued. He decided to share a poem. He HANDED OUT copies of the poem effectively killing a few trees for his dumb ass superiority complex. The poem wasn’t very good. On top of that he then analyzed the poem like we would in one of my 400 level writing classes in college if it was an assignment. Only, he was the only one analyzing. He talked for over ten minutes about this poem and why it was so great, dropping literary definitions like they were candy in a parade and we the eager children waiting on the sides of the road. (Only we weren’t children and were far from eager to listen to his lecture).

Next week we are critiquing writing people handed out at the end of class. We only have about 5minutes per person to critique. I hope to god Chuck doesn’t get called on. If he does and tries to take up all of my critique time I’m going to interrupt him and tell him I want a few other opinions before my time runs out.

I Really Cannot Believe I Have To Do This

2009-09-29T04:53:00.000-07:00

I was talking to a friend yesterday who was honestly convinced that the environment was better off now than in the past. I decided the best way to combat this strange, and untrue, assumption was with photos. I gathered all of these via Google Images (or referenced where I got them).

Above is an image of clear cutting in the Boreal Forest. Destruction continues to this day.

Above is an image of a whale beached and dead. It was killed by navy sonar use, which continues.

Whaling continues year after year even with depleted populations and a public outcry from many for it to stop.

Depleted Uranium Birth Defects (Above). "Also in 1999, a United Nations subcommission considered DU hazardous enough to call for an initiative banning its use worldwide. The initiative has remained in committee, blocked primarily by the United States, according to Karen Parker, a lawyer with the International Educational Development/Humanitarian Law Project, which has consultative status at the United Nations." See this article.

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - Polar bear populations in and around Alaska are declining due to continued melting of sea ice and Russian poaching, according to reports released Thursday by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Space Trash. "It is estimated that hundreds of millions of pieces of space trash are now floating through our region of the solar system. Some of them are as large as trucks while others are smaller than a flake of paint. There are a couple of relatively famous pieces of space trash. One is the glove that floated away from the Gemini 4 crew during the first spacewalk by U.S. astronauts. The other is the camera Michael Collins lost during the Gemini 10 mission. Rocket boosters, pieces that came loose from spacecraft, and fragments and particles created by space collisions or explosions are other examples of the types of trash whizzing around Earth at speeds of up to 36,000 km per hour."

Oil Spills. Oil continues to be accidentally spilled into waterways around the world. With each spill environments are destroyed. Here are some links to more recent oil spills (there are obviously many more):
Pine River
Brazil
Queensland
West Cork, Ireland
Des Plaines River

Coffee Farming. This requires people to clearcut their land to create space to grow coffee, which in turn destroys the soil. (Picture from WWF article).

Manatees. "The population of manatees in Florida (T. manatus) is thought to be between 1,000 and 3,000, yet population estimates are very difficult. The number of manatee deaths in Florida caused by humans has been increasing through the years, and now typically accounts for 20%-40% of recorded manatee deaths.^[10] There were 417 manatee deaths in Florida in 2006 with 101 attributed to human causes according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission."

I could go on and on, but this (The 15 most toxic places to live) article seems to sum it up pretty well.

-Amelie

My Great Nine-Day Adventure

2009-09-26T14:05:00.000-07:00

Day 3
Soaking up the sun this morning as well, there are more fishermen out now than there were yesterday however. It’s 10:20am and the loons are already singing. I’m not sure I ever want to leave this place. I think the north is where I want to buy a house, not here, there are too many houses, but somewhere like this place likely was one hundred years ago.

The loons are my alarm clock calling strong as they mourn, requesting another day’s protection from the motors, from the scorn.

If you go an entire summer without a mosquito bite in Wisconsin you most definitely need to get out more. Last night alone I think I ATE about ten of them on my run.

I saw a squirrel fall out of a tree this morning and calmly paddle back to shore. I think it was my pissed off little friend from yesterday who with a morning starting with a fall from a tree will likely not be any more friendly today.

I love how everyone waves up north. I was running yesterday and each car I passed waved, each boat that drives by the pier I now write on waves. Hell, I have conversations with strangers up here. A man was walking his dog yesterday during my early morning run and I STOPPED RUNNING to discuss the unreasonably warm weather. I’ve told friends before that morning people everywhere are more friendly—seem more trusting of those that get up at six in the morning than those that stay up until 4am.

Up north people are morning people all of the time. I think it’s the winters up here that do it. We all know that in two months we might be relying on a stranger to pull us out of a tough place (namely a ditch). In four months the ditches will be so full of snow that they won’t be distinguishable—but the snow BANKS then prove an even bigger danger because when it goes from “warm” (about 32 degrees) to “chilly” (about ten degrees) they freeze into solid walls of ice. At this point going into the ditch can result in the same amount of damage (and injuries) as a front end collision. You had better hope you waved to your neighbor in September.

My hands might be shaking a bit from the caffeine but I feel GREAT. I heard two gunshots this morning. I wonder what they were shooting at.

As you zoom through the water in your high-fangled state-of-the-art speed boat you fail to see the loons floating gracefully upon the bay. The loons have been there for hours—teaching their young one how to hunt on his own, calling encouragement at his failures and successes.

But you don’t see. Your boat is too fast to notice—the motor too loud to hear the mournful calls that mark their alarm at your fast approach. You fail to see. Spend several hours, days, years on the bay with no motors and no speed. Then tell me of the loons. I will tell you of the silence broken by the unnatural wake of your boat. I will tell you of the floating cigarette butts that washed upon shore after your departure. AND I WILL TELL YOU how close the loons came to bid their thank you to a friend who told you to stop and listen.

Later, 4:30pm:
I was taking a nap upstairs in the house when I heard the loons calling, I didn’t see them on the bay at first. I saw a mink running along the shore, but now I see a loon about one hundred yards from the pier. The loons really are my alarm clock this week.

I now understand all of the grooming I’ve seen them doing and the strange activity of the loons. It looks like they are molting their summer plumage for winter feathers. Their backs are more dull right now than usual, it probably itches. I’ve never been up here at this time of year so it makes sense that I’ve never seen it before.

Wildlife seen today:
Loons
Vultures
Squirrels
Mink
Blue jays
crows
Chipmonks
Wildlife heard today:
Loons
Crows
Ducks
Squirrels

My Great Nine-Day Adventure

2009-09-26T13:44:00.000-07:00

Day 2
I put some corn out last night and this morning I’m watching all of the critters prepare for winter as they bury it all around the yard.

Just gathered two buckets full of kindling for the winter-would gather more (there’s plenty for the taking) but I’m not sure where I’d put more of it. I’m sure it’ll be much appreciated when the ground is covered with four feet of snow in a couple months.

Came within a foot of a little chipmunk that had his cheeks packed to the max with corn I’d set out. He looked at me as if to say “thank you”.

I’m beginning to wonder if the loons have gone for the year already. I have yet to hear or see th em. Perhaps just the young are left here now. I’m not sure if the babies would call out at all—even if they did have a sibling on the lake.

I’m now sitting on the pier up north with a tray table, Endgame, a banana, a camera, a phone, and binoculars (oh, and a water bottle). I suppose that the phone is a breach in the ‘cut off from technology’ security—but I justified it by saying my mother would be worried if she called and I didn’t answer. It really is amazing how sound travels on this lake.

I haven’t seen any mammals larger than squirrels yet up here, but there are some strange droppings in the yard that make me think something larger—a badger or something of comparable size—is nearby.

I’m wearing a tube top-trying to get a last ditch attempt at a tan before the six month winter sets in. I think I’m still in denial about summer being almost over.

I was just thinking—how many mascots are endangered in their home states? The Badgers for instance—I’ve lived my whole life in this state and have not once seen one in the wild—not that running into one would be a fun filled experience per say. But, it would be one I should have had by now if they were so prevalent as to name a team in my state after them.
There’s a Musky fishing competition today so there are more boats than usual on the lake. I can see two right now in our small bay alone.

I sat, peaceful, serene, on the aluminum pier—not considering at all how unnatural the metal was—then with a glance toward the brown water lake I saw, clearly and without question the top from a soda or beer can about four feet down. What careless individual would go through the trouble of pulling the top off just to toss it into the lake and where is the can?

An airplane sounds so out of place in these woods, yet there it goes heading somewhere north of here.

“Even the trees in cities are in cages” Derrick Jensen

They are cutting down trees across the lake from me. Two have crashed to their deaths so far and they are working on a third. All I can see from here are their top branches as they fall and then I hear the crash as they touch the ground for the first time. The leaves would have fallen naturally in about two weeks, but now at least 30 years of growth lies dying on the ground. What purpose does this serve? Likely nothing more than a better view. Yet I myself write these words on a processed downed tree.

2:50pm Day 2
I got my answer to the loon question. There’s at least one I just heard it.

There are now two mature loons in the bay and one is acting quite strange. I’ve seen them “dance” before but this is different than anything I’ve ever seen. It will sink partway under water then flap its wings like mad as if to swim or take off but at the wrong depth for either. At first he was actually rolling in the water and I thought something like a musky might be attacking him. I was really worried but then I saw what I can only assume is a mate in the bay too—about one hundred yards from him and I felt much better.
Later: Two parent loons and a full grown baby-still in his/her adolescent plumage. That’s who they were calling to earlier I assume.

They may have stayed in the bay for hours if not for the asshole boat of fishermen that basically drove right at them. Grr! Motorboats, another way we are fucking up nature. The row boat promoted fitness, didn’t pollute—and didn’t scare the shit out of wildlife.

“The best and most courageous and most sincere of our efforts are never sufficient to the task of stopping those who would destroy.” Derrick Jensen

Red squirrels are far from quiet as they move about in the early fall. I just saw one in the yard behind me (I tried to film this with my camera but messed something up). I turned around and he froze, looking at me. He then rose to his hind legs (all five inches of his height) and started making these high pitched chirping sounds at me. He sprinted to the tree overlooking the lake by me, ran up and down it continuing his noises and glared at me for a good two minutes!

Later yet: WOW is all I can say. Who in their right mind drives a pontoon boat directly at an animal? ESPECIALLY a protected animal like a loon? What the fuck, I’m livid. I wish I had a boat right now so I could go fucking punch that guy driving the two jackasses that were and the boat who didn’t tell the driver to stop. The poor loons dove at the last minute.

Two hours later: I just sat for two hours watching the loons in our bay, always from a distance, smiling and totally at ease. They never went near a pier and then, just now, the mates came up within 20 feet of me. They looked at me, spread their wings for me and with one short call from one to the other they dove away. I feel that somehow they knew that even if it took swimming out to that boat that I would have kept them safe one way or another.

The squirrel is chirping to me again as if to tell me that I am right.

I love it when it’s no challenge to imagine a place as it was one hundred years ago. It’s so simple here. Remove the piers and you’re pretty much there. The loud motor boat and water skier that just almost took out the loons would have to go as well. I wish this was a non-motorized lake. Or one with an idiot test to enter.

Wildlife seen today:
Red Squirrels
Loons
Blue Jays
Grey Squirrels
Wildlife heard today:
Ducks
Loons

My Great Nine-Day Adventure

2009-09-26T13:00:00.000-07:00

Day 1

Got up here at around 4pm today and already (it’s 8:30) I find myself settling in. The simplicity of the days ahead of me is exciting. A jigsaw puzzle, perhaps a swim, early morning runs. Not opening a computer for days—ah—it’s like I’ve finally exhaled after two years of holding it in.

I’m alone up here (not counting the neighbors who are up now too). It will be my first time up here entirely alone as well as my first time doing a lot of things alone. I don’t feel alone in this house though. There are too many happy memories filling it up for that.

I look to the backyard and don’t see an empty lake—no—I see luges coated with water while our parents weren’t looking. I see my Little Mermaid saucer sled zipping down the luge at the front of a train. (The way that memory ends isn’t particularly happy, but with over ten years to dull it, it’s funny now).

I sit now at the dining room table and I don’t see three empty chairs. To the contrary—I see it full with a blue Fischer Price table nearby holding several more bodies. I hear laughter at the first play through of Apples to Apples—I hear my younger brother’s cries as he tries to explain he broke his arm on a four wheeler.

I see all of this and so much more. I’m far from alone. I have twenty years worth of memories to fill these walls.

I think that this will be a fruitful week as far as writing goes. I hope to get some amazing photography as well—both passions that I have allowed to lay dormant for far too long.

I also need to think about what I plan to do next year. School in Minnesota? Or the more drastic choice to move west to Oregon—a state I have never been to but somehow know is a place I belong. I need to stop even considering staying in Wisconsin in my wage slave technical writing job as an option. I need to remember to dream before I forget how to altogether.

Wildlife seen today:

2 Bald Eagles

2 Blue Jays

3 Bats

Animals heard today:

Ducks on Lake

Vacation Withdrawal

2009-09-23T07:35:00.000-07:00

As most of you know I just got back from a nine day retreat north a few days ago and since I have been going through the typical vacation withdrawal I’m sure all have experienced. I now sit at a desk in an office with no windows. A week ago I sat on a pier on a northern lake watching the loons teach their young to fly.

I now write manuals about an industry I’m not sure I agree with. A week ago I was working on an environmental novel that made me feel truly alive for the first time in what feels like years.

I get home from work and I take a nap, then maybe go outside for a run, or a little reading. A week ago I was only inside after dark, up until then I was outside listening to the languages of nature and learning more about life than I could ever find in a fluorescently lit room.

I wrote a lot while I was up there and I’m going to start (hopefully tomorrow) posting my musings from the north.

Thanks,

Amelie

Die Willy Die

2009-09-08T12:05:00.000-07:00

I recently saw a commercial for the U.S. Navy that was promoting how environmentally friendly they were. I have searched for over an hour and can’t find the ad anywhere online. If you watch TV with any regularity however I’m sure you have seen it or will soon. (There’s a jogging woman talking about how great the Navy is). First of all, the only premise they seem to base this on is the use of nuclear power in their ships and submarines. Don’t even get me started on how bad that is. The waste product of nuclear power (spent fuel rods) remain toxic for thousands of years and we have yet to know what to do to detoxify them.

I am not so much here to talk about why nuclear power is horrible and no reason to call yourself green (yes, I’m talking to you US Navy) but here to talk about the other atrocity they have been a part of for years—killing marine life. I’m sure you all remember Keiko and your love for the character, Willy, he played in the box office hit Free Willy. Well, how would you feel about a bunch of dead Keikos? We all cheered as they freed him in the movie yet we sit passively by while whales and other marine life are killed for unnecessary training exercises.

Here’s a video about the danger to marine life from these loud noises (sonar) used by the Navy.

There was a temporary ban on these harmful uses of Sonar that were killing marine life, but that ban was lifted in November of 2008.

Here’s an excerpt from the article linked above:

“For the [environmentalists], the most serious possible injury would be harm to an unknown number of the marine mammals that they study and observe,” he wrote. “In contrast, forcing the Navy to deploy an inadequately trained antisubmarine force jeopardizes the safety of the fleet.”

In an important caveat, the chief justice added: “Military interests do not always trump other considerations, and we have not held that they do. In this case, however, the proper determination of where the public interest lies does not strike us as a close question.”

In a dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said the court-ordered mitigation measures were “manageable” and justified. She said the Navy’s own assessments predicted “substantial and irreparable harm to marine mammals.”

So, I’m just wondering how exactly the U.S. Navy is so environmentally responsible?

Here are some more articles you should check out:
US Navy Admits Its Sonar Killed Whales

Whale Killed During Navy Sonar Exercises

Sonar from Navy likely killed whales in the Bahamas

Artificial Productivity

Pocahontas Meets Spoken Word

Another Far too Short Trip North: Night One

Gobby Goo By: Amelie Lillith

A Good Video

Liar, Liar, The Ocean's on Fire

Are Big Green Groups Protesting Too Little Amid Oil Disaster? http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/06/13-0

BP oil leak aftermath: Slow-motion tragedy unfolds for marine life http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jun/10/bp-oil-leak-marine-life-wildlife

Defenders of Wildlife blog: http://www.defendersblog.org/

BP Censoring Media, Destroying Evidence http://www.huffingtonpost.com/riki-ott/from-the-ground-bp-censor_b_608724.html

Gulf Needs Concrete Actions that Respect Residents' Rights http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kerry-kennedy/gulf-needs-concrete-actions_b_609827.html

Cheney's Push of Deregulators led to BP Disaster http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=5163

Oiled Birds Everywhere, but Little Rescue Crews can do http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Oiled_birds_everywhere_but_little_rescue_crews_can_do_999.html

Oil Leak Counter

Let's Find the Spark and Fight Back: Gulf Oil Leak

Articles:

Yes, Mr. President, It Was Your Katrina - Three Weeks Ago. Now it May Be Your Chernobyl By: Robert Redick http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/05/24-5

Oil Oozing Up On Shore Despite Best Efforts Of BP, Coast Guard To Contain (PR) Fallout: http://news.firedoglake.com/2010/05/19/oil-oozing-up-on-shore-despite-best-efforts-of-bp-coast-guard-to-contain-pr-fallout/

BP Witholds Oil Spill Facts--And Government Lets It: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/05/18/94415/bps-secrecy-keep-facts-on-gulf.html

Norman engineer has own idea about how to stop Gulf oil leak http://www.newsok.com/norman-engineer-has-own-idea-about-how-to-stop-gulf-oil-leak/article/3462317?custom_click=pod_headline_national-finance-news

CT inventor proposes solution to Gulf oil leak: http://www.hartfordbusiness.com/news13241.html

Links:

A livestream of the oil geyser: http://www.livestream.com/wkrg_oil_spill

Coast Guard says "It's BP's Rules, Not Ours" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eb4JWgUuSEE&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fuser%2Fgreenman3610%23p&feature=player_profilepage

Radio out of New Orleans talking about the spill and what is REALLY going on down there: http://www.wwl.com/pages/1050632.php

But most of all end the system that is destroying the planet.

The Real Eco-Terrorists

Time to Take Action: The Gulf of Mexico Oil Leak

Obama: Breaking One Promise at a Time

It's Time to Connect the (Oily) Dots

Be the Green Fire

My Second Up North Adventure, Day 3 of 3

My Second Up North Adventure, Day 2 of 3

My Second (and short) Up North Adventure, Day 1 of 3

Response from Sea World

Rusty Harman’s Experience

Sr. Director

Busch Entertainment Corporation

Sr.Director

Marketing for BEC

Strategic Marketing Director

VP Marketing

SeaWorld Cleveland

VP Marketing

SeaWorld Texas

Microwaves: Not Intended as Flotation Devices

Songs of Escape, of Soul, and Truth

Jack Hanna Needs a Smaller Cage

Long Past Time to Free Every Willy, an open letter to Sea World

Off Target

Poetry

Pandora is Right Here

When Stripes Become Bars

Iceland: Not Pure, Not Natural, Totally Spoiled

The Plastic Project

Eliminating Plastics: The Cleaning Edition

Things covered in this issue: Dishwasher Detergent, Dish Soap, Sponges, Laundry Detergent, Laundry Softener

Dishwasher Detergent:

The recipe:

1 large glass jar (for storage)

1 ½ cups--20 Mule Team Borax (found in the laundry section at most stores)

1 ½ cups—Baking Soda

1 cup—Table Salt

(Mix all together and use ¼ cup per dishwasher load)

Dish Soap:

Stainless steel soap dispensers:

Dish Sponges:

Non-Plastic Sponges:

Home Made Dish Rags:

Laundry Detergent:

Be sure to store it in a glass jar!

Fabric Softener

Store/buy your vinegar in a glass jar.

Eliminating Plastics: The Baby Edition

Eliminating Plastics from your Daily Life, Installment 3

5 gallon buckets for storage/hauling liquids:

Canvas Buckets: Bucket 1 , Bucket 2

I am trying to track down a pattern for making your own canvas bucket but have yet to find one. If anyone has one, or has made one and wants to share please email me/post a comment.

Lunch Box/Bag

If you are anything like me you take a lunch to work/school (or maybe your children/wife/husband/significant other do) nearly every day. Did you ever stop to think about what your lunch box is made out of? Most are made out of plastic (or at least lined with it). Belo