"I fell into a burning Ring of Fire..."

 

The Cinderella Planet

I spent part of the morning reading a superb piece about yet another instance where corporate/industrial development and Indigenous land use are in conflict. The article concerned the “Ring of Fire,” a rich deposit of minerals, some of which are being sought for the manufacture of electric car batteries. Located in the James Bay Lowlands of Northwestern Ontario, the deposit can’t be developed without overland access infrastructure. Rivers will have to be bridged, bogs torn up, forests cut down, all those things northerners recognize from past experience of, for instance, building and maintaining a highway link from Thompson, Manitoba to Winnipeg or from Prince Albert, Saskatchewan to Missinipi. Roads can exact tremendous ecological change, particularly to the delicate balance of land, water, plant and wildlife that has evolved since the last Ice Age in the harsh climate and conditions of the Canadian Shield.

In its pristine state, the Shield can be a paradise of clear, cool lakes and rivers and endless spruce forests.  The land teems with sturgeon, walleye, muskellunge, beaver, muskrat, moose and bear while providing an idyllic habitat for humans who have over many generations learned to live full, satisfying lives in harmony with nature’s largesse. They travel in canoes that leave no dent in the water, fish and hunt only what’s needed to survive, rely on roots and berries to supplement their diets. And in the wilderness where a meteorite deposited the Ring of Fire eons and eons ago, populations still experience that quiet life that is the north, they still dry sturgeon fillets, still hunt the mighty moose and lay in a winter’s supply of food. And the thought of “owning” any of this great north is still anathema to them,  knowing as they do that it all belongs to its creator. That they would wish to have a say into both the if and the how of development should come as no surprise.

Sturgeon Fishing on the Neskantaga First Nation (CBC News)

Shift to the national and international corporations salivating over the possibilities represented in extracting scarce minerals from the Ring of Fire. They will succeed; they have the backing of the Ford government for whom the sturgeon population, algae blooms, drained or flooded bogs and decimation of habitation doesn’t emotionally, personally register. Gross Domestic Product, profitability and jobs are the telling landmarks of progress in a settler colonialism that relies on ever-growing consumption. Settler colonialism that goes hand in hand with corporate capitalism evolves rapidly and decisively toward an end that won’t be pretty; on a limited planet, no system can keep growing indefinitely and the Ring of Fire is just one more example of consumerism’s attempt to stave off its inevitable end, at least for one more generation.

Electric cars and the batteries that they require represent one more attempt to kick the can down the road, to avert disaster without the inconvenience of reducing our wants.  

There may be only one sensible way to approach the looming climate change disaster, and it’s to reduce our consumption to match our needs instead of to our advertising-fed wants. Why, for instance, would we transport kiwi from New Zealand when our just-as-nutritious berries grow naturally where we live? Why would we fly halfway around the planet to attend a meeting on subjects that could be dealt with on the internet? Why would we holiday in places far away when creature-comfort venues can be created locally? Why would we tolerate built in obsolescence in our appliances when the means to manufacture longer-lasting ones are already in place and running? Why would we ship rice from Asia when oats, for instance, provides better nutrition than rice ever has?

Growing for export rather than for the local food market feeds into the consumption-growth-profit model. Much of Saskatchewan’s arable land is used to grow canola, from which the oil is extracted and shipped abroad for the most part. In principle, that same land could be growing oats for oatmeal, wheat for baking, potatoes for local consumption with surpluses marketed more broadly. Freight transportation is extremely unfriendly environmentally; more than profitability must eventually drive our priorities. For the population of the James Bay lowland, profit/loss motives simply weren’t considerations historically; only sustainability, conservation mattered.

Harping on the urgency of the need to shift to needs provision while reducing wants consumption may already be little more than a futile thundering against a lost cause. Breaking personal negative habits is hard enough; smoking, drinking, hamburger & bacon gorging, and lethargic living persist among many until their wants kill them. But that’s still nothing next to the breaking of bad habits in a global economy.

Localizing of economies is a must in a sustainable, renewable future on planet earth. For learning the how of this, the Ojibway of the James Bay lowlands might well serve us as teachers of Chapter One. 

For a more objective description of the Ring of Fire mineral-rich deposit and considerations for its development, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_of_Fire_(Northern_Ontario) To read the article cited in paragraph 1, visit https://www.cbc.ca/newsinteractives/features/a-divisive-road-to-ring-of-fire-ontario. 

P.S. I've borrowed the term "settler colonialism" from Enns/Myers Healing Haunted Histories. It refers to the relationship between those who historically gave something up through colonialism and those who continue to benefit from that historical fact. 

Baaa

"delicado, delicado, please handle with care . . ."

"Vrooom, vrooom . . ."

“Here’s what we ought to do . . .” he said, and I knew I was into yet another monologue on the evils, errors and, yes, remedies for the ills of the world. And while he talked, a germ of a thought began to grow and culminated in a centerpiece for this blog: what if our destinies are governed—not by predestination, fate, or even debate, planning and decision—but by the principles of evolution built into our genes.

               “We ought to raise the price of gasoline to $5.00 per litre,” he was saying, “so that people would actually think twice about buying a humungous pickup truck and settle for a smart car, or something.”

I couldn’t agree more, actually, unless that number were to be $10.00 instead of $5.00. Like so many others, I, too, have a head full of ideas for legislated solutions to developing problems: population control, tidal power, carbon tax, etc., etc.

“It’s not going to happen,” I said.

“Why not?” he replied, “it’s a simple matter, increasing the tax on gasoline to whatever figure you want.”

“Because,” I said, “. . . because the opposition party would immediately promise to roll back the tax if elected, which they would be, and we’d be back to exactly where we are now.”

“So what’s your solution,” he said, “you pessimist?”

“We wait,” I replied. “As oil gets scarcer, the price obviously goes up, eventually to the point where it has the same effect as you’re suggesting and no political party can do anything about it.”

“That’s a pretty sad scenario,” he said.

It is. He’s right, but that’s only if we focus on ourselves—individually—as the relative entities, and not on the herd. How do caribou or snow geese decide when to move and when to stay? They certainly don’t debate, vote and then act. More likely, there appears a need which registers with some or many of them who tentatively make a small gesture toward action. Gradually, the gesture registers with more and more of them—the speed depending on the degree of immediacy and drama in the need—until the collective will is in agreement, at which time the herd collectively stampedes, the flock takes off as a unit.

When the earth quakes or the tsunami strikes, the human herd reacts quickly. When the danger is less immediate (as in global warming) the response follows a slow, flat trajectory. Jump up and down and bleat at the edges of the herd as hard as you will; unless the collective mind is swayed, the herd will graze contentedly (I was going to say, ‘until the cows come home’) until the wolves are actually eating the calves.

Well this is probably overly pessimistic and over-simplified, but I predict that unless global warming actually causes the earth to shake under everybody’s feet, our governments will continue to place economic growth at the very top of every agenda.

Baaa . . ..

Pay attention

Station Arts Centre at Night - photo by Rod Andrews

I’m teaching a Bible class this morning based on Isaiah 48. The chapter is addressed to the Children of Israel during the period of Cyrus the Great’s defeat of the Babylonian Empire and his subsequent release of the Jewish captives to return to Judah.


Speaking for God, Isaiah says something like: If only you’d paid attention to my instructions earlier when you were still in Judah. You would now be rich as if a river of good fortune had rolled over the land. Your success would have been as unstoppable as the waves on a stormy sea. The population of Judah would rival that of any kingdom on earth; you would be rejoicing in the multitudes of children and grandchildren surrounding you. The well-being of your nation would have been secured for all time. If only you’d listened to me!


Bob MacDonald, science consultant to the CBC’s The National, explained how La Ninya caused the massive rainfall that’s been flooding Brisbane. When asked if there were other factors in the tragedy, he replied that the human factor was significant. Brisbane, like New Orleans, is built on a delta, the low-lying deposits of a river as it exits into the sea. A swamp in other words. Humans like to be near the water. As a result, Brisbane inhabits a flood plain of sorts that is very obviously vulnerable to such disasters.

We might think of some of the river valleys in Canada where people have chosen to live too near the water or in low-lying areas vulnerable to similar flooding.

If only the builders of Brisbane, New Orleans had paid attention to the lay of the land.

Paying attention, though, is seemingly not enough. Acting communally on what we know and have heard is quite another problem. Climate change is going to alter substantially the quality of life on much of the globe. We know this, and yet our leadership (the current government) encourages us to clap our hands over our ears and pretend that it’s all business as usual.

Someday we’ll look back and say, “If only we’d paid attention earlier when we were still in Judah.”

An Advent Sunday morning with hate mail

Click on the image to enlarge

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation column runs in the local paper unless there is ample material from local sources to crowd it off the editorial page. If you don’t know, the CTF is a think-tank-cum-lobby group whose focus is taxes we have to pay to keep this country running. More specifically, their goal appears to be a country where individuals are not required to contribute to the general welfare of the country, or at least as little as that individual can get away with.

A few weeks ago, their columnist made the argument that climate change was a hoax being perpetrated on the public, and that no one would be able to get elected if they espoused policies recommended by the prognosticators of climate disaster looming just over the horizon.

I couldn’t leave this unchallenged, and wrote a letter to the editor—a mild missive—in which I suggested that for Harper (and by implication, other Alberta politicians) this might be the literal case but that overall, Canadians are beginning to get the argument that we will either have to begin making changes now, or be forced to make them soon. It might, in fact, be difficult to get elected unless politicians show us a grasp of this problem and are in favour of taking our collective heads out of the sand.

The paper included my address, for some reason, and I got a hand printed, anonymous letter in the mail a few days later. According to its author, I am an idiot espousing a socialist viewpoint and since socialism and communism are the same thing, I am now a communist, as is every NDP politician in this country. He calls me “Comrad (sic) Epp” throughout.

I would challenge him to a debate on the issue of climate change, but I don’t know who he is, and anyway, he would likely dismiss me because “I don’t know what I’m talking about,” and “it’s a sad day when the editor of the paper would print such garbage.”

Well he may be right when he says I don’t know what I’m talking about re: climate change. Everything about climate change is best-guess stuff, but what I’ve learned, I’ve learned from people who can spell “comrade.” It’s unnerving to think that people like my anonymous stone-thrower might be able to get together and elect a government.

Apparently, we've still got work to do.