Respect and Responsibility
Last fall, Lauret Savoy spoke
at the Aldo Leopold Center in Wisconsin about how our lives are intertwined
with the environment. Savoy is Professor of Environmental Studies at Mount
Holyoke College. She read passages from her book, Trace, which explores how her life was formed by the landscape of
her family’s history, the places they lived, and her love of national parks and
the words of Leopold.
Each of us carries a
community inside us. The history of all who came before us — our ancestors —
are held within us. Our lives are rooted in their past. We carry remnants of
what they went through, the traumas they suffered, the indignities, the abuse,
and the celebrations. Their lives are encoded in our genes.
The home we grew up in is an
environment as much as the forests, meadows, and rivers around us. Our neighborhood
is an environment, as well as the rest of the city. The weather and the seasons
are part of this and affect us, shaping our outlook and modulating our moods. If
we love warm sunshine, when it’s cold and rainy for a week, we feel negative
and subdued.
Under the pressure of everyday chores and decisions,
we can lose sight of our values.
With all that we have to take
care of each day, we don’t have the time to think about the long-range
implications of everything we do, how this affects others or the land. Every
morning we need to take time to be quiet and remember our guiding principles so
that we can use them to guide our actions throughout the day.
Respect other people and
listen to them. They have a right to their views as much as we do. Make decisions
together. Collective wisdom is greater than individual hubris.
Respect the land and take responsibility for your
actions.
In the news recently, another
series of large earthquakes shook Oklahoma in an area where they never used to
have earthquakes. The cause has been identified as fracking. In Ohio and
Pennsylvania, drinking water for a number of cities has been polluted by the
industrial wastewater being injected into the ground to crack the rock and
release the oil. The business people who are making money off of fracking say
it causes no problems. Will they, or the politicians who profit from fracking,
take responsibility and pay for the damage that it’s causing?
If we are shareholders in an
oil company that fracks, but we say nothing about against it, then we are
guilty of causing the damage.
In North Dakota, the Keystone
oil pipeline was shifted away from Bismarck because its largely white
population worried that an oil leak would pollute its drinking water. The new
route now goes by the water supply for Native Americans, and another treaty is
broken by the United States. The oil company says the pipeline is safe. Then
why move it away from Bismarck? And why has this pipeline already sprung
several leaks?
Respect people and their communities.
When a freeway was built
through the African American community of West Oakland, it destroyed the
culture of what had been a vibrant community, full of the arts, music, and
celebration. We continue to sell the lives of poor people, women, and peoples of
color to make money. The powerless are abused.
Savoy notes that we have a
history of fragmenting our communities and ecosystem. We need to foster
ecological interdependence between human beings and the land. We need to
encourage a sense of belonging to a place, as Leopold also believed. We need to
stop large scale exploitation and destruction of the natural world.
We grieve the loss of the
places outdoors that we love. We grieve the loss of the communities that
nurtured us.
We have a responsibility to each other.
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