"A proverb that was circulated in Qianyanzhou at that time revealed the harsh environment at that time. Soil erosion in the hilly areas of Qianyanzhou was becoming increasingly serious, and the fertile red soil was washed away, resulting in a decline in crop yields."
There's a generation-long restoration project in Qianyanzhou. This auto-translated article probably has some errors, but the poetry of the language comes through. "A piece of copper on a sunny day, a bag of pus on a rainy day. Looking from a distance, it's all yellow, looking closely, it's all […]
I have a pretty good excerpt of my book on Tolkien themes and the modern environmentalist movement. I'm mixing together the Ents destroying Isengard with the Brazillian government breaking up illegal mining infrastructure in the Amazon. I'm going to publish it soon - hope you folks are […]
What a line from Tolkien. I actually teared up a little in reading it. I think about the things we lose daily. "Well, cheers and all that to you dearest son. We were born in a dark age out of due time (for us). But there is this comfort: otherwise we should not know, or so much love, what we […]
"Mainstream legal systems have long recognized that entities, not just humans, have legal rights—specifically economic entities like corporations and trusts. In the United States, free speech rights allotted to corporations enable them to give unlimited sums of money to political candidates."
This is really elegantly put: "But unlike many of us, who by circumstance or choice know little about the kaleidoscope of Indigenous cultures, people like Mamio Serato have learned to navigate both their world and ours."
I spent much of my early career thinking about peacebuilding. But in this book, I can only reference in a few paragraphs what I spent years trying to learn about nonviolent civil resistance. It makes sense. It's a book about Tolkien and trees, not arguments and efficacy peaceful nonviolence […]
Here's an interesting example of state violence against mining infrastructure. How Brazil is taking the fight to destructive illegal mining https://www.ft.com/content/5eb64108-3181-4352-804e-aca76e1be505
I want to find a real-world equivalent to the Ents breaking Isengard. I am tempted to draw parralels to incidents of eco-sabotage, but the comparison is imperfect. The ents are a nation, for one thing. The fight in Isengard is more of a seige of an army than an incident of monkey-wrenching.
