UFPPC (www.ufppc.org) — Digging Deeper LXXXIII June 1, 2009, 7:00 p.m.

Derrick Jensen and Aric McBay,

What We Leave Behind

(New York: SevenStories Press, 2009).

[

Thesis:

That the planet is in crisis andthe future of life is at stake: “This cultureis killing the planet” (99) largely becauseit is infinitely narcissistic. Jensen andMcBay speak for life on earth, againstcivilization, against humanity if need be.Philosophically, they argue for theprimacy of nature over culture, not, as iscommon in contemporary thought, viceversa.]

Preface.

“Industrial civilization isincompatible with life. It issystematically destroying life on thisplanet, undercutting its very basis. Thisculture is, to put it bluntly, murdering theearth. Unless it’s stopped—whether weintentionally stop it or the natural worlddoes, through ecological collapse orother means—it will kill every livingbeing” (vii). Four previous books (vii). This book is two books (one onexcrement and death, and one onsustainability and life), but they cannotbe separated; rather, it is a book “aboutthe spaces in between those topics”(viii). Style: “I” can refer to either author(let the reader figure it out) (ix).Interdependence of thought, perception,and behavior [cognitive behavioraltherapy model; not identified] (ix-x).

PART IDecay.

Lifelong fascination with decay(3-4). Shit and shitting (5-8). Pertinentetymologies (8-9). The concept of wasteinvolves utility and destruction (9-10).What happens to excrement in nature(10-13). Roots nourish bacteria (13-15).

Waste.

“[F]rom a long-term perspective. . . industrial civilization is essentially acomplicated way of turning land intowaste” (18; 17-18). Plastic bags (18-19).Waste is of different kinds (20-21). Theproblem of toilet paper (21-23). “Themost important question of all: does ourpresence and do our actions help or harm. . . the land on whom our own survivalultimately depends?” (23).

Garbage.

The history of garbage: itbecame a problem only with the rise of cities (25-28). Four garbage disposalstrategies: dumps; organic recycling(animals & composting); burning;recycling (28-32; 41-49). Personalexperiences with chickens as consumersof waste; dumpster diving (32-35; 37-38).Dumpster diving is “political” and“sustainable” only in a limited sense (35-37). The evolution of urban waste in thepast century (38-41). People who workwith waste are often socially stigmatized(49-53).

Sustainability.

Without an ethic of responsibility in both the predator-preyrelationship and the consumption-wasterelationship, communities “do notsurvive” (55). Sustainability means thatan action and all necessary associatedactions can be performed indefinitely,and must always be considered withrespect to the “landbase” (56-60).

Sustainability™.

A reluctant attack onarchitect William McDonough [co-authorof

Cradle to Cradle

, which goesunmentioned here] (and,synecdochically, Paul Hawken, AmoryLovins, Al Gore, etc.—see also 201-03) asa false priest of sustainability, criticizedfor seeking to continue rather than endthe industrialization that is killing theplanet (61-79; 405-11). McDonough’sfundamental error is to pretend thatculture rather than nature is primary(71). Discussion of ideologicalconfrontations in activist settings and the“about 700 pieces of hate mail,” almost

entirely “horizontal hostility” “from thosewhom I would have thought would havebeen allies” (74-77).

Compartmentalization and ItsOpposite.

Critique of the culture’scommitment to “compartmentalization”and “linear thought” (81-94). Analyzingshit, and Crohn’s disease, illustrates theunreality of compartimentalization (94-97).

Plastic.

Plastic is poisoning the planetand our bodies (99-102; 108-18). Historyof plastic (102-04). Our attachment toplastic is linked to our vain pursuit of immortality (105-08).

Mining.

Cyanide gold miningexemplifies our culture’s relation to Earth(119-27).

Medicine.

Medical waste (129-37).

Toxic Gifts.

Embalming and Westernburial (139-43). PCBs and the other 700chemical contaminants that can be foundin the average body (143-46).

Bodies.

Life is based on reciprocity, notdomination (147-48). We live in denial of or indifference to the fact that our cultureis “killing the planet” : “

Après nous ledeluge

” (148-50)

PART IIMorality.

“[I]f you’re not caught, itdoesn’t count” is a “fundamental guidingprinciple” of many of our culture’s“decision-making processes” (153-55). Tale of Dale Smith of Red Cloud, a lyingdeveloper of property at Elk Creek, ascultural exemplar (156-77; these namescould not be corroborated). Appeal tothe Declaration of Independence (174). The legal system is “primarily aboutmaintaining the current social order”(176).

Taking It Personally.

Anger; vow of resistance (179-83).

Morality Revisited.

Epigraph quotesWhitehead: morality is the opinion of themajority (185). Abusers generally have“a distorted sense of right and wrong”(quoting Lundy Bancroft’s

Why Does HeDo That?

) (185-88). Indictment of “thisculture” (188). Each person has a senseof internal and external morality (188-90).

Legacy.

The strength, resiliency, anddiversity of life on earth (or “healthylandbases”) is the fundamental moralgood by which all action should beevaluated (191-97; cf. “I’m sorry I haveto be the one to break the news, but theplanet is more important than thisfucking culture” [204]). Sequel to theRed Cloud development story (197-98).

The Real World.

If one believes theearth would be better off if we had neverbeen born, the first option is denial,distraction, and forgetting (199-209).

Taking It Personally, Volume II.

Another option: attack the messenger(211). Next option: “pretend that thedamage isn’t real damage” (211-18).

Magical Thinking.

Another option:revert to “magical thinking” (i.e. takingthought for action) and willing thateverything work out—many varieties of this tendency are listed, and thoseredolent of “new age bullshit” aredenounced with particular (andoccasionally mordant) ferocity (219-36).

Complexity.

We should regard thecomplexity of natural communities withhumility and not expect to understandthem scientifically in terms of cause andeffect (237-41). Indigenous cultures’magic may have been efficacious in waysbeyond our understanding (241-48).

Despair.

To conquer despair, we mustdecolonize our own minds to overcomeour self-identification with our cultureand pursue not just resistance but“

effective

resistance” (251, emphasis inoriginal; 249-56).

Powerlessness.

Five reasons that livingsimply is an inadequate response to thepresent situation (257-60). “Our civilizedselves must die” (260). Our culture isresponsible for our inability to grow outof our “infantile cravings,” which alsoinfect our activism (260-65).

Growing Up.

Rallying call to put asideinfantilism and overcome “fashionablenihilism” and act “such that the world isa better place because I was born,because I lived, and because I died”(276; 279; 267-79).

PART III

The Future: Business as Usual.

Thefuture: a “business as usual” scenario: aworld overwhelmed with waste (283-97).

Technotopia.

Another scenario—“an‘ideal’ society driven primarily bytechnological innovation and marked bya generally high quality of life”—critiqued, especially the notion of greenplastics or bioplastics (300; 299-306). The planet has a limited capacity forphotosynthesis (306-09). Technology’seffort to overcome decay is self-defeating: the world needs decay (309-14). Depleted uranium (314-18).Fluoride (318-20). Pollution is not just “anew nutrient” (320-22). Technotopiawould allow species extinction tocontinue (322-23). “[A] belief intechnotopia is essentially a form of magical thinking” (323).

Technotopia: Producing Waste.

Needs are invented and products sold tosatisfy them; e.g. “feminine hygiene,”expendable plastics (327-32).Governmental solutions are unconvincing(333-38).

Technotopia: Industry.

Industrial =machine-based (339-41). Technotopiansolutions are implausible because historyshows they won’t be implemented evenif they exist; “corporations need to beeliminated” (349; 342-51). Criticism of Buckminster Fuller as too anthropocentric(352-54). High-tech fantasies (354-58).

Collapse.

Final scenario, guided by Joseph A. Tainter’s

The Collapse of Complex Societies

(date of publicationgiven as 2003 rather than 1988) (359-69). The prospect of war (370-74).Economics as a factor in the collapse of the Roman Empire (374-76). But in oursociety there has been a dearth of actionin response to the danger of collapse(376-78).

Fighting Back.

Instead of a list of things the reader can do as a consumer,an appeal to the reader as a person (379-82). “Fighting back means doing what isappropriate”; violence not ruled out (383;382-85). Needed: an “effectivestrategy,” “a collective recognition of thereal systemic roots of the problem,” “aculture of resistance” (385-88).Government counterinsurgencyoperations, state reprisals, even fascismare to be expected in response (388-95).Action should not wait upon majorityconsensus (395-97). Need for “long-termthinking” (397). Need for individuals toevaluate their own risks and needs (397-98).

The Living.

The reader is urged to“reidentify with the living, with life, withthe real, physical world. And to live yourlife and to give your life for the benefit of the living, the benefit of those who givelife to you and those you love” (400; 399-401). A call to fight “[u]ntil this culturecollapses” (401).

Notes.

22 pages.