Those camas fields were cultivated, too. I was just watching a video about restoring native prairies in Washington and they had some ironic trouble because they eventually realized that the best and fastest way to spread and maintain the camas was to dig it up regularly-- the way people used to when harvesting it. It went on for so long the plants are adapted to it. But in the protected area this project was working in, it's ILLEGAL to harvest anything. So they ask the local tribes to come in and exercise their right to do it.
Studying native plants involves getting glimpses of how the landscape used to be.
Lewis & Clark kept mistaking what they thought looked like bodies of water in the distance, but turned out to be fields of blue camas in bloom.
A single oak tree can produce more than a ton of acorns. 1\3rd of the trees in forests in the eastern half of America were chestnuts, also highly productive. And then there's the tonnage of food that used to self-deliver upstream in the form of salmon, and how much beef could be harvested from the massive herds of bison, with not a fence or rancher in sight?
It takes a VERY BAD year, for people in an unspoiled landscape and the skills to understand it, to go hungry.
And it takes VERY BAD PEOPLE, for anyone in a modern world producing so much more than it needs, to go hungry.
What the hell is it with these types and the damn lifeboat analogies?
I don't even know how many times I've run into these guys and they say shit like, "If you're on a lifeboat at sea and somebody refuses to catch any fish, is everybody else on the boat supposed to feed him?"
And THIS is the guy people want to believe is actually trying to convince Israel to stop killing civilians. A guy whose bloodthirst is so bad it actually bothered one of Israel's own extremely violent prime ministers.
"In 1982, shortly before Reagan bluntly ordered Begin to cease his ‘holocaust’ in Lebanon, a young US senator who revered Elie Wiesel as his great teacher met the Israeli prime minister. In Begin’s own stunned account of the meeting, the senator commended the Israeli war effort and boasted that he would have gone further, even if it meant killing women and children. Begin himself was taken aback by the words of the future US president, Joe Biden. ‘No, sir,’ he insisted. ‘According to our values, it is forbidden to hurt women and children, even in war ... This is a yardstick of human civilisation, not to hurt civilians.’"
Libs freak out over Russian meddling in every shadow, but AIPAC runs openly back and forth through Congress and the media and academia etc etc gleefully tossing checks like Oprah and... *crickets*.... that's just fine apparently.
After the fire is lit, Bushnell shouts ”Free Palestine!” several times, then just screams in pain, managing one last ”Free Palestine!” before going completely silent but still upright, shuffling in place in a tense circle as he burns. It's after he gets quiet that at least one cop (briefly sounds like there could be several) starts yelling, commanding the inferno over and over to "get on the ground" about a dozen times that I can count. He stops when Bushnell finally crumples to the ground.
Somebody else is yelling, "Fire extinguisher! Who's got a fire extinguisher! Jesus Christ! Hey! Get the fire extinguisher! Fire extinguisher!" and runs into the frame with the cop right behind him, deploying a small extinguisher that knocks down the flames but doesn't totally put the fire out. The cop scoots up in combat stance with his gun trained on the motionless and smoldering man as if he might leap up and attack at any moment. He just hovers there hopping side to side to stay locked on target, barely glancing at anything else, not saying another word, while the other first responders rush back and forth past the muzzle of his weapon (at which point my heart is in my throat hoping nobody drops a damn acorn) trying to finish off the fire.
That's when somebody out of frame shouts, "I don't need guns, I need a fire extinguisher!!" which makes me wonder how many more cops were also there with their weapons out.
Censorship of Aaron Bushnell's self-immolation video angers me.
By all means put all the warnings. Don't let children anywhere near it. If it will hurt you to watch it, don't. Don't click on it in the first place, or look away when you need to. Unless you feel a strong conviction to do this, unless you know this is a constructive way for you personally to handle these situations, do NOT look.
But we should get to make that CHOICE for ourselves.
Those of us who wish to give him our respect in this particular way, those of us capable and willing for whatever reason to serve as witnesses, don't need a bunch of squeamish nannies getting in the way. This muffling, this covering up, this sanitization... as if the horrors become any less if we just don't see. As if it makes the world better, to hide reality. The turning away, the hiding, the denying and ignoring and papering over, is part of what got us here in the first place.
Like the "beauty screen" of trees the loggers leave along the highways to hide the clearcuts, so motorists can pretend the forest is still there.
Gaslighting makes me feel like I'm covered in ants. Every so often, I need to stand up and rip aside the cobwebs and fucking LOOK the monstrosity of this world right in the face. There's a calm, quiet place in the pit of my guts where I feel centered... a cathartic reality check. Yes. It's this bad. Yes, we are screaming.
Yes, this is intolerable.
If you had survived this, Aaron... maybe you would have regretted doing it. Maybe you would have changed your mind, and not wanted people to watch after all. I certainly hope your parents never see or hear it. I can't imagine what they are feeling now.
But the choice was made, and can't be taken back.
I can serve as a witness. I don't know why or how I am capable of watching this so calmly. This is NOT something I'm bragging about or a thing to emulate-- it could definitely be argued that I'm only wired in this peculiar way because there's actually something really wrong with me. I'm not going to judge that one way or the other. My peculiar perspective has its advantages and its costs. When I can find an advantage, I'll use it.
I'd really rather not, though. None of this should be happening. I'd rather that LillyAnarKitty was still with us.
The word "martyr" makes me feel ill. Glorifying the destruction of life and beauty always sickens me, even if the sacrifice can be said to have accomplished something.
Just because a shocking act might trigger events that show up in the news, doesn't mean it's worth more than what that life fully lived could have accomplished in ways we won't hear about from some viral fluke.
I can understand why someone would choose to do something like this. I can respect it. But if I had any chance to talk to them ahead of time I'd beg them not to do it. Don't. Please, please don't.
Your heart and skills are needed. The world is better with you in it.
Acid rain is still happening. Just because the skies aren't choked with visible coal smoke like 19th century London does NOT mean they're anywhere close to clean. I don't know what fantasy propaganda you've been absorbing but it's completely false. Pollution is worse than ever, and always growing.
If people think THIS kind of outrageous bullshit is reasonable, you can BET they're going to automatically treat the "AI" wordsalad generators as magical fountains of truth. Without even stopping to think twice.
And the usage of terms shifts over time and may be different depending on who's saying it-- particularly as propaganda seeks to push different associations with terms around and shift goalposts.
That's the thing. Liberals sneer at us about "purity tests" but no, seriously-- this is a moral litmus test issue. Anyone who is comfortable facilitating mass suffering and death has a moral compass so twisted they shouldn't be trusted with so much as a pot of hot coffee much less a position of power. If we don't draw a line HERE, we've got no fucking ethics or backbone at all.