activism

Don’t Look Up – ND #23

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Photo: L. Weikel

Don’t Look Up

We just finished watching Don’t Look Up on Netflix.  I’m still digesting it.

It’s not as if it’s a complicated plot or sophisticated premise. No, what I’m still digesting is how uncomfortable it made me feel. At least, discomfort was an initial feeling I experienced as the movie unfolded.

I had a rough idea of the plot of the movie, so the likenesses drawn to recent infamous figures were unsurprising. But the overall impact of that part of the satire was uncomfortable. (Satire doing its job, I guess.) It rang too true. In some ways, at least at first, it almost felt like a documentary.

Futility

What’s most disturbing is the inanity of society and the garbage that’s fed to us via so many outlets. While we know many people devote way too much time to staring at their screens, it’s still hard to look at that screen time being depicted as the pathetic mind-mushing tool that it is. And the vapid television programs! Oh my goodness, I just wanted to scream.

Hmm. Re-reading that last paragraph, I’m loathe to use the word ‘devote’ in the second sentence, given the sacredness with which I approach the concept of devotion. And yet I think it should remain precisely because, in so many ways, people are bastardizing the concept of devotion and applying it to objects or activities that actually disconnect them from all that is sacred or precious.

Yet again, the topsy-turvy, inside out reality we currently live in was on display. How do we counter craven power-seeking and money grubbing?

Photo: L. Weikel

Big Issues

This movie’s catastrophic event comes from outside of us – at the edge of our solar system, to be precise. But the analogies to the myriad big issues we have screaming for our attention (to just LOOK AT them, perhaps, and choose NOT to look away?) of our own making were obvious.

It’s unsettling to contemplate the reality of potentially losing everything we have here on Earth. Yet for me I think what’s most maddening is that we still have the ability to make some huge course corrections – but continue to fiddle around the edges.

I truly believe we still have time. But does it fit into our electoral schedule? I don’t know. The sense of urgency we should all feel about voting rights (here in the U.S.) bears directly upon the urgency demanded by climate change. We’re playing with fire right now. We can’t let those beholden to the (literal) dinosaur-based energy paradigm delay and obfuscate one more day. The tears rolling down my cheeks at the end of the movie were real, as was my desire to transmute my discomfort and sense of futility into action.

I believe the coming year has all the makings of seismic shifts in attitude and strategies. The sighted must take the wheel before it’s too late. Watch* and see if you know what I mean.

Feeling Passionate – Photo: K. Weikel

*and don’t miss the Tuvan shaman at the end of the movie, either.

(T+23)

Risk – Day 565

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Severe Storms Ahead – Photo: L. Weikel

Risk

Watching reports of the protests occurring nationwide in response to the reprehensible acts (or failure to act) of the four Minneapolis Police Department officers that resulted in the death of George Floyd is upsetting enough. But when you stop for a second and realize these protests and marches are taking place in the midst of a global pandemic, in the midst of a virtual plague, the fact that so many thousands of people are willing to put their lives at risk to demand justice speaks louder than any words they could chant.

A couple times today I heard or read someone express surprise that people are in fact gathering in these huge crowds, considering the considerable risk of spreading the coronavirus – particularly given that black and brown people seem to be harder hit, proportionately, than the rest of the population.*

But doesn’t their very willingness to risk exposure to the virus show how desperately our country needs profound systemic reformation – immediately?

What Trumps Who

If we’re honest with ourselves, black and brown lives are at risk no matter what. Sure, if they catch Covid-19, they’re at greater risk of being hospitalized and dying from it. But as things stand now, they’re at risk of being hospitalized or dying simply from being what they are. And yes, I’m consciously saying ‘what’ they are as opposed to ‘who’ they are.

For who they are doesn’t matter in the least. It’s all in the color of their skin, baby. That’s all that matters to far too many people who have access to instruments of power and lethal force, be they cell phones to call 9-1-1 on a ‘black man’ daring to call her out for breaking the rules to guns or choke holds or knees to the neck.

As we’ve nauseatingly seen time and again, people of color are not allowed to be in our country. They’re not permitted to play, or to jog, or to watch birds in the park. They’re not allowed to sleep in their own beds without being subject to lethal force when idiot police try to execute a no-knock search warrant in the middle of the night on the wrong apartment.

Mother Rage

As a mother myself, I cannot imagine the rage and fear experienced by mothers of children of color. And yet my sense that I would not be able to contain my outrage and terror is an indicator of my privilege. Why? Because my sense of justice burns hot for my babies. And yet mothers of black or brown children dare not risk expressing the rage I, as a white person, cannot imagine not expressing.

How do they live with that inexpressible terror and rage, simmering deep within? Any of us who contemplate such ongoing hell know – they can’t breathe. We can’t breathe.

There’s a plague hitting our country all right. While it exists all over the world, it is deep and ugly and pervasive all over the United States, but especially in places of power. And it’s time we  stood up, link our arms, and say in one voice, “NO MORE.”

We’re all brothers and sisters no matter the pigment of our skin. We bleed. We love. We grieve. We breathe.

We must actively take a stand. We must demand systemic reform. We must demand that this scourge be condemned and actively eradicated by those holding positions of power. Now. No more waiting. And if they won’t do it?

Vote. Them. Out.

And if that’s snatched away from us?

Cletus Contemplating the Impending Chaos – Photo: L. Weikel

 

*To be fair, the footage I’ve seen shows the vast majority of protesters wearing masks – and in many places, actually marching and assembling while maintaining some semblance of social distancing, which is no mean feat. This shows respect and reverence for life – theirs and those around them, as well as those with whom they live – which, I suspect is precisely why they’re willing to risk it all.

(T-546)

Our Voices Matter! – Day 292

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Tohickon Creek near Cabin #3 (yesterday) – Photo: L. Weikel

Our Voices Matter!

When I first read the great news a few days ago, I immediately thought, “I’m going to have to write about this tonight!” Alas, I ended up writing about other things, some definitely not as important as this.

But here we are, better late than never.

Back in June, I wrote a post about the Tohickon Creek, an utterly lovely waterway that has twisted, turned, flooded, dried to a meager trickle, been dammed, become free-flowing again, and hosted whitewater enthusiasts to fly-fisherpeople, to small children. Through millennia, the Tohickon has provided a place for humans of all stripes to connect to Mother Earth, and at the same time created a habitat for woodpeckers, blue herons, trout, kingfishers, frogs, turkeys, turtles, vultures, water snakes, carp, eagles, groundhogs, hawks, deer, osprey, sunnies, crows, foxes, and bluejays (to name a few). And sometimes, when the humans get lucky, these residents allow themselves to be seen and admired by the humans.

The purpose of my post in June was to ask you to take a stand on behalf of the Tohickon and speak out to prevent the downgrading of its classification.

I know; I write about the Tohickon frequently. But take a look at that list I just made (off the top of my head) of the creatures I’ve been lucky enough to share time with along her banks. It’s extraordinary!

Overflowing Gratitude

As a result of over 900 comments from the public, essential advocacy by non-profit groups, and some pressure by local officials, it appears as though Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has agreed to reevaluate their classification of this creek.

I love this body of water unabashedly. For me, I guess, it symbolizes everything I love about where we live and how deeply privileged I feel to have the freedom to visit her whenever I want.

Thank you for indulging my love and reading this post. Thank you for taking the time to speak out and submit your comment(s) to the Department of Environmental Protection. Thank you for helping us buy more time for the Tohickon to be studied further and, hopefully, designated an Exceptional Value stream in the eyes of the DEP.

Our Mutual Reward

Thank you for anything and everything you did to help this extraordinary body of water continue its quest to gain crucial environmental protections.

I can only hope that as a result of us taking a stand today, our grandchildren and great grandchildren (and beyond) will still be safely playing in that creek, creating treasured memories, and feeling awe at the sight of even more abundant wildlife!

Tohickon Creek, north of Cabin 3 – Photo: L. Weikel

(T-819)