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  • From: Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com>
  • To: Homestead <homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [Homestead] Homesteading may become very cool
  • Date: Mon, 21 Apr 2008 07:40:31 -0500

THE WAY WE LIVE NOW

Why Bother?
By MICHAEL POLLAN
Published: April 20, 2008

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/magazine/20wwln-lede-t.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5087&em&en=76d14e551d4461fb&ex=1208923200


In a challenging piece on personal response to climate change Michael Pollan deals what and why we might do what is needed to save our planet as we know it. Ironically, we homesteaders of varying levels have been doing much of what needs to be done, without government subsidies or laws compelling us to do so.

"Which brings us back to the “why bother” question and how we might better answer it. The reasons not to bother are many and compelling, at least to the cheap-energy mind. But let me offer a few admittedly tentative reasons that we might put on the other side of the scale:
"If you do bother, you will set an example for other people. If enough other people bother, each one influencing yet another in a chain reaction of behavioral change, markets for all manner of green products and alternative technologies will prosper and expand. (Just look at the market for hybrid cars.) Consciousness will be raised, perhaps even changed: new moral imperatives and new taboos might take root in the culture. Driving an S.U.V. or eating a 24-ounce steak or illuminating your McMansion like an airport runway at night might come to be regarded as outrages to human conscience. Not having things might become cooler than having them. And those who did change the way they live would acquire the moral standing to demand changes in behavior from others — from other people, other corporations, even other countries. . . ."

Pollan suggests that we consider Vaclav Havel's thought: that we begin to conduct ourselves as if we will live on this earth forever and be answerable for its condition one day.

We homesteader types already knew we were cool. Maybe more of the larger populace will begin to appreciate us. Not that appreciation is needed. But it's nice. Just might create lots of opportunities.



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