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  • From: Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com>
  • To: homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [Homestead] Wither Homestead?
  • Date: Tue, 2 Feb 2010 07:40:18 -0600


On Feb 1, 2010, at 5:23 PM, Marie McHarry wrote:

No. It's just been really, really quiet. I've noticed that usually in
the depths of winter when homesteading isn't so busy this list turns
to political discussion. Now that that topic has become something that
most of us what to ignore, I think everyone is hibernating.

Marie, I think there are three primary parts to the decline of the homestead list.

1. As with TMEN and other gardening/country living mags, once the subjects have been covered multiple times, it is challenging to go back to them and find something new to say. And it is tedious to teach the same class over and over. The teachers tire and retire.

2. There are so many other lists available to each of us that with slight effort we find a more perfect fit. I have found one, for instance, consisting mostly of people who are bright, articulate, accomplished and respectful. We have adult conversations. The list owner has a light hand but will not tolerate personal attacks and put downs.

3. Politics. I let myself get sucked into the political discussion here, which started out somewhat reasonable and devolved into hysteria and babble.

There is another issue that both amuses and troubles me. I thought the Internet would be the library of the world with all wisdom immediately at hand and, more, that it would help lift each of us to our maximal level. Alas, the wisdom has become deeply diluted by our human need to feel important. We easily find something new, embrace it, erroneously think we have become instant experts. And then we broadcast it willy nilly and feed upon the responses. The library becomes cluttered with The National Enquirer.

Perhaps it is a sign of our apparently deteriorating time. Major media thrives on death, disaster and dilemma. We fight back feebly with our e-mails and our blogs: no, not me, not my life, my life is fine, see, look at all I am doing, look at all I know, look how smart I have become. It seems to me that we have become unbalanced. Our focus has fanned and blurred. Like Stella, we need to get our groove back.

And the beat goes on.

Gene





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