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livingontheland - Re: [Livingontheland] with ownership comes responsibility/ commune way of living

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Subject: Healthy soil and sustainable growing

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  • From: Marty Kraft <martyk@allspecies.org>
  • To: Healthy soil and sustainable growing <livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Livingontheland] with ownership comes responsibility/ commune way of living
  • Date: Tue, 18 Jul 2006 12:49:49 -0500

Paul

I think it's something far deeper than ownership that makes you care. I believe that you care about the earth and places and things far beyond what you personally own. I'm not sure that I can put into words exactly what it is that people care about that makes then good stewards of land. Maybe it's that we feel like that we're a part of something instead of being a separate individual. Peoples who believe that they belong to the land and have no concept of ownership are very capable for caring for the land, some for seven generations into the future.

Marty Kraft
On Jul 18, 2006, at 10:23 AM, TradingPostPaul wrote:


And I respect your lifetime of experience and knowledge. I didn't make it
clear enough that intentional communities are fine by me, people can make
any living arrangements that suit them. What I took issue with was the idea
of the hippie commune, all things in common, nobody responsible - an
untenable lifestyle because only a handful survived at all. Specifically
their claims they were the wave of the future, the only right way to live.
Like, food grows itself without work.

Understand I'm not sneering at ICs with 3 or 4 members; how others choose
to live isn't my business. What they call a family isn't for me to say.
But that list is calling everybody that lives with someone else they're not
related to an intentional community, from college dorm arrangements to
gated developments. They watered it down so much it's completely
meaningless. What's the point then? That could include millions, most with
nothing to do with living on the land.

But my view is, ownership of land and natural family is the best
arrangement to encourage stewardship of the land. Others can disagree,
obviously. Joel Salatin said the definition of a successful farm is one
that your children will want passed on to them. He's well known as a very
successful 5th generation farmer on the same land. Family ownership of land
has been traditional worldwide for ages and it's not really financial or
corporate capitalism as we see it today. Extended families on their own
land predates modern capitalism by millennia. It's natural.

It's my position that only with ownership comes responsibility. It's no
guarantee of sustainable farming or success. But an artificial family
owning agricultural land in common is a prescription for problems because
they can (and do) come and go at will. They have no stake in the future of
it, little incentive to improve the land. They may not even be around next
growing season. Agricultural ICs without natural family ownership simply
don't function to honor and preserve the land for future generations.
That's what I see.

I'm with Joel Salatin on this one.
http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2006/05/no_bar_code.html? welcome=tru
e

paul, tradingpost@riseup.net
---------------
The care of the Earth is our most ancient and most worthy, and after all
our most pleasing responsibility. To cherish what remains of it and to
foster its renewal is our only hope.
- Wendell Berry
*********** REPLY SEPARATOR ***********

On 7/18/2006 at 8:11 AM Uriel wrote:

Paul,
I have enormous respect for the job you do with this list in expanding
all our knowledge of living on the land in an intelligent and productive
way. But I must question how well you understand the community movement.
Having been involved with community for 35 years I've seen a lot and
think I've gained some understanding of why communities seem to have had
limited success. The biggest single handicap that I've observed (and my
own prejudice shows here, I'm sure) is that in order to live in
community you have to be able to relinquish many of the concepts of
ownership and control that are basic to capitalist philosophy. I do
believe that we are seeing the beginning of the demise of international
corporate capitalism and that its collapse will result in many changes,
eventually, in how the survivors view those concepts.

BTW, you sneer at communities that only have 3 or 4 members. Do you
sneer at families that have only 2 or 3 children as failures to
reproduce more abundantly? We in community have the luxury of choosing
our families and it's an ongoing process that can lead to immensely
rewarding experiences and relationships. I would not for anything trade
it for the confining environment of the nuclear family that has devolved
from the traditional extended family tribal grouping. It is that sense
of the tribe that many of us are searching to reproduce as best we can.

Uriel / SW Missouri

TradingPostPaul wrote:
Doing more checking to see if there are agricultural ICs I missed in the
past. Going through the "A"s, I find Alpha Farm at Deadwood, Oregon,
and
it looks promising. Been around since 1970. Then I scroll down and see
they
have a grand total of 4 adults.



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