permaculture

[Jason Gerhardt <jasongerhardt@gmail.com>]

Koreen,
I totally agree.

I wanted to point out that the difference is whether we call that other
work "permaculture", be it Mcdonaugh or Paul's example of the farmer and
herbicides. I don't actually need "permaculture" to demonstrate to a farmer
the disastrousness of using herbicides, that's just soil science. So just
because the farmer stops using herbicides he can say he practices
"permaculture"? I just think that dumbs down what permaculture is. When I
do a large farm design I tell clients that I am using permaculture as my
design process, not that I am helping them somehow become "permaculture". I
think we really need to be careful how we use this term we all cherish. To
me it is better as a verb in the above instances as opposed to a noun.
Permaculture design is applied, utilized, practiced as a design discipline.
The farm is the farm, why does it need to be a "permaculture" farm. I think
we will get a lot further by refraining from attaching the term
"permaculture" to too many things. It's a cool term, but it doesn't have to
be the moniker that we all wear on our sleeves for everything we are
interested in. We are verging on cult status when we do this. It's time to
take the "cult" out of "permaculture", figuratively that is.

The only reason I'm even commenting on this is because I care about the
term. I think permaculture is unique and I see it being eroded into all
kinds of general ecological, conservation, farming, and countercultural
things. We loose a lot when we do this, and we loose the power that
permaculture has. We have lost many good words already, and I hate to see
"permaculture" going down that road.

On to celebrate the end of a good year!
-- 
Jason Gerhardt
Designer and Educator

----
I don't think that ethics always happens naturally, but I think it can
happen gradiently. So Paul, your farmer with herbicides could stop using
1/2 of them or 3/4 and see that he can survive, and then look at how he
could stop using any. That is a legitimate ethics path, in my mind. I think
that permies who judge him for that have probably never worked with a
farmer to get a design implemented and so are totally unreal about it. The
solution would be to get them to confront a real design and hit the walls
they're going to hit and come out the other end being more real about what
it takes to get a true, regenerative design fully implemented from both a
visible and invisible structure angle.

In McDonaugh's case, I would say that is a slippery slope because there is
so much time spent patting each other on the back for a design that is not
whole systems (as you point out Scott) that they never get around to asking
how they can do it better next time. A few corporations are actually asking
the question of how they can go zero waste, zero fossil fuel energy, and
real fair share and decent working conditions for their employees. It's
hard,  because the vast majority in that world don't agree with that game
yet. So the more we can do to popularize the game of being ethical, the
better. I try to make it at least a little bit fun to be ethical because it
is.

Koreen Brennan