permaculture

[christopher nesbitt <christopher.nesbitt@mmrfbz.org>]

>
> *"Cris, it sounds like you're doing a lot to address equity. Can you be
> doing more? Yes. The video for example, yeah, you did the best you could at
> the time, but do we have a need in the permaculture movement to address the
> gaping hole of cultural appropriation? Yes. What if your email wasn't about
> resistance, but about how we make it more possible to do less
> appropriation?*
>

Seriously? WHAT GAPING HOLE? Where do i find it? Installing photovoltaic
systems in schools, clinics and community centers, is that appropriation?
Designing and installing modified composting toilets from USAID design from
1965, is that cultural appropriation? Photovoltaic systems for community
level water pumping, benefitting over 1000 people and creating the water
boards to run them, thats appropriation? Food on 900 plates for elderly
people last year, is that cultural appropriation? 170 Belizean graduates of
full 72 hour PDCs. Is that cultural appropriation? Working with Maya
farmers to creat a agroforestry manual based on te work I have don for the
last 29 years, do you think that is cultural appropriation?

This guy personally attacked a video we made as a way to spread information
to farmers in Belize, most of whom have access to cell phone data, saying "*To
put it bluntly, this is appropriation of knowledge". *That is beyond
stupid. It is willfully and enthusiastically uninformed. If he is stupid
enough to say that, after allegedly watching the video, when it is
demonstrably untrue, I cannot help him. His problems of understanding and
comprehension are much deeper than I have time to assist him with.. Maybe,
just... maybe, that's why I was resistant. If you, still, think I need to
address his clueless accusation of cultural appropriation, or see any in my
work, I can't help you, either.

If you see "appropriation" where there was none, there is nothing to be
gained by engaging in this conversation, further.

I have work to do. Enjoy your self flaggelating self righteous
masturbation.

I bow out of the conversation.

_____________________________

Christopher Nesbitt


Maya Mountain Research Farm

San Pedro Columbia, Toledo

PO 153 Punta Gorda Town, Toledo

BELIZE,

Central America


www.mmrfbz.org
www.facebook.com/MayaMountainResearchFarm

On Sun, Apr 30, 2017 at 9:23 PM, Jason Gerhardt <jasongerhardt@gmail.com>
wrote:

> I guess I don't see racism as a permaculture problem. I see it as a human
> problem, with a huge gradient of layers. And I didn't see that article as
> being useful to dealing with it. It just seemed a shoddy lambast of
> permaculture in a context I've been working in so I spoke up to ask some
> more detailed questions. And some of those questions were about cultural
> appropriation, which nobody bit on. I'm guessing very few want to have this
> conversation, or feel safe doing so, so I'm at least glad we're having it.
> We can agree to disagree that Tobias article was on point. And we can agree
> on the rest, though we may have different approaches toward the work.
>
> I'm aware permaculture can be perceived as elitist and a white space, but
> saying so does discredit a whole lot of people of color who have made big
> contributions and apply it in their work (whom I credit and showcase their
> work constantly), though most as far as I can tell could care less about
> the "movement" part of permaculture, because most that I know are busy in
> another movement that is a lot more on point when it comes to ending
> oppression. There's this tendency in permaculture for it to be about
> everything and for everybody and the truth is nothing is like that. The
> shoe doesn't always fit. Most people of color I talk to in my city don't
> have time for it. They belong to other communities of activism that meet
> their needs better. So be it. I'm not gonna tell them they really need this
> permaculture thing that I find particular value in. Their trying to prevent
> the police from killing their neighbor, and being hired by the police
> department to train their officers, or running for office, or just pissed
> off in the street. I ask how I can help them in their movement not the
> other way around. We're dealing with different contexts. It's okay. I'm
> moving on. I have work to do.
>
> Jason
>
> On Sun, Apr 30, 2017 at 9:34 PM, Kelda Lorax <kelda@riseup.net> wrote:
>
> > Jason, regarding the basics of white privilege, etc take a moment and see
> > how I'm addressing everyone who's chimed in on this topic. I admit I'm
> > writing as a summary and not addressing point per point for everyone.
> Since
> > you are more trained in anti-racism work than others why didn't you call
> > out white fragility instead of me? Regardless of defensive emotions, us
> > permaculturists have a lot of work to do addressing cultural
> appropriation.
> > I'm really interested in the solutions and we can't get there if those of
> > us who see the problem are not speaking up. You may have been more gentle
> > than me, but if it was so gentle that I didn't recognize it as a 'calling
> > in' then it might need to be a bit more blunt.
> >
> > Tobias critique is not even the most seering towards permaculture that
> > I've seen. But it's as good place as any to start.
> >
> > Lawrence, I appreciate your enthusiasm and could say a lot more. But
> maybe
> > for anyone interested in addressing their own racism, this is a really
> > useful perspective that's much gentler than I can be:
> > http://nonprofitwithballs.com/2016/08/flossing-and-the-denta
> > l-hygiene-paradigm-of-race-discourse/
> >
> > Thanks
> > Kelda
> >
> > On 2017-04-30 13:01, Lawrence London wrote:
> >
> >> On Sun, Apr 30, 2017 at 1:33 PM, Kelda Lorax <kelda@riseup.net> wrote:
> >>
> >> I am quite racist, in the sense that I have unbidden racist things pop
> >>> into my mind and thus I scrutinize my mind heavily.
> >>>
> >>>
> >> What a unique and important topic to bring up. Outstanding. I now see
> >> where
> >> you are coming from.
> >> Maybe we can explore this. I said previously that when such unwanted
> >> neural
> >> energies burden my as I make my way through each day I respond by
> thinking
> >> about the Australian Aborigines and their contribution to mankind and
> that
> >> they hold the keys to one living in harmony with Nature or rather Gaia.
> >> Poof, racist thoughts gone. If only I had known how to do that from age
> 1
> >> to age 40. A related story from my time growing up in a university town.
> >> There was a black gentleman who lived nearby whose brother was a stone
> >> mason. George Baldwin was a gardener by profession and an eccentric
> fellow
> >> of small stature. He did yard work and landscape maintnance in
> >> neighborhoods mostly occupied by university faculty members and their
> >> neighbors. He talked to the plants. He was such a skilled horticulturist
> >> that he became
> >> the famous botanist WC Coker's (Coker-Totten "Trees of the Southeastern
> >> United States") favorite gardener. That was a real honor for him.
> >> He worked for my parents and other people in the neighborhood. Sometimes
> >> he
> >> would come to work and after a while disappear for hours.
> >> A search would find him curled up under a bush with a wine bottle. No
> >> problem. To each, his own. Anyway George seemed to me to be some kind of
> >> plant guru, distant and elite, his lack of education notwithstanding.
> >> There
> >> was something about him and about his work that exuded a mystique about
> >> the
> >> Earth' landscape, the world of plants what left a lasting impression on
> >> me.
> >> At age 40 I became a landscape contractor and later moved to farmland
> and
> >> entered the world of natural gardening and permaculture. So, there you
> go.
> >> instead of racist thoughts popping into my mind I have memories of
> George,
> >> a supreme steward of the Earth I was graced to have known and benefitted
> >> from.
> >>
> >>
> >> Not because I want to oppress but because I no longer want to be the
> >>> oppressor. If you think it's because I Want to think people of color
> are
> >>> lesser, than you don't understand my meaning.
> >>>
> >>>
> >> No, I did not think that.
> >>
> >>
> >>> On a gentler note, my husband and I were talking about this whole
> string
> >>> and he said "Well, everyone feels defensive at first"
> >>> -spoken from a man who was Seriously Annoyed every time I pointed out
> how
> >>> racist he is, but now looks for it himself and helps other white people
> >>> see
> >>> theirs.
> >>>
> >>>
> >> Well done, Kelda!
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> Lawrence F. London, Jr.
> >> lfljvenaura@gmail.com
> >> https://sites.google.com/site/avantgeared
> >>
> >
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