On 8/7/2012 10:02 AM, Toby Hemenway wrote:
Right on and thumbs up, onward relentless, let nothing stand in your way.If we want to survive . . . each and every family as much as
possible needs to be able to produce it's own food for itself, and
as many other people as possible.
I don't need to grow my own food.But there are millions of others who do need to grow their own food in
order to have a healthy diet, involve themselves in very worthwhile
activities as practitioners and learners. Many need to do this to put
food on their tables as they try to weather the poor economy, job loss,
keep their homes and land, keep transportation or seek working
alternatives (bus, bicycle, carpool), have adequate healthcare, etc.
I need to be part of a healthyThose networks, if they exist, are not necessarily available to millions
network that does.
of people and for a varieties or reasons. Let's hear more about your
networks. Who forms them, who is part of them and who keeps them going
and functionsl?
The LL plan for America includes a computer/web/internet-based product
and services production, marketing and distribution network, PSPMDN.
It could be created and made to work and serve everyone participating,
no matter how small, as consumer or seller, barter, trade, donate, have
its own currency and be compatible and cooperative with the IRS.
While I'd love it if everyone gardened, aWhere are they and how many are there; what is the projected future for
coordinated community food system
this resource?
is more resilient and allows moreNot so. At all. You're conception of this is too fixed and limited
diversity than individual dachas, and fits better with American
culture and land ownership patterns. The US has a very different
history from Russia.
and too limited to the past.
And most yards are too small to produce "all ourStraw man argument. They need to produce as much of their food needs as
own food."
possible, themselves. This can be done in pots or windowsills in
apartments, urban or suburban homes, rural homes and homesteads and
farms. How many thousands of books have been written encouraging people
to grow their own for table fare and health, and to share or sell. How
many tens of thousands of videos exist on YouTube demonstrating every
aspect of home food production and renewable energy, and cottage
industry possibilities. We need 21st Century Victory Gardeners
Practicing Permaculture. We need a nation of them. Think of the savings
in energy, materials and equipment.
Its a mass movement already, a happening thing, thank providence.
This is what permaculture is really all about down to its core set of
principles.
A single 18th-Century farmer could feed 50 people. Making theAnd the oligarchs, the cabal, corporations, etc. are not doing this now?
household, instead of the farm, the neighborhood or even the town,
the core unit of a food system atomizes the community. Let's not
default to "go it alone." It reduces the many options for reaching a
goal--meeting our food needs--to a single tactic: grow it all
yourself. It means that this critical function is done only one way,
with all the attendant hazards (what if you get hurt?) and reduces
most people to serfs farming for a banker. It's part of the mix, but
not the solution.
The dachas are well worth looking at. But severe food and economic
disruptions tend to be brief in developed countries (see Argentina,
Iceland, Weimar Germany, Mexico, etc.), stabilizing soon at a
simplified level. So to redesign as though the unstable period will
be permanent is unwise.
While Russians were busy farming their 2.5 acre dachas all day, the
oligarchs were seizing control of everything else. They still have
it. Let's learn from that. We need to organize at a higher level than
the household.
Stealing their investments, causing profound inflation and profiteering
from price rises (charge what the market will bear, law of supply and
demand), sending most American jobs overseas and not creating a
significant number of new ones to replace those lost, largely factory
and small local businesses ceasing operation in the face of competition
from chain stores selling imported goods (at inflated prices). And
people do not need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, reorganize
their lives and livelihoods, seek self sufficiency, independence,
personal sovereignty, freedom, liberty, family security and access to
the basic necessities of live? Of course they do, now as much as ever,
including during the Great Depression.
Toby http://patternliteracy.comThis is a good thread, keep it going.
Are you reading, Koreen and Bob Waldrop?
LL
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