Leave no child inside
The best part of my groggy morning, penance after a long night of grading papers earned by blowing off all work for two solid days on the weekend, was stumbling across the latest issue of Orion and, within its pages, this wonderful article by Richard Louv. And of course, there's a book that I missed entirely but must now rush out and find.
Louv has put into words much that I wanted to say in my own feeble forthcoming efforts, but it is said here with such deep passion that I'll fall well short of the mark.
The main point: we must find ways to engage our children with nature. It begins in the backyard, the front doorstep, perhaps even the bedroom window, but it is an agenda that is every bit as vital to our future as alternative fuel sources, carbon sequestration, hybrid vehicles, Kyoto. Perhaps more so for, even if by some miracle we find a way to pull out all stops, slow or even reverse the trend towards a scorched lifeless planet, the next generation or the one after that will only truly take up the mantle of responsibility if they see value in doing so. Our generation has, for the most part, lost sight of that value, and that's why convincing anyone to change their behaviour in the slightest is such an uphill climb. It's hard to make the case that shutting off the lights, getting out of the car, eating locally, is going to make a difference to who lives and who doesn't. Ultimately, the case is there to be made, but the time between action and consequence is just too long for anyone to apprehend, and it's indubitably true that the actions of one person make little difference. So we fail. I fail. But if we didn't act for our future survival, but for the preservation of something we love every day, something that we wonder about and cherish, then perhaps the case would be easier to make. If we assumed our role as stewards of all this wonder, or, perhaps even better, recognized the need for us to back off and leave more of it alone, there might be a small chance of success.
The long comments attached to the article are worth reading through for a wealth of ideas, resources, readings, websites, and positive glowing enthusiasm for what is described as a 'movement'. Something else comes through, too -- a disdain, perhaps even something of a hatred, for technology. This is where I think I part ways with the deep eco-kids. It's no solution to take up our hammers and smash the machines. We'd never succeed, and, if we did, people would die in the hundreds of millions (though I know many think that's the only way). I'm investing a fair amount of time these days in trying to understand and apply many technologies that are designed to extend our reach, our command of space and time. If I didn't have a conviction that there were ways to co-opt this technology to achieve the aims described in this article, and many others like it, then I'd want to take up a hammer as well. Maybe we can't rip our kids away from televisions and computers, but if enough of us use our heads and raise our voices, we should be able to exert much more of our will on what appears on the little screens.
Louv has put into words much that I wanted to say in my own feeble forthcoming efforts, but it is said here with such deep passion that I'll fall well short of the mark.
The main point: we must find ways to engage our children with nature. It begins in the backyard, the front doorstep, perhaps even the bedroom window, but it is an agenda that is every bit as vital to our future as alternative fuel sources, carbon sequestration, hybrid vehicles, Kyoto. Perhaps more so for, even if by some miracle we find a way to pull out all stops, slow or even reverse the trend towards a scorched lifeless planet, the next generation or the one after that will only truly take up the mantle of responsibility if they see value in doing so. Our generation has, for the most part, lost sight of that value, and that's why convincing anyone to change their behaviour in the slightest is such an uphill climb. It's hard to make the case that shutting off the lights, getting out of the car, eating locally, is going to make a difference to who lives and who doesn't. Ultimately, the case is there to be made, but the time between action and consequence is just too long for anyone to apprehend, and it's indubitably true that the actions of one person make little difference. So we fail. I fail. But if we didn't act for our future survival, but for the preservation of something we love every day, something that we wonder about and cherish, then perhaps the case would be easier to make. If we assumed our role as stewards of all this wonder, or, perhaps even better, recognized the need for us to back off and leave more of it alone, there might be a small chance of success.
The long comments attached to the article are worth reading through for a wealth of ideas, resources, readings, websites, and positive glowing enthusiasm for what is described as a 'movement'. Something else comes through, too -- a disdain, perhaps even something of a hatred, for technology. This is where I think I part ways with the deep eco-kids. It's no solution to take up our hammers and smash the machines. We'd never succeed, and, if we did, people would die in the hundreds of millions (though I know many think that's the only way). I'm investing a fair amount of time these days in trying to understand and apply many technologies that are designed to extend our reach, our command of space and time. If I didn't have a conviction that there were ways to co-opt this technology to achieve the aims described in this article, and many others like it, then I'd want to take up a hammer as well. Maybe we can't rip our kids away from televisions and computers, but if enough of us use our heads and raise our voices, we should be able to exert much more of our will on what appears on the little screens.
posted by Colin at 8:25 PM
3 Comments:
Hi, Colin,
Thanks for stopping by and leaving the nice words. I'm glad you're back to posting a bit more often. You give me hope and lots to muse over...and some good book ideas.
Thanks again....
But Nature does not lie. How will children learn that all the world is a shadow stage of illusion and that truth is subjective unless exposed to healthy indoor doses of television?
The Radiant City admits no such obsolete "natural world" thinking.
That being said, living in a city teaches you the world is a crowded place of finite resources where nature is precious and you have to learn to tolerate everyone. Running around in some vast wilderness teaches you that you are alone in the world and that its resources are infinite. So I'm not convinced that a subway visit to a local city pocket park doesn't instill a better understanding of the world, than running through a series of suburban backyards would.
Of course, children running through backyards these days would probably result in police choppers overhead and news reports of strange feral packs of dangerous wolf-children.
It's a complicated issue. Vast wilderness is, sadly, not on the table for most kids, but I think Louv (and others) make the point that there's nature to be had on the street corner, the pocket park, maybe even the windowsill. I remember those kinds of nature epiphanies from my childhood and I grew up in big cities. For my family a wilderness adventure was a one day drive to lake where we'd park on the beach and cook hot dogs on a camp stove. But still I remember cataloging bugs in the sand, wondering how fish know how to school, marveling at the texture of a toad's skin. I don't see those impulses to observe and wonder about nature in my kids unless there's lots of encouragement from adults. The power of The Sims or the Bob the Builder website seems greater somehow.
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