Erika Holt
Helen CzerskiOne of the biggest habits that humanity has to kick is that of seeing a human-free space and assuming it’s worthless/empty unless we fill it up with something. It’s happening with plans for the ocean, deforestation for “development”, talk of delivery drones filling the future sky, cube sats that will hide the stars. This “space” is the planetary engine, and it’s incredibly valuable NOW. doing all sorts of things that keep us alive & enrich our lives. We should protect it. #ocean #climate #Earth
Rage Rumbles 🏴☠️🫂 🔞@helenczerski I think you may want/need to wean people off their attachment to the teat of consumer capitalism before you imagine any success in that area. Capitalists out there be bribin literally everyone to narcoleptically drift into doomsday. We be Netflix and chillin our way to destruction with barely a whimper of dissent.
Jonny Clark@helenczerski Exactly. It’s not “wasteland” - something else lives there.
RobertJacksonWe see the conundrum when we are fortunate enough to have a garden where others have been before, trying to undo their projects, removing bricks and concrete and rusty metal ... But to where does this waste go as we try to recreate what was there before?
Gustavo Ogasawara@helenczerski For sure! I see a lot in #agriculture. Producers looking for land that could be producing always thinking wrong about the #opportunitycost.
Pedestriansfirst@helenczerski And no more new roads! #justwalk
Blake Leonard@pedestrians1st @helenczerski We definitely should be cutting way down on roads, and maybe replacing them with rails instead, especially elevated HSR. You need far less space to run those, and they run far more people at any given time.
However, at least in the US, our public transportation infrastructure is so insanely car-dependent that there's no use for it (think: you have to have a car to get to the train station and from the next station to your destination).
However, at least in the US, our public transportation infrastructure is so insanely car-dependent that there's no use for it (think: you have to have a car to get to the train station and from the next station to your destination).
dangrierson@helenczerski that’s why it is so important to rewild grouse moor monocultures etc. We need to lead by example. The Govt doesn’t get this,
Lee 🌏@helenczerski
Because we know, right now, someone is planning to sell advertising space on drones, in our skys.
Because we know, right now, someone is planning to sell advertising space on drones, in our skys.
AndyDearden@MrLee @helenczerski In a disturbing Philip Dick (I think) story, someone is commuting back from Saturn to Earth, when an advertisement gets into the passenger seat of their vehicle!
Quincy ⁂And asshole #advertisers have already succeeded in converting many of our cities into farms for eyeballs 😠
Because they can't accept that "empty" space not crammed full of shit has a value
But nothing is ever enough for them,
the godawful "city blights" moving billboards only appeared in that form after they'd converted online spaces into advertising wastelands ...
and now it's the night sky next, if those mindless zombies have their way ...
David Ortiz Méndez@helenczerski We should protect and value our planetary engine, recognizing its immense current value and the essential role it plays in sustaining and enriching our lives.
GrantLife is a see-saw. When there are ups, there are downs.
The UP for me during Covid lockdowns, was that for the first time since I was a child (a looong time ago) I was looking at blue skies without cloud streaks across them and hearing no distant engines roaring.
Gentle blue silence.
@gsymon @helenczerski Life is like a seesaw. When there are ups, there are downs.
An example from my personal experience during the pandemic was that, due to the lockdown, I had more time to spend with my family at home, which was wonderful. However, I also experienced the sadness of not being able to see my loved ones and missing out on social gatherings and events.
Ironically, I just came across this... which puts it into perspective.
6th july 23 = hottest day & most simultaneously airborne aircraft ever.
Numerozero (@[email protected])
Attaché : 1 image Avec 20 000 avions dans le ciel, le 6 juillet 2023 a battu le record historique de vols simultanés. Par un hasard cocasse, c'est aussi la journée la plus chaude jamais enregistrée.
gato@helenczerski I agree with the sentiment but for one point I think its important tomake. This is not a habit humanity as a whole has to break. There are many societies and peoples throughtout history and nowadays that dont make a habit out of destroying the environment they live in. In fact, when europeans arrived in the americas, they thought "look at all those forests untouched by humanity". While in fact, those forests existed the way they did because of the activities and care of the indigenous population that lived there.
The problems caused by the destruction of the environment in name of this eternal capitalist development, is problem that the whole humanity faces. But not all peoples and societies a guilty of destroying the environment like that. And that is something we cannot forget, for those same people are the often the ones fighting literally with their llives on the line to protect their homes and territories from this kind of destruction.
@gato @helenczerski Part of the problem is Cartesian dualism and the idea that 'humans' are somehow different to 'nature'. We are all connected
MichaelCabus@helenczerski I agree. Also the idea that land not in use is somehow okay to use to dispose of waste. There are wetlands by my house and people do that on occasion. Not as bad as this case. But if someone did the same at the local dog park. https://abc7.com/old-bridge-new-jersey-pasta-dump-spaghetti-mystery-nj-charges/13302928/
Ricki Yasha Tarr@helenczerski Ugh every time I see one of those posts about fitting everyone in Texas or something, I'm just like, Sure, but that's not how anything works, we have to have open green space to have clean air and water.
Siue Allen@helenczerski so many times I’ve undertaken an ecological survey of a ‘gap’ site to find it’s teeming with life; a whole ecosystem just nicely trundling along, enriching the earth and air. Trying to preserve as much ‘as is’ is a fight I constantly wage.
Tiota Sram@helenczerski caveat: this is not a habit of "humanity." It's a habit of certain human cultures (i.e., white supremacist western capitalist patriarchal imperialism, most prominently).
@helenczerski this is what I tell my in-laws when they see my back yard hasn’t been mowed in weeks.
CAWWW@helenczerski @mjohanning humans are a greedy scourge aren’t they.
Pattyice@helenczerski I remember this beautiful field in my hometown that was kind of in between the 2 more populated sections of town. It always seemed so beautiful the clock tower marking downtown then the stretch of stores but in the middle this big beautiful field.
Now that area is luxury apartments and a clinic.
Sam L.@helenczerski I was hiking yesterday and struck by the fact that trails were made by people, the park might not have been forested for more than a century, etc. And yet this was what we think of as "appreciating nature": an accessible, constructed environment with the trappings of wilderness.
@helenczerski on the other hand, people had carved their names into trees and not cleaned up after their dogs, so maybe that's as much wilderness as we should be given.
chriszanf@helenczerski The only spaces those people need to fill is the ones between their ears
Eugene Teplitsky@helenczerski For the capitalists, empty space is an untapped opportunity to extract profit. Remember the existential panic when work from-home became so pervasive in some places (like New York City) that they started losing some of that profitability?
@helenczerski yeah, but how can you sell bottled oxygen when the trees give it away for free
I'm O'Hare, I'm one of you. I live here in Thneedville, too.
WndlB@helenczerski and, as usual, humankind is trashing it.
Cha Cha@helenczerski I flew across the US yesterday and, looking out the window, noticed how humans have manipulated nearly every square inch of flat land and a significant portion - noticeable from a few miles up - of mountainous land too. Flying presents a perspective that emphasizes the beauty of the non-manipulated land and water
Lorna@helenczerski The tragedy of the commons.
MrBadger42@helenczerski Plants and animals are people to.
Rick Thoman@helenczerski Counterpoint: this is not a habit of humanity. This is a habit of particular cultures. Many Indigenous cultures do not share this worldview.
Peter Gray (per/per) 🚲🏞🎷🏠🌿
Barry Goldman@helenczerski on the other hand... NO OTHER life form has practiced this. life has filled EVERY FRIKKIN NOOK AND CRANNY OF EARTH.
so it runs in the family!
@helenczerski the worse habbit is probly just breeding so dammned much. or maybe LIKING being in crowded mobs so we tolerate so many of us?
it's a lot of big omnivores and their frikkin cows now.
TimP@helenczerski I have always been outraged that the brightest thing in the night sky, bar the moon, is the ISS. How dare we?
kikebenlloch@helenczerski It's some sort of twisted horror vacui. Humanity's utter inability to leave at least some parts of our surroundings be, to walk, see, breath & enjoy without further alteration (they needn't be virgin forests or unaltered coastlines).
Often the more we mess with them, profitwise, the worse the outcome.
Often the more we mess with them, profitwise, the worse the outcome.
Alsa@helenczerski it was the capitalist that paved paradise to put up a parking lot
Davva@helenczerski
That isn't a habit of "humanity". Many humans and cultures already value such spaces. It's more a habit of colonialism and capitalism.
Blaming all Of humanity, lets the architects of capitalism and it's cheerleaders off the hook.
That isn't a habit of "humanity". Many humans and cultures already value such spaces. It's more a habit of colonialism and capitalism.
Blaming all Of humanity, lets the architects of capitalism and it's cheerleaders off the hook.
Reiner 🐻 
@helenczerski I heard a very interesting podcast once how open spaces (in mind or landscape) make humans restless. That’s why people try to fill every single second of their day with something - and every acre of land and sea and sky.
Christian Kent@helenczerski @mastodonmigration As an Australian I visited Scotland and found empathy in the emptiness … there’s a natural fear I’ve seen in some of travelling for 30 minutes without seeing another human