How We See Each Other

“The hierarchy of caste is not about feelings or morality,” Wilkerson writes. “It is about power — which groups have it and which do not.” ~ Caste, by Isabelle Wilkerson

America is beset with a wound of spirit. Slavery, or the subjugation of others based on skin color, origin – or any other arbitrary distinction -is an ongoing contradiction in our Constitutional lives yet to be resolved. Today, Black Americans are still struggling for equal representation. Now, with the striking down of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, are we back at the basic question: Do Black Americans have a right to equal representation in voting districts? We are at another make or break moment. Is the Supreme Court right that there is no longer a need for federal oversight of district maps in southern states which have historically worked to suppress the vote of African Americans?

Human beings can be vicious, murderous, and also kind and loving…and everything in between. We are a complex species with potential for good or bad. Our canon of law traces all the clever ways we try to obtain power.

For millennia, humans have sought distinctions that give them a false rationale, stemming their sense of guilt when taking what is not rightfully theirs. More advanced cultures are more tolerant, making judgements based on how people act in various situations.

Much of this wisdom of the ages was on the minds of our founders when we set out to establish a new kind of government based on equality. Yet, most of them owned slaves and denied poor whites privileges who did not own land. Over our history as a nation, Americans have subjugated and disparaged African Americans, Irish, German, Slavic, Italian and Chinese immigrants, and Native Americans. The Constitution and Bill of Rights, and ongoing adjudication in our courts, continues to refine how we live together and who gets a “slice of the pie.”

Listen to a scholarly discussion about the impact of the Voting Rights Act from the National Constitution Center.

Isabel Wilkerson explains in her landmark book, Caste (2020) that she set out to discover the origins of our discontent. In her lengthy study, interviewing thousands of people, the things that divide us the most are not so much color or gender but rather about who’s got power.

In a 2023 interview with Oprah Daily, she was asked about the banning of Caste from libraries across America. She responded, “In writing Caste, I had to do a tremendous amount of research into India and Germany during the Nazi era. The Nazis studied the United States’ Jim Crow laws in creating the Nuremberg laws. We are coming perilously close to the spirit of what they were doing in another century with the banning of books. It’s revisiting a past that we should never want to experience again.”

It seems to me that we are at a new juncture in determining whether a redistricting map achieves the goals of the party submitting it for review: to determine whether it serves to weaken the moral principles of a Republic to achieve a new form of government, i.e. an autocracy based on white male supremacy and Christian Nationalist ideology. Yes, it is a grab for power, but much more, right? It seeks to tamp down the voices of Black Americans who are seen as opposing white power and privilege which for centuries enslaved generations. Sound familiar? I think we are right back at Reconstruction.

What do you think? Please submit comments.

Resources:

National Constitution Center Civil Rights Town Halls on YouTube:

Civil Rights Division, Department of Justice: Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act

Scotus Blog

Brennan Center for Justice

How quickly we forget

When I was a teenager, I would ride my horse deep into the Northern California wilderness. I came of age living in big nature. Given California’s growth and development, that ride would now be impossible. Yet phylogenetically, big nature is deep in all of our psyches. So I began to wonder why we were so rapidly destroying it. Years later at my first job at the University of Houston, I was studying children and parents’ environmental views and values. I found the children knew what air pollution was; but when we asked them if Houston had a problem with air pollution, they said, “No, we don’t have pollution here.” At the time, Houston was the most polluted city in the United States. – Peter Kahn, Environmental Psychologist

Environmental Generational Amnesia (EGA) was identified by Peter Kahn when I was working as an environmental educator. It began to answer my puzzlement about why people could not see the degradation of nature over time.

Kahn explained this phenomenon occurs as each generation takes the environment in their time as the norm.

Now, in America, I am wondering if this phenomenon works with memory of a democracy. We take what is before us as what it has always been.

In Kahn’s recommendations to counter environmental generational amnesia he worked with urban planners, for example, to build in features that allow local residents to experience more robust nature in a built environment.

Could we do the same for each generation to remember and know the origins of our Republic by experiencing aspects of a democratic society through out our lives as The People. Our form of governance is dependent on robust citizen and representative action and participation.

We could start by considering how to identify fairness, developing respectful listening; teaching check and balance by designing situations where kids can participate in situations demonstrate how it works to protect representation, free speech, and other key characteristics of a democratic society.

I recall a teacher in high school who designed his homeroom to function in this manner. He did something else: he taught us the Latin and Greek derivation of many words in our language so that we could derive meaning from root words

Do you agree that a type of democratic generational amnesia may be a force that works to undermine democratic governance which is dependent on individuals possessing more than rudimentary knowledge (i.e. memorizing definitions).

What is a democracy?

The Rights of Nature

For too long, the dominant culture has cleaved humans from the web of life, insisting upon human separation from and superiority to the larger living world. That assumption has been translated into law, governance, and other realms of practice, justifying the treatment of nonhumans and nature as treasure troves for endless exploitation. However, the grip of this mode of thinking is beginning to ease, leaving space for new ideas and actions to sprout through. MOTH – More Than Human Life Program, https://mothrights.org/about/

Among thoughtful people across disciplines, the understanding that human beings are woven into the fabric of Nature – animal, plant, river, ocean – all is part of a whole that is interconnected beyond the human imagination. Recent research on trees, for example, demonstrate how certain trees “mother” others and pass on their knowledge to new generations. We’ve learned how fungi are a living glue and generative structure that is ubiquitous in nature and microbes in human beings are a living brain in the gut lining. The more we learn, the more we are humbled before the whole of life on earth.

Now, as great harm is evident through the combined activities of human beings which weakens and disappears species, robs whole forests or rivers of its life sustaining powers, we are called to reconsider whether the Earth is for human taking. What of the rights of all beings who make human life possible?

Emergence Magazine Podcast my readers will note is a well I return to frequently to gain new perspectives on the nature of our relationship to the whole of life. Western philosophy separates humans from nature, thereby providing rationale for extraction and overharvesting for economic gain and for power over others. Ironically for America, present at the time of exploration were millions of Americans with intricate knowledge of how to live on a piece of land without ruining it (Aldo Leopold) and a conceptual understanding of the web of life and its spiritual nature. To me this is one of our nation’s greatest sins. Yes, I consider it a sin because a thinking person through observation alone can observe how life is wildly interconnected and sacred.

Two links for readers to explore:

Emergence Magazine Podcast: Song of the Cedars. https://emergencemagazine.org/podcast/

Robert Macfarlane and the MOTH project https://mothlife.org/staff/robert-macfarlane/?fetch=single-staff and https://mothrights.org/about/

In Song of the Cedars listeners experience the oneness of life with an exceptional group of humans interwoven in the panoply of a healthy rain forest.

Consider whether the exploitation of a mineral from the earth should come with a cost paid back to that mountain based on the legal rights of nature. While listening to this podcast, I thought, “Wow. to think there are people who are engaged in integration in the web of life. I thought these are our most important people, guides and wisdom keepers.”

Let me know what you think about this movement. What is your experience with the rights of nature if any.

Robert Macfarlane Books

Photo from Kentucky Native Plant Society: Purple Coneflower

The Wisdom of a Forest

“When Mother Trees – the majestic hubs at the center of forest communication, protection, and sentience – die, they pass their wisdom to their kin, generation after generation, sharing the knowledge of what helps and what harms, who is friend or foe, and how to adapt and survive in an ever-changing landscape. It’s what all parents do.” – Suzanne Simard, author of Finding the Mother Tree.

Suzanne Simard, Forest Ecologist and author of Finding the Mother Tree and newly released When the Forest Breathes shares her latest research including the role of people in the health of the forest.

Please check out this recent podcast interview by Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee at Emergence Magazine with Suzanne Simard. The Scaffolding of Life: Cyclical Structures of a Forest

A mother tree: sugar maple, Bowling Green, KY

Democracy will not die in America

Get a cup of tea or coffee, glass of wine, and sit with all your attention to this great American Supreme Court Judge present an astute analysis of why the current Supreme Court’s use (misuse) of the Shadow Docket weakens the nation’s courts system overall.

Whenever we get to see democracy in action by a great American, take heart. Each of us, according to our ability, and from our own area of expertise, can provide the critical guardrails needed to protect the nation from tyranny.

Detail on stairs in the Capitol Rotunda
In the Capitol Building

The Land and Waters Speak

At present Lake Mead and Lake Powell on the Colorado River distribution system are at record lows (Lake Mead 34% and Lake Powell 27%).

From 1990 to 2008 I called Arizona home. I lived first in Yuma where the Colorado River channels into myriad canals to water America’s vegetables and grains in the Imperial Valley of California.    

It was in this vast valley that I first encountered the Colorado, unrecognizable to me as it was sprayed at high velocity from circulating sprinklers. Precious water evaporated in the dry hot atmosphere before falling to the ground.  Row upon row of lettuce, broccoli, and cabbages lapped up what water fell to ground. As far as the eye could see, this preposterous apparition filled my windshield as I drove through to Yuma at the confluence of Arizona, California and Mexico borders.

In its natural state, the Colorado River ran down through the Rockies, gathering size and speed, carving deep canyons in the red sandstone of northern Arizona. The river ran red where it dropped suddenly down toward the Sonoran Desert, flooding its banks in the spring as it flowed down into Mexico and emptied into the Sea of Cortez (Gulf of California). Where it slowed and spread from its banks, marshlands formed that were places of high biodiversity. Plenty of fish and game were found by Indigenous peoples and later explorers. All along the river near Yuma, forests of mesquite trees released bushels of nutritious bean pods. Later, university scientists discovered the pods, when ground and made into flour, provide local people with immunity to diabetes. Mesquite bread is naturally sweet and easily digested. River peoples grew crops in rich deposits of mud left by the receding waters. Legends of fish so large and numerous the people could walk across the river.  

In our Anthropocene era, the river is most recognizable in its highest elevations where it continues to cut the stone of Colorado and Northern Arizona and carry it tumbling south. Hoover Dam at Lake Mead collects the lion’s share of water, but starting at Parker in Arizona,  water is pumped 700 ft into the air where it drops into an open canal system (Central Arizona Project or CAP) and travels by gravity toward Phoenix, shimmies through and on to Tucson and then drips into Mexico. Over decades after the canals grew with a burgeoning population and larger farms, the river never made it to the mouth of the Sea of Cortez. It petered out above the marshlands of northeast Mexico which slowly dried up. Recent efforts by environmentalists and indigenous communities managed to restore the flow enough to fill key areas of marshes again. The once rich biodiversity is returning.

At this date, two dams and their respective reservoirs, Lake Mead and Lake Powell, are at historically low levels. Hoover dam was built in the ’30s of the 20th century on assumptions made during an unusually high snowpack in the Rockies that was not the norm. The dam at Lake Powell was later built to collect water  and generate electricity for business, farming and cities. Desert lands where the canals distribute water are biomes with limited water. Turns out that the Colorado River flows are normally lower than the projected. Long-term tree ring studies show regular drought periods of up to 100 years. The area is in one now.

Warming from climate change is causing snowpack changes – faster melting rates and new evaporation of ice crystals directly into a gaseous state.   

As American food security, economy, science and culture face a potential crisis, how will 40 million people live in a hot, dry desert? From LA to Phoenix to Tucson and points between, much will be unsustainable without reliable Colorado River water. Cities have mostly drained their ground water. Some like Tucson are replenishing it with CAP water but that, too, is a scenario with a short horizon.

Now the powers that made the Law of the River (Upper and Lower Colorado coalition of states, municipalities and tribal nations) are talking about draining Lake Powell and sending water to Lake Mead. All partners will see reduced acre feet per year, and some will no longer receive any water from the river. Ongoing talks and mediation have reached no agreement yet. Arizona’s tribal nations are adamant that they must be part of that negotiation.

Lake Powell in southern Colorado was constructed under a huge outcry by residents and tribal governments who ultimately suffered the sacrifice of their homes and property and traditional homelands to fill the huge reservoir. Traditional lands of Indigenous nations must be returned. What about all the people who lost their homes and farms?

Will humanity learn anything from this tragic miscalculation? I’m skeptical given history.

When Congress commissioned John Wesley Powell to survey the West and determine its potential for farming and building cities, he traveled extensively in the West and was one of the first expeditions to make the wild trip down the Colorado River from the headwaters to Yuma. Result? He reported to Congress that the area held limited water for most of the land mass and that if the government should sell lands to enterprising ranchers, farmers and speculators, they should bear the financial burden of providing what water supply they could find. Imagine if they had followed Powell’s advice. Many fewer people would reside in the Western deserts; the food supply would be regionally grown, and the international food markets would be in places where rain naturally falls. The River would run free, nourishing  human and natural communities to the sea.

I once wrote a speculative fiction novel in which, due to changes in climate, local communities formed enterprises that fit the bioregions where they lived. Later, they became small nations with a shared ethic that recognized the ecology of place and innovated within natural limits.

Resources:

  1. Colorado River Management: https://www.azwater.gov/crm/dashboard#
  2. Bioregionalism: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bioregionalism
  3. The American Southwest: video on YouTube – https://youtu.be/K96ly_uLAPk

The American Southwest is a 2025 award-winning documentary with updated information and spectacular photography. It shows the biodiversity and the role of many animals, plants and insects adapted to the river, and how their lifeways provide sustainable strategies for human life in arid lands.

It traces the original agreements (The Law of the River) on how the Colorado River water would be allocated, the construction of Lake Mead, and subsequent construction of Lake Powell. I recommend the film for citizens and students of ecology and bioregionalism as we enter a defining period when we will all need to work together to mitigate and adapt to a changing climate. If we consider the land and water in that partnership, I believe we can live within the limits of the Earth while innovating in our communities.

Let us not be indifferent to the evil perpetrated by this president.

“We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented.”
― Elie Wiesel … https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/1049.Elie_Wiesel

I refer readers to Paul Krugman’s noon hour post on Substack in Our Darkest Hour. Americans who do not stand and push back on this vile attack on civilians and civilian infrastructure in Iran (an international war crime) will be aiding the end of America which has striven to be a force for good in the world though imperfect. Our history, our story is being stolen and altered to the vision of radical people who profess Christian Nationalism. Their beliefs are antithetical to our traditions and values. Our moral force as a nation.

Everyone must push back, and be vocal, and rage against the immorality being perpetrated in our names. America, save yourself!

Timothy Snyder on Substack, i.e. “Thinking About,” has a similarly cogent essay as Krugman’s.

https://open.substack.com/pub/snyder/p/the-president-speaks-genocide?utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web

“Whatever happens tonight, or any other night in this war, is now legally defined by the president’s statement. In the practical application of the law of genocide, the Genocide Convention of 1948, the difficulty is usually in proving “the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.” Henceforth the intent is on the record, in the published words of the president of the United States and the commander-in-chief of the armed forces about the death of “a whole civilization.”

Note at 4 p.m. Eastern Standard Time: Pope Leo is calling on leaders and citizens around the world to call for an end to the Iran war.

There are also groups contacting citizens to join in a scripted message to each of our Congressional Reps. I called all three of mine, a Republican Representative (Jen Kiggans) and Senators Tim Kaine and Marc Warner.

The message asks Congressmen and women to call for a War Powers Resolution to stop the war and to not authorize any additional funding. Trump is asking for trillions of dollars to continue to support his military targets and campaigns. He needs to hear and feel from the majority of our voting public a resounding NO!

Lest It Slip through Our Hands

There have been 9 generations of Americans since the ratification of the Constitution.  Our form of federal governance has been discussed and amended by citizens over our Republic’s history as we labor together to create a more perfect union.

Over the last 80 years however, that “conversation” has gradually intensified until the present moment. The rule of law and civil rights are ignored. Corruption is flagrant. The treasure of America is being raided and spent without Congressional oversight.

Dark money has bored into the election system, causing candidates to find more substantial sources of funding to win a race. Citizens United, one of the most consequential Supreme Court rulings on the election system​, has diminished the vote of the people. The rich and powerful ​have steadily gain​ed greater influence.

The American citizen is the last and greatest bastion of our freedom and justice. But how do we become the kind of citizens who know how to wield power or identify its misuse​ by our representatives and administration?

I can only share my own experience to describe how I learned about my government and the roles a citizen plays to fulfill his or her obligation.

As a child and teen my parents led discussions at the dinner table about our nation’s history and, at times, of elections and why they voted for a candidate. Often, my mother and father diverged on candidates which was fun with spirited debates. This was how my sisters and I realized the nature of democracy​: it is participatory.

In public school, we students learned how and why our form of government was established, and what rights are guaranteed and rules of order. Social studies and civics education was integrated into K-12 education. Debate clubs offered students instruction on how to defend ideas while learning to respectfully listen to opposing views. When Congress functions in this manner it is called bipartisanship. Compromise is the core.

Public institutions further reminded us about democratic behavior. Churches, clubs, libraries, museums, and public leaders across many disciplines modeled how we treat and care for each other as citizens and neighbors. Standards of moral behavior kept the Republic steady. No​ one is above the law in a democratic nation.  

My parents and grandparents also supported our education with expectations we would apply ourselves to learn a body of facts and skills that prepared us to go out in the world. Then, there were generally accepted truths and facts shared by three TV channels. Diversity of thought and opinion were available in numerous print magazines and journals. People read books, journal articles, and local newspapers. We exchanged opinions face to face.

My parent’s love of reading was contagious. Biographies, literature, and poetry – culture from across the world – was brought to us as we read together or listened to discussions. I recall my father reading Sherlock Holmes mysteries out loud on a winter’s day around a roaring fire. How was this possible? There were no cell phone​s, no social media. And, in our small southern town in Tennessee, no business was open on Sunday. There was time and quietude. We were not wealthy or powerful people. Our relatives were farmers and skilled laborers. They all understood that dreams could be fulfilled with a good public education.

I do not expect that we could or would even wish to go back to those “slow” times, but maybe we might look back to understand how to raise up citizens who are curious, well read, and able to function as a living guardrail to keep our democracy fit and strong.

A key skill is the ability to discern when ideas that are opposed to a healthy functioning democracy rise up as they do from time to time. Today, American citizens can barely make heads from tails with an onslaught of disinformation and outright lies. AI enables citizens to create false videos to fool an electorate. We are all to blame for the mess we are in today.

Should we wish to keep our democracy, we must seriously confront these issues. Working locally to speak truth to power; to discipline ourselves to listen respectfully to ideas you may abhor. But listen we must.

We are the guardians of freedom, of liberty, lest we neglect our obligations and let it slip through our hands. 

Capitol Building Rotunda, Photo by Susan Feathers

Food Security

… every day, 2,000 acres of farmland are lost to non-agricultural uses, many farms continue to lose topsoil at alarming rates; and one-third of America’s farmland may change hands in the next 15 years as aging landowners sell their properties. These trends jeopardize the future of agriculture and our environment. Farmland is essential for food production—the demand for which is expected to increase by 60% by 2050. But farmland is also essential for a wide array of ecosystem services on which our future depends.~ American Farmland Trust

The American Farmland Trust is where I first learned about the importance of land trusts as a means of conserving land for farming, forestry, and soil improvement. I was living in Bowling Green, Kentucky when I was learning about the organization and its goals. This was during the Pandemic years from 2019 – 2022. I was an avid supporter of Community Supported Farmers (CSF).

Land Trusts Help Young Farmers

My farm family was a young couple with a growing family. They supplied me and their subscribers with a beautiful box of fresh farm produce with occasional surprises like local jam or sauces. And during the Pandemic, this enterprising family delivered the produce to our door.

A land trust conserves farmland and leases it to farmers in long-term leases as long as they fulfill the terms of the lease. Some leases can be as long as 99 years and inheritable. With some, farmers can gain equity for buildings and equipment they invested in farming the land leased. This can be passed on to relatives. Land trust have formed to specifically address inequities such as farmable land being bought by industrial farming operations that drive up the cost of land. Young farmers wanting to do the right thing by the soil, water, and air often cannot find land they can afford to buy. A lease with a Land Trust makes it possible. Black Soil KY is an innovative agribusiness model.

No-Till Growers: the Innovators

Young farmers and entrepreneurs put together podcasts about regenerative, no-till farming. I helped them with a start up grant from the government to provide educational videos for farmers to learn the art and practice of regenerating their farmland or market gardens. Today, this is a nationally recognized nonprofit business: No-Till Growers.

The Farmer

During these heavy, Pandemic years, I found hope in Kentucky farmers, especially the young farmers. Most could not afford to buy land and thus joining a Land Trust allowed them to lease land long term and even gain equity on it should they wish to pass it on to relatives.

My mind was on fire with stories I could write about a quiet revolution happening on farms with dreamers regenerating the soil. The outcome? A novel! The Last Farm on Lovers Lane is complete and I am now looking for a publisher. Below is an excerpt, protected by copyright law. Read it here.

CHAPTER 1

Belle Patterson

I parked the truck in the shade of a sprawling sugar maple. The redolence of warm soil and spice of wild grasses filled the cab as I rolled down the window. On this day I would continue an experiment on a worn out field on my grandfather’s property. Two centuries of extractive farming had depleted our farmland of its natural soil diversity. Teaming up with my friend Janelle, we were conducting a 2-year capstone project to restore the soil.

Stowing the instruments of my trade in a tool belt – spade, sample bags, soil test kit, thermometer, syringe, and Draeger tube – I headed for the field with anticipation. Kneeling in the spongy soil near the first metal cylinder, I inserted a needle into the aperture on the lid to draw a sample of air and pump it into a Draeger tube to measure the gas concentrations, recording them in a field notebook. Knowing the relative amounts of carbon dioxide, nitrogen, and oxygen, we could determine the health of the soil’s ecosystem. Next, I drove my spade into the dark loam for a sample. An earthworm oozed out.

“There you are earth-queen,” I whispered to the soil denizen. A drop of my sweat splashed onto its glistening skin causing the worm to contract and plunge out of sight. Small insects worried their bodies through the soil while a sow bug rumbled along my glove like an invertebrate Humvee. Under a hand lens, springtails were busy at life and ants went about their well-ordered societies. The soil community was reawakening.

Hours passed happily as I continued this process at each of the cylinders placed at intervals across the field. A flock of sparrows in the old maple chattered amicably. Engrossed in the process, I jumped when my flip phone vibrated in my pocket. It was Pops.