floog wrote:

Cranius wrote:Thanks that was really thought provoking...

Well, in some ways, but in other ways I just roll my eyes and sigh "oh for fuck's sake".

That Michael Pollan article is nothing radical. I find it astonishing that we have been utterly overtaken by all the nonsense that surrounds us that our grandparent's principles have been obliterated within a couple of generations. If any of our grandparents were to read any of the above posts, they would piss themselves laughing (and not because of their incontinence).

Look, I don't mean to be negative or offensive, but when people earn their living from simply raiding their grandparents' memories reminding us of things that we really should already know, and then begin to label it "ecosophy" or ""avant-gardening", staking claim to a radical movement, then I lose all heart. Rubbish saying alert: Necessity is the mother of invention goes the old saying, and when our grandparents had needs they also had the wherewithal and knowledge to get on and do something about it. I guess that necessity has been sucked out of us.

I take your points, maybe I'm overtheorising it.

Pollan's allusion to 'victory gardens' is apt though. If you imagine wartime to be a situation in extremis, then a parallel to ecological disaster is a fair one IMO. Similarly, people through the depression and war were forced to recycle and make-do and mend. Then it was seen as a patriotic duty. These are practices that we unlearned in 50's. Growing your own vegetables was a radical response to radical times. Certainly that's what Pollan is saying regarding Vaclav Havel under a totalitarian regime; how they 'resolved that they would simply conduct their lives “as if” they lived in a free society.' Their refusal is radical for me, just as the effects of our consumption patterns are radical. I like the idea of gardening subtracting from the damage we are doing.

If you don't have room to grow anything, check this website for sustainable locally grown food, farming co-ops, farmers markets, etc...

http://www.localharvest.org/

Some of them might even let you work a couple hours a month for your food.

I hate this article's tone.
Gardening is for rich people. Fuck em.

floog wrote:

Cranius wrote:Thanks that was really thought provoking...

Well, in some ways, but in other ways I just roll my eyes and sigh "oh for fuck's sake".

That Michael Pollan article is nothing radical. I find it astonishing that we have been utterly overtaken by all the nonsense that surrounds us that our grandparent's principles have been obliterated within a couple of generations. If any of our grandparents were to read any of the above posts, they would piss themselves laughing (and not because of their incontinence).

Let's not fool ourselves that our grandparents lived in a Golden Age of spartan values and closeness to the land. It was our grandparents, and their parents, who spent their entire lives trying to invent the labor-saving devices that not only freed them from back-breaking work, but also gave them the leisure time to eventually turn into passive consumers.

Look, I don't mean to be negative or offensive, but when people earn their living from simply raiding their grandparents' memories reminding us of things that we really should already know, and then begin to label it "ecosophy" or ""avant-gardening", staking claim to a radical movement, then I lose all heart. Rubbish saying alert: Necessity is the mother of invention goes the old saying, and when our grandparents had needs they also had the wherewithal and knowledge to get on and do something about it. I guess that necessity has been sucked out of us.

See above. What they did about it was think of and invent new ways to save themselves the trouble. And reducing Pollan's accomplishments and thinking to some kind retro vampirism only reveals your lack of familiarity with his work. (And be fair to the article. Pollan isn't insisting it's radical. Just important and overlooked.)

I agree it is a positive action to be commited to - for the record, my yard is the size of a shoebox and I know I wouldn't have time for an allotment (don't know what that's called in America - it's a small patch of land in a communal area that you rent from the local council to grow flowers or veg on), so I don't do fuck all. I've got friends who grow their own fruit and veg, and I am insanely jealous.

So you're one of the Western world's ever-growing number of citizens who are increasingly urban/suburban, have no tradition of living from the land, and a busy life that leaves little time for simple, sustaining activities like gardening? And you wonder why gardening (and let's be accurate, not just gardening, but gardening-as-public-statement-of-purpose) could be considered a new and different approach to environmentalism?

I think you're tilting at windmills.

Ty Webb wrote:tilting at windmills.

There's a series of short movies on the Guardian website this week about making your own wind-turbine, the world's first and only lived-in zero carbon house in Unst (Shetland) and making your own seed-bombs to propagate flowers in areas of urban neglect:

Living off the grid: Scotland's wind-powered community

Living off the grid: Zero-carbon house

The guerrilla gardener's seedbomb recipe

Cranius wrote:

Ty Webb wrote:tilting at windmills.

There's a series of short movies on the Guardian website this week about making your own wind-turbine, the world's first and only lived-in zero carbon house in Unst (Shetland) and making your own seed-bombs to propagate flowers in areas of urban neglect:

Living off the grid: Scotland's wind-powered community

Living off the grid: Zero-carbon house

The guerrilla gardener's seedbomb recipe

awesome. thnx.

Hey me and the Missus have got some tomatoes, olives, chillis and oranges growing at the moment ! we even kept the seeds from our very first tomato and have germinated 9 more plants from it!!!! (BTW best tomatoes ever!! I have tasted anyway, having only store bought ones.) oh, and we grow our own basil, coriander and schallotts as well! its great to make spaghetti and cruise out to garden, scissors in one hand, vino in the other, and cut me some fresh basil.!!!!! mie piache molto.
not sure of spelling.

yeah, its a good idea to start with basic hardy vegies/herbs and work up from there. spend winter getting your patch ready with manure and straw, plant early spring = vegetown.

Sorry to be a wet sock, but the "carbon footprint" argument in favor of home gardening is the least compelling one. Self-sustainability requires a land plot significantly larger than a suburban backyard-- that is, if you're lucky enough to afford one these days-- so planting a garden won't seriously change the infrastructure that stocks your grocer's produce counter.

If anything, consolidating gardening to local farms is more efficient. If we want to reduce the carbon footprint, we should all go en masse to the local farmers' market on the way home from work.

FuzzBob wrote:Sorry to be a wet sock, but the "carbon footprint" argument in favor of home gardening is the least compelling one. Self-sustainability requires a land plot significantly larger than a suburban backyard...If we want to reduce the carbon footprint, we should all go en masse to the local farmers' market on the way home from work.

Which is why Berry's argument in favor of the moral imperative to acknowledge our dishonesty about the balance of resource use is such a strong one. Self-righteousness and misguided beliefs about reducing carbon outputs are dangerous, but ignored dishonesty far more so.