Walks #81, #82 and #83: Domination Systems!

Walk Durations: Two at thirty minutes, one hour today...

A new six foot tall fence dominates a section of my walk now...

I walked in St. Helena on Monday. Tuesday I drove the 158.8 miles from the hospital to my front door. With the evening sunlight lasting longer, I was able to celebrate my reunion with our Homestead with a walk.

More of the same today. Except now my walk is mired by a new fence. The ambitious kids down the road have enclosed their three acres with a six foot tall fence. Last week I stopped and talked to the male kid about the fence. "We have predators", he said. "We like to keep our dog in here", he said. Of course, the dogs are pit bulls, the number one breed of the Redneck in these parts. When I mentioned that his fence interrupts the natural flow of the fauna in the area, he looked at me like I was speaking Hindi. When I went on to state that it is incredibly ugly to have all these individual Fiefdoms on the ridge, he just shook his head and walked away. I am in danger of becoming an ecosocialist leper in this "off the grid" community.

Of course, there really is no good reason to construct such a fence. Any garden he has could be protected with just a perimeter fence around the garden. The same goes for protecting his chickens. And what dog needs three acres to frolic (terrorize?) in? This ridge we sit on is narrow, just a few hundred yards from side to side. All sorts of wildlife meander through these sections of private property. Constructing a high fence restricts the normal flow of deer, skunks, raccoons, possums and other critters.

Wendell Barry writes about cooperating with the land. He wrote that land needs humans to complement it. Stewards. That would be nice if most of us operated from a "take only what you need and share the rest" point of view.

We are products of a Domination Culture. Our religion teaches us that we are the "crown" of creation and we've used this ideology to dominate every thing around us. This has led to Domination Cultures which create not only empires, but also plays havoc with the culture of the Wild.

I read this weekend that 50 percent of the land surface of the Earth is now inhabited by humans, or used for our human economic activity. Of course this is all the best land. We build our cities next to the best rivers. Our farms on the best land. What is left for Wild Culture are sections of mountains or deserts which we have been unable to Dominate yet (or are undesirable).

So what does this have to do with my neighbor's fence? It illustrates once again, our ideology of Domination. "Keep the Varmints out!". "No Trespassing". "This is my land!". In the meantime, the acorns which feed the deer on this ridge top, are no longer accessible from the youngster's property. Jackrabbits will no longer be able to roam and forage on his property. The same goes for skunks and raccoons.

This is where I cheer for the bears of the area. They don't respect fences. It is my hope that they will break down this fence, and harvest our neighbor's chickens. The bears need the protein more than my neighbors. Hopefully, the bears will bat last!

Time to leave our Domination Systems behind. And soon! if we expect our wild cousins to survive. How will this happen? My hope is that a change in consciousness will occur en Mass, much like Cigarette smoking went from expected behavior to deviant behavior within one generation. A good start would be to realize that All Life has a right to exist. Not just humans. Then, we as humans will adjust our behaviors to include all living things.

And fences will be a thing of the past....