ON LAND, IN SEA AND IN OUR EARS
Hanns F Skoutajan
“One of the world’s most sophisticated and beautiful nations ( Canada, our home and native land) is being ransacked by barbarians,” so writes George Monbiot in the first paragraph of his most recent book “Feral: Rewilding the Land, the Sea and Human Life.”
The barbarians that Monbiot refers to are “the nation’s elected government. The world has watched in astonishment as your liberal, cultured, decent country has been transformed into a thuggish petro-state.”
Monbiot has spent much of his career as a journalist and environmentalist, working with others to defend the natural world he so loves. It is obvious that he has a high regard for Canadians, all the more reason for taking his harsh words seriously.
His passion is the restoration, or rewilding, as he calls it, of our damaged ecosystems. In his native Britain, particularly Wales and Scotland, he takes issue with sheep farming. He claims that it has absolutely devastated large areas of the country leaving virtual deserts with no trees.
A few years ago on a flight to Edinburgh as we proceeded towards landing I was utterly amazed to see from my window hills upon grey hills totally devoid of vegetation. Later hiking through the Ochill Hills east of Stirling I saw at close quarters the terrain and the sheep that had shorn it clear. The only trees left were in crevices too inaccessible for the sheep to reach.
Monbiot wants such ecological devastation to be “rewilded,” that is restored to what it once was. Those same bare hills that I wondered about from the plane and later visited on foot , had once upon a time, been covered with thick forest and hosted a variety animals now sadly missing. And, as he maintains, it can be returned to somewhat that state but at a cost to the wool industry. There is a price for everything.
Monbiot has travelled the world over and has seen other devastation. Not only is he concerned about the land but also the sea around us. He harshly, but justifiably, attacks the fishing industry which has virtually raked the ocean bottom totally disfiguring it, wrecking coral reefs, while sucking up the fish population indiscriminately.
He is not without hope for he believes and gives examples of nature’s resilience. Once its inhabitants/owners return to more responsible practices of farming and fishing the environment can make a comeback. What is lacking is not the means but the will.
My most recent read is a book called The End of Night: Searching for Natural Darkness in an Age of Artificial Light. Paul Bogard, the author, teaches creative non-fiction at James Madison University in the United States. His description of what a London and Paris might have looked like in the age of the gaslight is beautiful, when “The Old Lamplighter of long, long ago, made the world a little brighter” as the romantic song has it. But that was before electric power transformed not only cities but the world. His book contain photos from different times that show how electric light has brightened the world such that night seems to have been banished in a good deal of it.
We live in a 24/7 work world where employment schedules have totally changed the lives of working people. He interviews nurses in an emergency ward of a hospital, in factories where employees work in three shifts keeping machines running at all times, in stores open 24 hours a day and elsewhere. Shift work has made family life difficult and indeed it has been the source of much illness for the many who have been exposed to light 24/7.
As I finished the two books it occurred to me that there was one more aspect of our living that had not yet been covered by my readings. I am sure that the subject of noise pollution has been written about and I am looking for a book with a title such as “The Death of Silence.”
Both light and sound are made possible through electricity powered by wild water harnessed as well as atoms split, all of which impacts our environment.
Recently I have heard a documentary on the CBC about noise in our restaurants and bars. My last venture out for dinner was in one of those blessed but scarce eating establishments where the sound system was not overwhelming and allowed us to converse without raising our voices. And by the way the food was excellent. At a bar that I visited a few nights earlier the clientele vied with each other to be heard above the blare of the speakers emitting what I suppose passes for music. But, oh, I am getting old! We are enveloped by sound and light.
Once again I must take you back to my youth. In the spring of 1939 after a five hour trek by horse and wagon my parents and I, our two friends and a bachelor moved into a remote, decrepit one room log shack in northern Saskatchewan. Later that evening when we had made our homes in the four corners of that one room we all stepped outside. For the first time in my life I encountered total darkness until the moon rose over the neighbouring woods. I also experienced total silence except for our own voices, the occasional hoot of an owl and the baying of coyotes. It was awesome and unforgettable.
I doubt that we can totally rewild as Monbiot advocates. Too much has changed. Our lives depend on power whatever its source may be. But there is no doubt in my mind that humans, and lets start with ourselves, must learn to live mindfully , mindful of our environment, the flora and fauna and of each other. It is becoming more than obvious to many, hopefully soon to most, that the sole arbiter of our economic decisions cannot be just “the bottom line.” There is more to life than what meets the accountant’s eye.
SQ 18/08/2013
