I'm actually pretty green guy, in that I like nature and wish there were more of it (outside my house). I also wear birkenstocks and eat granola on a semi-regular basis.
Now that we've established my supreme eco-friendliness, I'll get to the real point of today's post: to make fun of a bumper sticker that read, and I quote:
"THE EARTH DOES NOT BELONG TO US. WE BELONG TO THE EARTH."
There are a number of ways to take this, and all strike me as pretty foolish. In what sense is this true? Strictly speaking, this implies that the earth is an animate being, to whom a moral sense of ownership could be ascribed. One is free to believe anything, including that a space rock is a living deity. I could say the same thing about my navel lint. "Don't throw that away. You belong to that lint."
But is this true? Is the earth some sort of being that we serve? I'd have to say no. It's a rock in space and so therefore doesn't own anything, nor is it 'sad' about pollution, nor does it feel 'neglected' by us.
And if the earth is a being, and we are fleas on her back, are we really responsible for her well-being? (As I write this, a backhoe is digging out massive chunks of her flesh in my front yard.) It seems that either the earth could be a victim OR a deity. But a victimized deity makes no sense.
My point is that there are plenty of good arguments for conserving, preserving and observing the natural world, and this is not one of them.
There is a much stronger statement to be made when this is cast as an issue of stewardship: how well do we manage what we've been given? Waste, whether of time, money, or swaths of rainforest, is not only harmful but it also betrays our innate selfishness. It becomes a personal responsibility to care for a shared space. When my lifestyle impinges on another, I begin to wrong them. But this is not because I have an obligation to the earth, it's because I have an obligation of love to God and to my fellow man.
my favorite ecosticker says "pave the whales"
Posted by: levy at May 4, 2004 09:43 AM