At 11:52 PM 2/2/99 -0500, Doug Henwood wrote: >It's very hard to persuade affluent Americans that the problems of the poor >can be their problems too someday, or that ecological crisis could have any >bearing on them. No doubt many, even most, people who drive SUVs consider >themselves environmentalists of some sort. You can present all kinds of >reasoned stats on rising surface temperatures and climatic instability, or >on the risks of infection of "normal" populations, and they won't believe >you. And if any of the threats become too real, it's likely they'll opt for >containment (incarceration, quarantine) or private sector solutions >(private schools, air filters, bottled water) over more humane approaches. Do you think such a response to crisis is "human nature" or merely a form of behavior that is specific to social-historical conditions that prevail in this country? To pre-empt your answer: Many years ago I took a cultural anthro class where I saw a documentary about the !Kung bushmen of the Kalahari desert. Until recently, the !Kung were the only known gathering-and-hunting society relatively little affected by Westernization. They could survive in the arid environment due to an extraordinary cognitive skill that helped finding water stored in the roots of certain desert plants. They would simply memorize a "cognitive map" of where such plants grew in the spring, and could later find their roots even if the top part was gone. The makers of that film were supposed to follow up a group of the !Kung who gave up their gathering and hunting life style and settled down thanks to a technological innovation - a diesel powered pump that pumped underground water to the surface. When they arrived at the site they discovered that the pump was broken and the villagers abandoned the site in search of water. It was clear, however, that they had little chance of finding it because extended period of sedentary life killed their water-tracking skills. The film crew followed the tracks left by the villagers and was able to locate the whole group that could not go very far because of exhaustion. Most of them were still alive although extremely dehydrated. Since the crew carried some water supply, they shared their water with the villagers and filmed the the whole scene. Here is what the film showed: 1. Those who could still move would approach th etruck to get water. 2. Upon getting water, the villagers would first carry it to those who were too exhausted to move of their own (that included people as well as animals) because they needed water the most. Then they would return to the truck for more. 3. There were no scenes reminiscent of gas stations in civilised America during the 1970s gasoline shortages, even though the villagers did not know if there was enough water for everyone. This suggests that the individualistic response to crisis suggested in your posting is the response conditined by bourgeois society. When the crisis finally comes, bourgeoisie is more likely to use individualistic responses to it which, in a long run, decreases their chance of survival. That is good, no? Why would any decent Marxist want to warn the ratfuckers that they are an endangered species? Why not dropping some infested corpses in the burbs instead? Regards, Wojtek
