We Have Been Too Kind To Those

So Many Indigenous People Have Said To Me That The Fundamental Difference Between Western And Indigenous Ways Of Being Is That Even The Most Open-minded Westerners Generally View Listening To The Natural World As A Metaphor, As Opposed To The Way The World Really Is. Trees And Rocks And Rivers Really Do Have Things To Say To Us.

Civilization Is Based On A Clearly Defined And Widely Accepted Yet Often Unarticulated Hierarchy. Violence Done By Those Higher On The Hierarchy To Those Lower Is Nearly Always Invisible, That Is, Unnoticed. When It Is Noticed, It Is Fully Rationalized. Violence Done By Those Lower On The Hierarchy To Those Higher Is Unthinkable, And When It Does Occur Is Regarded With Shock, Horror, And The Fetishization Of The Victims.

Violence, And Evil, Doesn't Always Come Dressed In Black, And It Doesn't Always Look Like Charles Manson. Nor Does It Always Come To Us As Obvious And Arrogant[...]. Often It Comes To Us With The Simple Plea To Be Reasonable.

All The Mega Corporations On The Planet Make Their Obscene Profits Off The Labor And Suffering Of Others, With Complete Disregard For The Effects On The Workers, Environment, And Future Generations. We Have A Straightforward Proposal: If They Want Public Money, We Want Public Control. It's That Simple.

It's No Wonder We Don't Defend The Land Where We Live. We Don't Live Here. We Live In Television Programs And Movies And Books And With Celebrities And In Heaven And By Rules And Laws And Abstractions Created By People Far Away And We Live Anywhere And Everywhere Except In Our Particular Bodies On This Particular Land At This Particular Moment In These Particular Circumstances.