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About Eugene weekly. (Eugene, Oregon) 1993-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 4, 2003)
TO THE EDITOR BY MARY O’BRIEN Private Rights We are custodians with dual interests. M ist is gathering around Mount Pisgah’s summit and we’re on the far side of dusk. A black shape is bunched below on the north slope. Is it a small conifer? A person pausing on a cross-country walk? The shape shifts and flows silently up toward us and into the woods. One deer. The moment a gift. Think of all the gifts. Every breath of air, every drink of water, every piece of food, every season, every sunset that ever stopped you in your tracks, every bird you ever heard migrating south, every cell in your body, has been a gift to you from Earth. And then think of how we are constant- ly lobbied to regard Earth’s gifts as some human’s or corporation’s “private” property. But what, ecologically speaking, is “private” about incinerating oil in one’s private automobile? Does it not insert poisons into the one atmos- phere shared by all living beings on Earth? What is “private” about growing a genetically altered crop that will pol- lute the native genetic pool of plants off-site from the farm? What is “pri- vate” about draining a wetland given that species eliminated by the cumu- lative loss of “private property” wetlands are not owned by any of the pri- vate wetland-drainers? What is “private” about putting Drano into our region’s shared water system via one’s private kitchen sink? I t’s an interesting exercise to try to think of anything any of us does physically that can be considered truly private. Maybe having children. Really? There are not public, ecological consequences of six billion humans and more each day consuming Earth’s food, space, and energy? Going on the Atkins diet. There are not public, ecological consequences of eating fish when the oceans are being desertified and farm fish are being fed fish from the ocean? Hmm. Going to the bathroom! THAT’s private! There are not public, ecological, consequences of peeing caffeine, birth control pills, or mood or chemotherapy drugs into the Willamette River? For good or harm, no man, woman, child, or property is ever, at any moment, an island. Neither socially nor ecologically. Yet much of the moti- vation behind the writing of our nation’s Constitution was to keep “govern- ment” from interfering with “private property.” Much current political rhet- oric deifies human “rights” to grasp “private property” and decries the evil of “takings” of “private property” to conserve Earth’s ecological diversity and health. But, wrote ecologist Aldo Leopold in 1934, “The crux of the problem is that every landowner [or private property owner/user] is the custodian of two interests, not always identical, the public interest and his own.” What does a person do, who understands ecology, but lives in a society that grants humans and corporations “rights” to lay waste the Earth of all beings, and then, with a straight face, labels those rights “private”? My only answer: bring change to such concepts with skill, effectiveness, and other people who acknowledge both humans and the Earth. won his election without presenting any plan or program for solving the state’s problems. In Mississippi, Haley Barbour rode to victory wrapped in the Confederate flag. Here in Oregon, Multnomah county voters rejected a chance to make PG&E public again. Now it will be sold privately with no guarantee that the next owner will be any better than Enron. Is anybody paying attention? The word democracy is getting a lot of use these days but it’s poorly understood. People can’t make wise decisions about things they don’t understand. Geez, I know it’s tough fit- ting in all that reading between work and the kids and whatever else but if we don’t, then our vote becomes about as important as our choice of cornflakes. Brook Adams Eugene TAXING PET FOOD Corporate America’s relationship to the de- vious people managing our public relations in- dustry has become a plague upon our nation in every aspect of government. On a local basis the combination of that alliance has now scraped the bottom of the barrel when it began attacking local efforts to reverse the inhuman treatment of dogs and cats in Lane County. Terminating the lives of 700 dogs and 2,000 cats per year is hardly a commendable local government oversight, but having the very people who profit from the feeding of family pets object to finding a local solution to euthanasia is morally objectionable. Taxing animal food makes considerable sense! A 5 percent tax on the retail cost of food purchased by pet lovers would provide • Residential & Commercial Services • Quick Response On/Off-Site Customer Support Your Complete Computer Solution PC & Macintosh Experts Virus & Data Recovery HOSANNA DANCE PROUDLY PRESENTS • PC Workstation/Server Construction & Repair • Website Design, Construction & Search Engine Optimization The Clothes Horse A Woman’s Resale Boutique...and more! HOLIDAY SALE BUY ONE ITEM AT REGULAR PRICE & GET THE SECOND 50% OFF Adventures in Narnia A DANCE INTERPRETATION OF THE LION, THE WITCH & THE WARDROBE With featured guest performer Rebecca Le Duc * Also a sneak preview of "Waiting" * Directed by Jennifer Knight Dills SATURDAY, DECEMBER 13 • 1 PM & 7 PM Tickets are $5 • By phone 607-5798 or at the door HOSANNA DANCE - The Art of Dance with the Heart of Worship 1361 River Rd • Eugene • 607-5798 • www.hosannadance.com 6 DECEMBER 4, 2003 In the article “Looking D Nominees in da Mouth” Dan Carol (11/20) gave us a glimpse of the candidates. My horse is Dennis, even though Dan says “the guy literally looks like Mo from The Three Stooges.” He is single, and that could get him some votes. • Data & Voice Cabling LANE COMMUNITY COLLEGE PERFORMANCE HALL Mary O’Brien of Eugene has worked as a public interest scientist for the past 23 years. She can be reached at mob@efn.org HE’S MY HORSE • Network Design, Deployment, Administration & Maintenance A s a starter, in this winter season of gift-giving holidays, I would suggest we each remember the procession of gifts we have been given by Earth and what support we are giving Earth in return. Through our purchases, money, time, jobs, volunteer efforts, political deci- sions. If you love to know that polar bears are on Earth, are you working for policies that will reduce global warming, which is driving them to extinc- tion? If you love children, are you supporting organized efforts to reduce the load of industrial chemicals they now have to struggle with while they are assembling their bodies and brains before being born? If you love pub- lic places of nature, are you insisting your legislators gather funds for their protection? If there is anything public that you love — lands, information, social support in difficult times, health, news, biodiversity, water, trans- portation, education, elections — are you helping insure it remains healthy and public in the face of current aggressive political campaigns to strangle and privatize it? Perhaps, for 2004, place above your desk or in your wallet some saying that daily reminds you of your intimate friendship with Earth. And then consider what that can mean for you this coming year. Here’s one that might work: “Give to the Earth as you would have the Earth give to you.” an additional $700,000 per year for the local welfare of animals. Most of us who own pets would have little objection to paying an additional annual cost of $3.05 per cat and $5 per dog. With two dogs and two cats, the cost to our pet loving family would amount to $1.34 per month. Our neighbors owning no pets would pay no animal taxes of any kind. But ironically, The Pet Food Institute has contracted with a Eugene public relations firm to defeat the proposal. They say people may resort to feeding their animals “table scraps” if a tax were imposed on pet foods. They claim table scraps are unhealthy, but promote the highest cost junk foods on the planet; dog and cat foods often contain rendered animals unfit for human consumption. The objectors to local control are the spokespeople for an $11 billion per year un- regulated dog and cat food industry. America has more people in jail than any other nation in the world. I would propose the executives of the pet food industry and their public relations counterparts be made a part of the jailed population. I would also propose they eat their own food products they claim as being superior to table scraps! John Fluent Eugene • 2nd item of equal or lesser value • Store credit not valid • Coupon good til 12/24/03 GIFT CERTIFICATES AVAILABLE 720 East 13th Ave • 345-5099
