Fight? or Flight?

Those of you who are more than occasional readers of this blog (and thank you for that) have probably picked up on the fact that we're fans of Ed Abbey's writings. Recently, we started reading a book of his essays, title: One Life at a Time, Please. Yesterday we read the essay Eco-Defense. There are a couple of paragraphs in particular we want to call to you attention. Here's the first, it's the opening paragraph of this piece by Abbey.

If a stranger batters your door down with an axe, threatens your family and yourself with deadly weapons, and proceeds to loot your home of whatever he wants, he is committing what is universally recognized—by law and in common morality—as a crime. In such a situation the householder has both the right and the obligation to defend himself, his family, and his property by whatever means are necessary. This right and this obligation is universally recognized, justified and praised by all civilized human communities. Self-defense against attack is one of the basic laws not only of human society but of life itself, not only of human life but of all life.

Abbey continues to use these assertions as a basis for defending public wilderness against corporate onslaughts of logging, mining and beef industries. He claims that public agencies supposedly responsible for protecting against corporate looting, aided and abetted by politicians and others, focus  on short-term gains at the expense of long-term resource conservation and management.

how can we resolve these?

Photo by J. Harrington

His arguments are no doubt familiar to many who have been observing with dismay the continuing public entity efforts to permit and promote new pipelines, new forms of mining, industrial-scale confined animal feed operations and dairy herds in the thousands. There are two further circumstances in Minnesota that make Abbey's arguments less relevant than many (some? one?) of us would like to see.

First, Minnesota's version of the "Castle doctrine," defense of self, family and home, is more tempered than Abbey's claims regarding universal recognition. In Minnesota, "A person may have a duty to retreat to avoid violence if one can reasonably do so." [Read the linked description for more details.]

a "new" kind of mining in Minnesota?

Photo by J. Harrington

Second, many of Minnesota's "regulatory" agencies, particularly those focused on protecting much of our common resources, suffer from both conflicts of interest and regulatory capture. The same Department of Natural Resources responsible for issuing Permits to Mine and leasing or selling mining rights is also responsible for supporting and promoting recreational uses of public lands that present conflicts with mining. (The U.S. Forest Service experiences similar problems.)

Although many of us wish we lived in a world in which black is black and white is white, the reality is much more nuanced and we as a society have not sorted our priorities very well. In fact, we are mindful of some of the best "political" advice we ever received. "When the facts are against you, argue the law. When the law is against you, argue the facts." We have come to believe that courts of law are not necessarily the best venues to argue either the law or the facts when it comes to the conservation (wise use) of public resources. That explains much of why we have come, more and more, to support changes to our current processes and regulations on mining. We think we will reach results that are more fair, more protective of our resources, and, in the long run, more profitable and sustainable by using the approaches being developed and used by the Mining Association of Canada's Toward Sustainable Mining and the generally comparable Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance, which has recently been announced as being followed by the steel sector.

An alternative to a more structured, nuanced, collaborative approach would seem to involve a more rigorous application of a "Castle doctrine" to Minnesota's public property than the citizens support for  their homes in this state.

Home to Roost

By Kay Ryan

The chickens

are circling and

blotting out the   

day. The sun is   

bright, but the   

chickens are in   

the way. Yes,

the sky is dark

with chickens,   

dense with them.

They turn and   

then they turn   

again. These   

are the chickens

you let loose

one at a time

and small—

various breeds.

Now they have   

come home

to roost—all

the same kind

at the same speed.

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