Brown Stuff

Carl Remick cremick at rlmnet.com
Tue Aug 10 08:22:05 PDT 1999



> Our goal in making society work for the betterment of all
> people would be to
> convert our economy from something that resembles a nation of
> a few farmers
> working a multitude of farm workers into a new kind of
> economy that resembled a
> community of gardeners, in which workers would have good
> reason to attack their
> jobs with a sense of care, price, joy and even exhilaration.

This passage attracted a predictable amount of ridicule, but I thought Michael's point was really excellent -- as was Nathan's response: "There is no doubt a happy medium of application of farm technology for maximum productivity of farm labor with a minimum of enviro-destroying results ... there is little doubt we are far from the happy medium right now."

We should beware of false dichotomies -- the idea that we are destined to be dependent on exploited stoop labor OR on environmentally dangerous GM technology. There has to be a way of reducing the scale and adverse environmental impact of high-productivity modern farming without simply reverting to subsistence farming.

Carl



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