Connection to the Environment

Published on Apr 26, 2025, filed under misc (feed). (Share this on Mastodon or Bluesky?)

Maybe you’re like me, and besides your professional work, you’re also interested in understanding the root causes of our mess on this planet. What mess? That there’s nothing we’re good at except plundering resources and killing animals and people, and destroying our own habitat—making us the most primitive species on the planet.

The root causes are few, with property being one of them (I’d love to discuss this further in a different forum), and yet that’s not the point:

What I want to focus on here is our utter lack of connection to our environment.

We feel completely disconnected from other people, and show utter disregard for them. At best, we only give a sh_t about what’s going on. In other cases, we make life difficult or hellish for minorities and other-minded people (as with Trump-led, Republican-backed U.S. fascism). At worst, we annihilate them (as with Israel’s genocide against Palestine, but also Russia’s attack on Ukraine as well as the many other ongoing armed conflicts).

We feel entirely disconnected from other life forms, with 90–99% of people (!) insisting that animals need to suffer or die for them. Speciesism is the most popular yet least discussed -ism, and we are so blind to our brutality, it’s as heartbreaking as it is sickening.

We are nearly fully oblivious to the environmental damage we cause and continue to cause, with climate change signaling the destruction of what sustains us. We accept the plundering of natural resources and the shrinking of wildlife and land.

We are so disconnected from our environment that it’s as if everyone lives alone.

We must decide to stop this.

We are not separate from other people; we are not separate from other life forms; we are not separate from this planet.

Any damage we do to our environment, we do to ourselves.

It’s time we recognize this: Not only must we stop the exploitation and destruction, but we must also begin guarding and caring for everyone and everything around us.