What Can One Person Do? A Creation Care Dialogue

Here is another article in dialogue form - an approachable take on consequentialism.

In light of crises that seem too big for one person to solve, a friend stresses to another the importance of doing the right thing, regardless of the outcomes.

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Good article, but I don’t think anybody here cares. Also, he forgot to mention voting for environmentally-friendly candidates.

As an organization, we steer clear of advocating for specific policies/candidates, etc. aiming to only present the science/faith angles, so that part of the narrative is typically excluded.

In that case, I would add, “choose your leaders carefully.”

But it’s nice to get back to environmentalism.

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I definitely feel some COVID News Fatigue!

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Voting for good candidates is definitely a goal. Though often for me I run into the issue of things that are equally important to me that span the two party system so I actually don’t think I’ll vote again except for on the local level in my city and county unless a exceptional candidate rises up. But I’m tired of voting for the lesser of two evils type situations. Obviously from my own perspective.

Teaming up with others is definitely a good approach. I team up with others here to help local trails and nature preserves. I voted , and we were successful once against clearing a creek out from 3 feet deep and 6 feet wide surrounded by woods that was 100+ years old into a river that was 50 feet wide and 10 feet deep eliminating all the old forest growing along it essentially. I protested the daylights out of them and when they even tried to move forward I’m through various loopholes they finally gave up after not being able to work because like 30 people would show up and we would be in the creek and woods technically on our private properties and not saying this is necessarily ok or not, on how you want to view rights to your property and ect… but after about $2,000,000 in damages to tractors and equipment and people standing around while no work could be done but having to be paid they pulled out. Did not even reach 1/6th of a mile in almost a years time. The creek is only a few miles long and not a single person supported it except maybe a few who just wanted property values to go up. But apparently people kept dropping hundreds of BBs ( tiny bullets ) down the gas and oil and even water lines. $2 worth of BBs dismantled $150k machines every week.

I also think that just like mutual funds it’s good to diverse your giving. Like 50% goes to local organizations focused on citizens. 40% goes to local organizations focused on protecting your local wildlife. 10% goes to overseas organizations. Those are just made up numbers but gets the idea across. That way you can invest in multiple things.

Then locally, where you are the most powerful, it’s definitely great to volunteer. Staring just with neighbors is great. It’s funny to see people drive 10 miles to help rebuild a house for a stranger but they don’t think to spend 20 minutes every other week cutting the elderly widows grass 2 houses down and so on. You can even do simple things for animals. Most people who get dogs tend to treat them as living furniture. These dogs barely get played with, stay outside in a caged fence and still wag their tails at their owners. You can get to know your neighbors and volunteer to walk their dogs every other day on a short 1/2 mile walk. So there are endless things to do within your community.

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Love this approach! Definitely both capital power in both being a contributor to an org that can make big waves, and also being a contributor to something smaller that can affect your direct environment.

Good going, except for the BBs. That is easily a felony.

I agree in part. But I also understand why people do it. I would have if no one else did. When I own land, and you just take my land and begin cutting down the strip of 200+ year old forest without my permission you’re kind of opening yourself up to retaliation. All because someone bought property on that river and decided to use backhoes to tear it all up illegally to create a dock. So then they tried to file zoning and other stuff to connect that creek to a canal. They are lucky I was a decent person who honor human life above ecology. When they first came on to my property and I said no and told them to leave and they kept showing up I was going set a bunch of bear traps under pinestraw and shotgun traps like how farmers use to keep coyotes away. Where if you trip the wire it shoots. I set it all up. Then a day later felt bad and took it all down.

I agree that property rights are not respected as they should be, and politics gets involved. Glad it all worked out for you. Ultimately, we are all just renting from the state, as fail to pay property tax and they kick you off, but they should protect us renters rather than oppose us. Perhaps that does reinforce the idea of using votes to affect things, as it seems power prevails.

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