World Full Of Volition

You cannot destroy a world and live on it. It is only this culture's monumental arrogance, abusiveness, narcissism, and stupidity that causes so many people to believe that they can ignore the needs of the world, that they can manipulate it, that they can poison it, that they can blithely exploit and consume it, that they can take from it without giving back, and that the world will, like a good victim, continue to support those who are killing it, and that it will never fight back.

It doesn't really matter in this case whether you are a mechanistic sort who does not believe that the word can and does and will fight back, or whether you are more of an animistic sort, who, as I do, experiences the world as full of volition. If you're the former, you can talk about ecosystems collapsing and losing their ability to support human (and if you're in an especially expansive mood, nonhuman) life. If you're the latter, you can talk about the planet withdrawing its support for this wretched culture, and fighting back, undermining and ultimately destroying that which is attempting to kill it.

. . .

You know, it's always the same with those who are destroying life. First you ignore the damage entirely. We can kill all the bison we want, you say, and it doesn't matter. We can kill all the passenger pigeons we want, and it dosn't matter. When it doesn't work to ignore the damage, then you deny [that] it's happening. The herds are just as big as they were last year, you say. It's harder to hunt them, but the herds must be just as big. When it doesn't work to deny that the damage is happening, then you attack those who try to tell you about it. You attack their reputations: Oh, they're just Indians, they aren't scientific, they don't know anything about population dynamics. They're just environmentalists, they're too emotional, and you know they'll lie to protect some piece of ground. When it doesn't work to attack the mesenger, you pretend [that] the damage isn't really damage. Who needs bison anyway? And what does it matter if there are a few chemicals in every stream? You already have chemicals in your body, and they haven't killed you yet, have they? Global warming is good, isn't it? When it doesn't work to pretend the damage isn't damage, they you try to blame someone else. The Indians, not the whites, were the ones who overhunted the bison and killed them off. [It's all those Chinese who want to drive cars that are really creating global climate change.] When it doesn't work to blame someone else, and you finally have to acknowledge that you are the one who did this damage, then you say that someone made you do it. You wouldn't have killed the bison excep the Indians wouldn't give you their land, so you had to starve them off. . . . And when it doesn't work to blame your destructiveness on someone else, then the last resort is for you to say that everyone does it, so you cannot be held accountable. . . . It's all crazy. No matter what we say, you've got an answer forit, and no matter what we say, you keep on destroying our home.

~Derrick Jensen, Endgame, Volume II, Resistance