Take a hike (and fix-up a trail)

National Trails Day is just over a month away. On Saturday, June 6, organizations all over the country will be working to build and maintain hiking and biking trails, and trail shelters along the way. Scout troupes, conservation groups, state and local governments, the National Park Service, and hiking clubs are looking for individuals and groups interested in serving their communities.
As someone who has volunteered with this sort of work in the past, I can tell you that it's tough but rewarding. Perhaps the most important outcome of doing this is the sense of ownership that trail stewards develop as a result of taking brief responsibility for a piece of land that lots of people enjoy. Jones Mountain Cabin, in the wilds of Shenandoah National Park, seems like an old friend after that long weekend of cleaning out the fireplace, replacing the railings on the front porch, and maintaining the hand tools. There was a lot of hiking, eating, drinking 50 degree spring water, and playing music too, that June weekend. (This image more likely pictures October.)
Many trail clubs and other organizations leading Trail Service Day events accept volunteers with no experience. And (unlike the 2.5 day event I mentioned), most of these service events simply run from the morning to around lunchtime. However, if you have serious landscaping or construction experience, some groups also have projects for those looking for something more involved.
If you're interested in pitching-in, the American Hiking Society offers an event finder:
http://www.americanhiking.org/NTD.aspx

Image: Jones Mountain Cabin, Shenandoah National Park, VA, shamelessly ripped-off from some hiker's flickr page

I respectfully dissent

Since President-Elect Barrack Obama named evangelical pastor Rick Warren to deliver the invocation at his inauguration, there has been no shortage of ire. The decision has been called “Appalling” by gay-rights activists. Others in the blog lines and a variety of media sources have suggested that the choice is antithetical to the idea of an inclusive administration, or that it is divisive. While I'm on the subject of Pr. Warren's positions, I disagree with him on a few points. So, apparently, does Mr. Obama.
But, I applaud this choice. Far from “divisive”, this choice suggests a legitimate commitment to a dialog between dissenting opinions. It could also be regarded as a statement to those who voted against Obama that he plans to work for them as well as his supporters. Ending division isn’t accomplished by squashing dissentors (see US political history, 1776-present).
Only time will tell whether the Obama administration will actually part with the tradition of banishing and scapegoating those who disagree with the reigning party, and exacting four years of blind revenge on the leaders of other parties and ideologies. However, Obama’s invitation to Rick Warren suggests that the President-Elect acknowledges that a diversity of opinion and belief exists, and that disagreement on one issue doesn’t preclude cooperation on another. Moreover, this selection recognizes the plain truth that leaders from across the ideological spectrum can and must work together to realize meaningful change.

Wake up

This past weekend, my wife and I joined some friends for a pseudo-annual trip to Shenandoah National Park. This was our son’s first such excursion, though in general he is no stranger to public parks, national or otherwise.
We generally make the trip this time of year, a couple of weeks after the leaves have done their thing. We find that the Sleepwalking Masses are no less ephemeral than the pumpkin-colored xanthophylls that paint the trees for a week or two. I like it that way.
Alas, this year they seem to have hung-on longer than the leaves. Who are they? They leave cigarette butts or spent Evian bottles here and there. They everywhere talk loudly on cell phones and complain how bad the reception is in the park. They drive, no matter how short the distance, including the 0.3 mile stroll from the lodge rooms to the dining room. They make snide remarks about Virginia wines and local accents. They encourage their lethargic children look up for a moment from their horde of electronics only to throw Skittles to the whitetails. They spend more time in the gift shops than on the trails, and when they do hike, they complain about how far the falls are from the parking lot. These are the people Ed Abbey loved to hate in Desert Solitaire. The chestnut blight and the gyspie moth are less of a scourge on the park than are the Sleepwalking Masses.
Understand, I have no ire for ignorance. We are a culture blinded by consumption and suburbia. It is a sad state, but an honest one; it is a state not to be insulted, but corrected with an open mind and an appreciation for great and enduring things. I don’t begrudge a new visitor trying to make sense of the savage order of nature, anymore than I would think ill of my infant son for trying again and again to crawl and feed himself, or a student for picking up a new book.
Indeed, I was quietly gleeful to see the curtain of ignorance pushed aside: My godson momentarily befriended another boy about his age, as kindergarteners will do. The other lad hastily disentangled himself from an iPod, and they both stood grinning with bated breath at the cartoonish celerity of a chipmunk darting in and out of a woodpile. The two positively cackled when the cheeky little beast acknowledged them and instantly rendered itself invisible. Children always understand chipmunk humor better than adults do.
I don’t aim to discourage anyone from visiting a park. Rather, I want to encourage those who make the trip to actually experience the place. This means watching and listening. It means extending courtesy to the other visitors to the park, including those who have yet to arrive. It means respecting the land and the living things whose lives are woven into it for more than the length of a weekend trip. It means submitting to power of western mountains devouring the Sun or to the subtle alchemy of green shield lichens slowly, slowy, slowly consuming a boulder.
Wake up, sleepwalkers.

Redress of grievances

As the Washington Post and several other newspapers reported Thursday, the Maryland State Police recently distributed letters to 3 members of the nonprofit group, Chesapeake Climate Action Network, indicating that the state had maintained records and gathered intelligence on those 3 individuals as suspected terrorists.
This organization seeks to educate citizens and advocate for clean energy in Maryland, Virginia, and the District of Columbia. It’s based just a short Metrorail ride from my home in the MD suburbs of DC. And while I’ve never been affiliated with the group, I have known several people, mostly high schoolers in need of service learning hours, who have volunteered with them. CCAN describes itself:
“The Chesapeake Climate Action Network (CCAN) is the first grassroots, nonprofit organization dedicated exclusively to fighting global warming in Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, D.C. Our mission is to educate and mobilize citizens of this region in a way that fosters a rapid societal switch to clean energy and energy-efficient products, thus joining similar efforts worldwide to halt the dangerous trend of global warming.”
A nonprofit group with an office in Takoma Park, MD, which recruits volunteers to write letters to the editor, send postcard mailers, hold peaceable rallies at the Statehouse during critical votes, or pass-out fliers about wind turbines and light bulbs, doesn’t seem like a terrorist breeding ground to me. Even recognizing that members of the organization engaged in an act of civil disobedience (several members were given citations for laying in a roadway to block access to a coal-fired power plant in MD), this is not the kind of organization that engages in monkeywrenching, let alone violent terrorism. The CCAN members on the list as potential violent terrorists have no criminal records.
I’m generally concerned that the state government seems to be indulging in the fiction that environmentalism is somehow intrinsically linked to terrorism. It’s not. That’s worth restating, in no uncertain terms: Environmentalism is not a fringe or radical movement and it is not a front for vandalism or domestic terrorism. Suggestion to the contrary is not only profoundly ignorant, but insults thousands of Marylanders who work or volunteer their time to improve their communities.
I’m concerned that the actions of the Maryland State Police may not have been this general or accidental. Among the Chesapeake Climate Action Network’s platforms has been opposition to the Inter-County Connector, a planned multibillion-dollar stretch of highway in the Washington, DC area. Pushing the ICC through was among the central platforms of Maryland’s former governor, who was in office during the period that the CCAN members were labeled suspected terrorists. This concern over abuses of power becomes more pronounced, in light of similar listing and surveillance of members of other groups that opposed the governor’s politics, such as anti-death penalty, anti-war, and pro-choice groups. The appearance that politics may have been the motivation behind black-listing these individuals is troubling.
I remind my government:

Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

The right to peaceable assembly, the right to petition the government for a redress of grievances, and freedom from unreasonable searches are outlined in the US Constitution. I believe Maryland’s government owes its citizens an explanation.

So, what is it?

I heard a college kid explain to her father that "...sustainability is just another term for environmentalism", as I rode home on the Metro yesterday evening. The word "sustainability" has been bandied about here and there, especially since the UN's World Summit on Sustainable Development dispersed the idea in 2002. But, it seems that lots of people still don't get it.
So, what is sustainability? Is it purely an environmental idea, as our student suggests? Have sustainable ways of life ever existed? Do any exist now? If we were to shift our current way of life to a sustainable one, who would win and who would lose?

Image source: Wikipedia

Seeds

I wrote some time ago about the beginnings of a green ministry at my church and promised that I’d address this again in the future. On Saturday, this green ministry quietly began, as I led a group of 17 volunteers on a seed collection in suburban Maryland. The ministry will officially kick-off in the spring, with a four-week Sunday school class on stewardship beginning Earth Day Sunday and with more events. We’ll focus on learning about and showing appreciation for our gifts and we’ll work to serve others.
For now, I’m finding kindred spirits in the congregation and building interest and buzz. I’m connecting the dots that working for a healthy environment is among Christians’ responsibilities: The Father gave His people this duty in Genesis. Beyond this, we should take care of a gift for which we are grateful, especially a gift in which the Maker has expressed such pride. Moving ahead to the teachings of Christ, we see a charge to care for the physical needs of others.
This weekend, we put this theology into practice. In two hours, we learned about watersheds and native trees, and served our community by collecting seeds that will soon become seedlings. These seedlings will grow to become trees, perhaps part of a new forest. They will make for cleaner streams and rivers, improve drinking-water quality, feed and shelter local wildlife, and support the men and women who earn a living harvesting crabs and oysters in the Chesapeake Bay. Not bad for two hours spent with friends on a beautiful fall day.

Georgia on my mind

In recent days, we’ve stopped hearing much, if anything about the pseudowar in Georgia. Before Juno MacGuff became center of the media universe, the news seemed to be talking about diplomacy, official actions and reactions of national governments, and troop movements. In the dozen or so articles I’ve read in various publications since the conflict escalated a month ago, I’ve seen little discussion of the petroleum industry and virtually no mention of the Russian state-owned gas company Gazprom or the several oil and gas pipeline segments that cross Georgia. This has gotten a little better recently.
For readers unfamiliar with this contentious little piece of the world, Azerbaijan and the former Soviet republic of Georgia happen to be situated in such a way as to allow for the transport of oil and gas from the productive Caspian Sea region to the Black Sea, a major transportation hub to Europe and a petroleum source in its own right. For those who don’t know Caucasian geography nor have a map in front of them, this corridor snubs Russia and its massive gas industry that supplies much of Europe. (A primer on energy in the Causasus region, if you're so inclined)
With this in mind, I put some questions to the reader:
Why is Russia supporting the break-up of Georgia? Is Russian support for the break up of Georgia at all similar to the US overthrow of Saddam Hussein? Is Russian support for an independent South Ossetia materially different from US support for a semi-autonomous Kurdestan? Would anyone care what was going on in Georgia or Iraq, if these countries’ major industries were fruits, nuts, hand-woven rugs, and wool?

Image source: CIA World Factbook

Windfall

Over the last few months, excited murmurs have given way to boomtown glee over a bed of rock called the Haynesville Shale. In truth, it’s not the rock that has caused this hysteria, but what may be the world’s 4th largest natural gas deposit locked-up in it. Extraction companies are clamoring for mineral rights that have been made relevant by this discovery and by recent developments in extraction technology.
It’s in Dubai? The rich Canadian gas fields? Siberia? Nope. The Haynesville Shale spreads out around Shreveport, Louisiana, a burg of around 200,000 people. What’s interested the press lately is the fact that the shale also extends into some economically depressed areas in northwestern Louisiana. Stories have begun to appear about small-towners turned overnight millionaires by leasing their mineral rights. Unfortunately, there’s also been talk here and there about people being swindled out of mineral rights for a few thousand dollars.
I happened to read an article about the Haynesville rush today, moments after reading an article about the use of cyanobacteria to produce ostensibly carbon-neutral fuel. This begs a few questions, some of which I’ll put to the reader:
Should landowners in this situation lease their mineral rights? Is there an ethical question here vis-à-vis climate change? Does anyone outside the area being drilled have a right to weigh-in on this? Can anyone hold it against someone living in or near poverty for accepting an offer to make outlandishly rich? How about if the offer simply makes that landowner less poor?

Jury Duty

Today, I concluded service as a juror for a civil case in U.S. District Court. I wish that I had purchased a lottery ticket on the day the computer spit out my name as a prospective juror. The court district encompasses the 26 counties of the Texas Panhandle. Eight of us were chosen from the pool of 24 that responded to the summons. There were 2 no-shows for the summons. I'm curious as to their fate.

The case revolved around a wage dispute in which the plantiff claimed they had worked time "off-the-clock" for which they were not compensated. The suit was brought under the Fair Labor Standards Act. The defendant was a regional corporation in the business of convenience stores. They employ approximately 2500 people to work their 300+ stores on any given day.

The reason that I post about my service is this: Upon adjournment to the jury chambers to deliberate, it was immediately obvious after the initial polling of the jurors that 1) corporations are bad and immediately assumed guilty despite the lack of evidence and 2) the employee is obviously in the right just because he's the little guy.

Why do we have that perception? Is it an inherent human tendency to leap to the side of the underdog? Is it envy of success -- i.e. large corporations are successful, I'm not, they must be cheating the system? Is it public perception based on negative portrayals in movies, literature, etc.? Your thoughts please.

On limitless growth

In my brief respite between semesters, I’ve been revisiting HBR’s Business and the Environment. I was particularly struck by an interview with former Monsanto CEO Robert Shapiro, who expresses concerns about a booming world population, depletion of mineral and agricultural resources, and the ability of a large company to turn a profit in this environment. He delves into natural limits on renewable resources and posits some innovative, though questionable solutions to a number of resource problems.
I pose some questions to the reader:

Can humans continue reproducing at the same rate they historically have? Can people, on average, consume at a rate the equal (or similar) to historical rates of consumption? How do we know how much each person can consume? Should people consider their children or other future generations in how they consume?

Image source: Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education

An iconic image of rural poverty

This photo was taken by Dorothea Lange on April 11, 1940. The caption reads "Edison, Kern County, California. Young migratory mother, originally from Texas. On the day before the photograph was made she and her husband traveled 35 miles each way to pick peas. They worked 5 hours each and together earned $2.25. They have two young children... Live in auto camp. " The photo is one of a series taken for an agricultural "Community Stability and Instability" study by the Bureau of Agricultural Economics. Taken by Dorothea Lange and Irving Rusinow, the photographs are a record of pre-World War II rural life and social institutions. Of particular interests are images of African Americans in Alabama and Georgia and migrant laborers hired to work in cotton fields in Arizona and California.

Image and text source: National Archives and Records Administration; ARC Identifier 521780

Δημοκρατία

Can democracy work as a system of government in every culture or every country? Do democratic countries have a responsibility to encourage democratization, or to subvert nondemocratic governments? Should democracies allow monarchies, theocracies, and other autocratic or otherwise repressive regimes to continue without interference when it’s in our economic best-interest? Can the ideal of individual rights and self-determination be upheld if democracy is foisted upon a state that has never wanted it?

Image source: Composite of images in CIA World Factbook

O wonderful, wonderful

I’ve been uncharacteristically quiet the last several days. A week ago, my wife and I welcomed into the world our first child, a son. Mother and baby are both in great health. This is one of those great moments in a person’s life that is formative of everything to come, and which colors all of the memories that precede it.
This is also an event that brings home the reality and immediacy of the need for broad change in how our society does things. Any parent knows that they must provide a safe home for their child and ensure that they are well fed and cared for. A good parent also knows that he must thoughtfully raise his child and provide for his future. Yet, somehow, we’ve failed to recognize that we can’t make reckless use of finite resources, or produce persistent waste without limits. Ensuring that our children have everything they will need for a healthy, dignified life is no less our responsibility than feeding them and keeping them warm. This is a time of great celebration for me (not to mention a time of abject sleep-deprivation), but is also an opportunity to renew my focus on what is increasingly the work of my life, the pursuit of a sustainable community.

Moral Crusader

In recent posts there has been much talk about morals, relativism vs. absolutism, and what is deemed right or wrong. It is obvious that we can debate relativism vs. absolutism for an infinite amount of time without coming to a consensus view. This is what is most important, I believe, because one persons views will always differ from the next. While religiosity can be called into play here, it must be stressed every individual in society is brought up uniquely. Each person has their own set of experiences, given-advice, and environmental upbringing, which creates a persons moral standards.

Regardless of calls for moral absolutism, there will always be deviations. With that being said, how does this play in policy making and the electorate? Todays headlines flash the tragic news of New York Governor Elliott Spitzer's involvement in a prostitution ring. It is yet another case of our policy makers getting illegally wrapped up in the very laws they are charged to enforce and follow. It is interesting to note how quickly the electorate will turn on those politicians that are caught in an unfortunate, and sometimes illegal, act. It is common place for an individual to harp on the bad deeds of their politicians, while also performing their own less-than-moral acts.

In the case of Spitzer, it is obvious that he must step down as Governor, but as more of a political and familial decision (much can be said of the politics that pushed this story forward as well as why other flagged politicians have not stepped down as well). Morally, though, is it right that society holds their decision makers to a higher standard then how they hold their own? While moral relativism (in my opinion) is the only possible case for society, is it right to act as moral absolutists in regards to their elected officials? Is public policy more of an "ideas game" than an "individual game"?

Image Source: CBS News

Relatively Wasteful

When is waste waste? The linked article below poses an interesting view of waste. What do you think?

YOU DECIDE: Is waste relative?

Says who?

There's been a good deal of discussion here about how we decide what is right. There's been concern over moral relativism, moral or religious law, and the roles of government, society, and community in making these determinations. I find a number of nagging questions amidst these discussions, which are worth addressing in some detail. Those questions beg a few preamble questions that frame the discussion. I ask the reader:
Does a deity, or do deities, exist? If not, would people have invented one (or several)? Do morals other than providing for one's own interests exist if there is no higher power? Or, do other people become more inherently valuable in the absence of such a power? Are there other metaphysical phenomena that could promulgate a moral framework?

Image sources:
Freer & Sackler Galleries
US National Gallery of Art

A plague of plagiarism

I just put an 8 week on-line sociology class to rest; entered the grades and said farewell. I was, up until the very last moment, about to have an all time record for on-line classes. For the first time since I began teaching on-line classes in 2000, I was about to have a class in which everyone who had not officially withdrawn actually completed the entire course with a passing grade. Some of those grades were going to be D's, but they were still going to pass. Normally there are several students who neither complete the course nor take the time to formally withdraw and thus end up with failing grades -- an "E" in our system.

Unfortunately, when I got to the very last student (both alphabetically and because she had waited until the last day of class to turn all her papers for the whole eight weeks), all the work she turned in was plagiarized. Some were papers taken in their entirety from one of the free on-line paper mills, other she apparantly did the work of hunting down paragraphs to copy from the internet herself. Plagiarism is always upsetting and disruptive, but this coming as it did at the last minute to ruin what would otherwise have been a class for the record book, was crushing.

I have less plagiarism in my classes since I got seriously tough on it, and created ways of getting the message across to students at the beginning of the class (borrowed some great "For Better For Worse" cartoon strips from Lynn Johnston -- with references of course) that drive home the point. But even with all the warnings, students still do it. I don't remember have these problems when I first began teaching 30 years ago.

As a sociologist I have to wonder, is plagiarism more common today or is it just easier for teachers to check for it? If it is more common (which I suspect but cannot prove) why is it?

For a time I thought that what I perceived as an increased incidence of plagiarism was only because the types of students that I taught had changed. I began teaching at the University of Kentucky in Lexington, and then moved on to the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown, now I teach at a community college, in a poor, rural area. Was the increase plagiarism due to my students having poorer preparation and poorer college skills? Since discovering the Rate Your Students blog, I realize that the problem of plagiarism goes well beyond my little corner of academia.

So if, as I believe (but cannot prove), plagiarism has increased, the question is why? I know lots of people who would jump to "declining values" as their first response. That answer reminds me of a quote from sociologist Abraham Kaplan "We do not explain why there is a lion in the garden by pointing out that in fact there are two of them in there." If values have changed what caused them to change? Values are a cultural phenomenon, they are the result of social processes, and do not float down from the ether. For there to have been widespread changes in values, there have to be widespread changes in society that produce those value changes.

What has changed? One thing that has changed is opportunity. The technology of computers and the Internet has certainly made plagiarism far easier than it was in my college days. I would liken it to changing the channel on the TV -- from the time I was 5 until I was 34, when I wanted to change the channel on the TV I got up, walked across the room and turned a nob to change the channel. I didn't change channels often, and used the TV Guide to look up what I might watch before changing channels. Then I got a remote control, and overnight I became a channel surfer, and changed my viewing habits just like that. My values and attitudes about television viewing changed after the fact, as a result of access to a new technology.

Something else that has changed is that a much higher percentage of high school students (and the population in general) are going to college, than did when I went to college. While the increased access to college has benefited many people who want to go to college who might have been left out forty or fifty years ago, it has also meant that many people who aren't really interested in what colleges offer (academic learning) are nonetheless attending college. They are attending college because that is what the job market demands. As a society we have lost alternative career paths -- even though there are shortages in fields that don't really need college (electricians, plumbers, construction, repair work). When economic necessity is forcing you to get a diploma, but you don't care for the activities that are required to get that diploma, short cuts become appealing.

These are just two ideas I've had about the sources of plagiarism. I think that there are more things, and I'd like to hear other people's thoughts.

The right to pollute

Whether you're a global warming true-believer, iconoclast, or somewhere in between, the subject begs questions about the tragically unglamorous, hugely important question of pollution in general. Among them:
Do individuals (or groups, or corporations) have a fundamental right to pollute? Do economic and business activities (including personal business) necessarily result in pollution? Do I have the right to not accept someone else's pollution? Do I have any particular recourse if someone else's waste winds up on my property? What if I am only a part-owner of that property?

Image source: National Archives and Records Administration (ARC Identifier: 557246)

Extra, extra! Some questions to the reader returns!

This week saw the quiet passing of a dubious anniversary in American history. On February 19, 1942, FDR passed an Executive Order directing the military to compel American citizens of Japanese descent into inland camps. This has returned my thoughts again to the question, “Who has rights?”
With this problem in mind I resurrect Some questions to the reader, a device that charged-up regulars and passersby on The Influence Machine. The questions posed below (and their sequents) are an invitation to the reader (and to the contributors of this blog) to build discourse, agree, disagree, get mad, ask related questions, and understand a spectrum of opinions.
Comments on Blue Island Almanack can be long and cerebral (I’m as guilty as anyone on this front), but please feel welcome to respond to any of these questions, to all of them, or to questions you can connect to them- I want to hear what you think.
So, you tell me:

Who has rights? Do any rights extend to those who are not citizens of a particular country (or state, or county, or city)? Are there rights that are not codified by any government? Do governments grant any rights that they shouldn’t? Can a just government suspend people’s rights? Who should decide these things?

Image source: National Archives and Records Administration (ARC Identifier: 539149)

We Must Change

I'll start out by saying that this post is not about Barack Obama, voting for Barack Obama, or voting for the democratic party. This post is about what it will take to actually initiate effective change regarding the issues we are most interested in - education, economy, environment, and ethics.

Over the past years, when dealing with almost every issue, our nation has been told that there is either no hope (social security for example), no movement for change (education for example), or out right denial (climate change for example). Why is it that society has allowed itself to be told this over and over again?



We have allowed ourselves to be told that we should not get our hopes up...not have high expectations for the decisions of our policy makers...not have an optimistic outlook on the future. No wonder the youth generations are as inactive in public discourse as they are! They have been given no chance to lend their ideas - if it isn't a part of the political norm of the day, they are told indirectly that it is unrealistic, infeasible, or not good enough.

While we write, speak of, and comment on these posts, I think it is important to note that no idea is ridiculous. For example, it will take some outside-of-the-box solutions to truly fix increasing entitlement costs, climate change, and education (see comments from previous post)for example. Outside-of-the-box solutions could be something brand new or a solution that was deemed "not possible" by the current political crowd.

Society needs a change in message - one that is inclusive and open minded. High minded debate is excellent and needed, but will be for nothing if those very debates are constricted by a message of "it's not possible" or if the solutions of such a debate are passed over. It may seem unrealistic to think this way, but the issues that face us require it.

The video, while being for Obama, also tells the story of a new message. It says nothing of what cannot be done, but of the possibilities of what can be done. If anything, this message could make the ideas and solutions talked about in these posts real and within reach. Do you think a message such as this is good for society? Policy making? Will it be enough to tip the scales in favor of real solutions for education, the economy, ethics, and the environment?