"Ecocide: Legacy of the West"
 
by D.T. Dietz
 
in The Snapper (October 12, 1992 Vol. LXI No. 5  p. 2)
 
     In nineteen hundred and ninety two Kirkpatrick Sale beached
his ideological ship at Millersville University.  And boy, did he
make waves!  As the apex of the year's academic theme, Sale spoke
Monday on the "encounter of two worlds."
     By Sale's account, Columbus known to contemporaries only as
"Colon," initiated a long and ever-expanding process of
interaction between the Old World and the New.  This interaction,
he argues, was usually an occasion whereby Europeans benefitted
and Native Americans suffered.  For example, it is well known
that Europeans received the potato, maize, and new medicine from
the New World and thus were saved from famine and disease.  In
turn, however, the Indians received only disease, persecution and
destructive invading floral and faunal species from the Old
World.  This is an undeniable fact.  In the long run, Europeans
have prevailed over indigenous peoples of America with
overwhelming severity.
     The cause behind this European "conquest of Paradise" was
addressed during his lecture as being, among other things, a
frustrated search for salvation.  In the sense that Colon's
voyage stemmed from a Europe racked by violence, disease and
famine, and which has a preoccupying obsession with materialism,
death and apocalyptic consummation, the New World represented for
Columbus and company a chance for redemption.  Unfortunately,
however, the mind of the European immediately fell to planning
out an exploitation and eventual Europeanization of the newly
discovered earthly Paradise.
     To modern minds, the brutality with which the white men
treated their initially gracious hosts seems horrid indeed.
Believe it or not, there are those who choose to defend the
Imperialists' ghastly persecution of the Indians with the
argument that they were merely a product of their times.
Granted, they were a product of their decidedly inhumane European
justice system.  However, this does not excuse them completely.
While society can be blamed for an individual's actions, it
nevertheless remains true that society is made up of individuals.
Therefore, society can conversely blame individuals for its
actions.  If the conquistadors are to be judged in the context of
their times, then let them be judged by the prophet of their
times, Bartolome de Las Casas.  Las Casas fought for Indian human
rights throughout the sixteenth century, decrying the oppressive
hidalgos for their lack of Christian love.
     Sale pointed out that the root cause of the difference
between the Indians and the Europeans is the fact that Indians
were rooted as an organic part of nature, while the Europeans had
cut themselves off from nature, mechanically seeking to dominate it.
While the Indian worldview recognizes a humble human role in the
overall "sacred web of life," the Europeans saw themselves as
overlords of nature, which was deemed wild and untamed, foreign
and mysteriously threatening.  Rather than working with nature ,
as the Indians usually did, Europeans battled against nature,
seeking to control it.  The only good they saw in nature was its
utilitarian value.  Along with this comes the European claim on
real estate as a tradable commodity subject to private
possession.  This ecocidal view has not gone away in the past 500
years, rather it has more or less thrived and consequently lead
to the situation of global denigration we find ourselves
embroiled in today.  Ultimately, Western humanity has taken the
view that this carving up of nature is, in fact, to be desired;
and has dubbed the operation "civilization."
     Sale's advice to Western society is, in a nutshell, that
we'd better wise up and learn from the Native American
homeostatic worldview.  If we fail to do so, we shall eventually
destroy ourselves.  While many ecophobes may oppose his solution,
due to their distorted understanding, any reasonable person will
see that he makes good sense, and will readily admit that respect
for Mother Nature is indispensable in the never-ending quest for
the good life.
 
Permission granted by author.
 
DIETZ01