stoney321 | *askance* (Reply)

I got hit by a troll last night on my Mormon posts, and I'm sad to say it's the lamest of trolls. But then, I didn't expect anyone to bring their A game, as the church teaches that you should never get into a scriptural debate with anyone. (Seriously.) Um... anyone else see the flaw of that sentence? Also, minor rant regarding "being organic/earth conscious" etc.

I get (and applaud!) the idea of reducing toxins to the earth. I practice that philosophy, myself. No one wants to paralyze birds and kill fish and frogs. Unless you're evil, which clearly you are not. *beams* So you stop buying Ortho products and switch to Jimmy Crack Corn's All Natural Health Inducing Earth Grow Products. (Or similarly named. And packaged in lovely green bags/bottles with pictures of children and flowers and bunnies gamboling under lovely sunshine)

And guess what? You've just polluted the earth. How? Because that stuff came in a bag or bottle or dispenser, which had to be manufactured. Which in turn had to be loaded onto a truck. Which was then driven across the highways, belching smoke into the air. Which was brought into a store that most likely has A/C and electric lights and some kid named Skip that works the backroom that dumps his "Monster Bull Energy Drink" - filled with chemicals - onto the ground by the azaleas. You're still consuming manufactured products.

And organic products are still produced in the same way that "inorganic" products are made: machinery, by-products, packaging.

You're just trading one thing for another. It's not "helping" the earth. It's helping your conscience by making you think you are. (Note: your grass doesn't know that your nitrogen came from a by-product of one thing, or from sheep's urine or from liquefied seaweed. And that seaweed? Big oily boats were on the water pulling that in, and loads of fish were killed as a result. Just thought you should know. You should use a mulching mower and not fertilize your lawn at all, actually.)

If you're one of the few that gets their produce from farmer's markets, if you're one of the few that composts their own kitchen/yard waste, if you're one of the VERY few that composts your old cotton/wool clothes, towels, and sheets (did you know you could? You CAN!) and you use smart environmental practices in your garden (the right plant for the right place, native plants that aren't invasive or have high water/nutrition needs that can't be met in your soil, NO OVER WATERING), if you are one of the few that does these things, then this rant isn't for you.

But if you're buying "organic" because you think you're helping the earth, please note the irony. You're BUYING STUFF. Stuff that was manufactured, packaged, delivered, PRODUCED. Net global production has to come down for any affect on Mother Earth to be measured. Which means we have to stop buying crap.

~inspired by a new slew of "green" commercials for light bulbs, organic gardening products, and that horrible BP commercial where friggin' FLOWERS come out of the car because it's their gas. WTF.

Thanks to everyone that left me a huge pile of HP recs to dive into. YAY!! I'm off to print a chunk of them and lay outside reading. Ahhhhhh. HAPPY SATURDAY! May the sun be shining in your neck of the woods, and may your icy beverage never run dry. Ooh, before I forget: HAPPY BIRTHDAY to