J ournalism for P eople B uilding a B etter W orld
25 S
YEAR
inter 2021 SW ummer
Solving Plastic THE
ISSUE
How to Get Rid of Throwaway Culture The First Giant Step? Unpackage Don’t Let Consumerism Co-opt the Zero-Waste Concept What to Do With Piles of Plastic Waste? Other Countries Get Creative One of the World’s Biggest Cities Outlawed All Single-Use Plastic
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INDIGENOUS FOODWAYS
INVITE 7 WILDFLOWER MEDICINES INTO YOUR GARDEN US $6.50 Canada $6.50
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25274 87100 1 Display until July 31
INDIGENOUS FOODWAYS
Valerie Segrest Illustrations by Annie Brulé
PART 1 SUMMER
An enchanting blanket of wildflower medicine adorns the continent. Carefully cultivated by Indigenous inhabitants for hundreds of years—often thousands—these blossoms, leaves, roots, and
A STYLISH MAUVE beehive shaped blossom, with a punk-rock spiky seed pod, perches atop a lanky stalk. Underground, a well-established root system builds bioactive compounds from elements in the soil called alkylamides. These compounds produce a tingly and numbing
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sensation on our tongue. Few plants create such a compound or are as effective at treating infections as Echinacea. Dozens of tribes have recorded historical uses and cultivation methods for Echinacea. Eclectic Physicians of the 19th century, who learned botanical healing from Native Americans, used Echinacea for many ailments, including upper respiratory infections, inflammation, throats, coughs, toothaches, and even snake bites. More than just medicine for humans, Echinacea is one of the biggest attractors for pollinators. They bloom from mid-summer to fall, providing ample nectar for the honeybees. Echinacea tolerates poor rocky soil conditions and thrives in full to partial sun. Sow them from seed easily, or buy an established start from a local nursery to grow your own.
fruits generously cure the commonwealth in return. Each plant carries its own unique gift and healing stories. Deepening root systems and enhancing the health of the soil make these perennials and self-sowing annuals a wise investment for backyard and container gardens. Indigenous Americans reference fauna and flora as a People. Through this lens, paradigms shift. Considering our plant neighbors a People requires a different type of relationship, one of reciprocity and respect, the necessary mindset to see the reciprocity as we tend to each other. Meet seven deserving medicinal wildflowers to invite into your world.
A POCKET of brambly canes armed with thorns protects soft silvery leaves and white flowers, which transform throughout summer into ruby raspberry fruits. Raspberry canes have been found in archeological dig sites that date back thousands of years in both North America and Asia. So much more than tasty berries, Raspberry offers leaves and roots that are useful for a variety of conditions. Linked to fertility in many traditions, Raspberry invokes the energy of the blood, pumping through the heart carrying good nutrition and love throughout the body. An affinity to the blood and its
vessels makes consuming the fruit and drinking the leaf tea a wonderful women’s tonic. For ages, Raspberry has assisted in soothing labor pain, and easing contractions, muscle cramps, and nausea. Like its close cousin Rose, its thorns and nourishing qualities remind us to protect the fruits of our labor. This patient attitude comes in handy when beginning to cultivate Raspberry, as the first year’s growth does not produce many fruits; brambles focus on establishing their lengthy stalks. The second year will be more fruitful. In the meantime, the leaves can be harvested for tea.
A PRIM apple-scented daisy-petaled flower sits atop a plume of light green lacy foliage. Chamomile does not originate in North America; it was brought by German settlers. Growing wild from North Africa into parts of Germany and Russia, this little flower has made quite a journey across continents and into backyard apothecaries. In South American healing traditions, Chamomile is called “Manzanilla” which means “tiny apples.” This delicate flower imparts Motherly strength to aid sleeping and calm colicky baby tummies. Chamomile works on the digestive and nervous systems like
a biochemical pinwheel, creating wide-ranging positive effects on conditions ranging from indigestion, diarrhea, and flatulence to anxiety, depression, and restlessness. It is applied externally to ease discomfort from chicken pox, diaper rash, and even eye infections. Seeds are easy to sow—simply sprinkle them where you want them to grow, in a partially sunny spot and watch them thrive. The flowers will be ready by summer, but Chamomile dies back in the fall. It is technically an annual, but once established will re-sow itself and return for years to come.
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PLASTIC WORLD? Turn the page
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The plastic crisis is tied not only to ecological destruction, but also drives systemic injustice. With plastic’s fall, will we rise?
Story, photos, and artwork by Erica Cirino
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y the time I set out in 2016 with a crew of volunteer researchers to sail an old steel sloop named Christianshavn to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, public perception of plastic had shifted away from its longtime reputation as a modern human-made miracle to something more sinister. My first thought as we entered the Garbage Patch was that we’d gone off course. After passing through rough waters outside the clockwise-spinning North Pacific Gyre, where the patch is located, we did not encounter the floating dump of human detritus we’d expected. Instead, we sailed through what seemed like clean blue sea, growing calmer the further we sailed west, away from Los Angeles, toward Honolulu. Before long, one of the sailors, Danish plastic expert Malene Møhl, called the crew’s attention to the waters beneath our ship, which revealed an even more dangerous situation as the sea seemed to shape-shift before our eyes. As the waters calmed, we could see the Garbage Patch was not so much a mass of trash but a soup: the shredded corner of a sun-bleached orange plastic fish crate, a fist-sized chunk of white Styrofoam, a green shampoo bottle, a pink dustpan. While sailing, the crew dipped trawl nets into the sea, each of which pulled out hundreds of tiny plastic particles: microplastic. The shedded particles created a dense cloud in the Garbage Patch, which circulated in the spinning gyre. In this remote part of the ocean, 1,000 miles from any people who might be using
or making the material, we detected hundreds of indomitable emblems of humanity, a massive and ever-growing collection of plastic objects and particles that will never biodegrade. Thanks to the sailors, scientists, environmental justice advocates and activists, and so many others who have chosen to bear witness to the universal harm of plastic and share their stories over the past several decades, the truth is now out. All life-forms—humans, other animals, and the Earth—are beginning to feel the weight of that harm, some more than others. Now, more than any other point in our history, is proving to be prime time for course correction. HOW DID WE GET HERE? People have long had a proclivity for accumulating stuff, which, beyond mere utility, can confer messages about one’s wealth, status, and view of the world. The first mass-produced plastic, celluloid, used natural organic materials from trees and cotton: camphor and nitrocellulose. It was invented in the late 1800s to bypass inherent limits on materials available in nature—specifically ivory, which was becoming scarcer with every elephant slaughtered. Until then, ivory, tortoiseshell, horn, and other animal parts were used to make popular consumer products, particularly valuable items seen as luxuries, such as jewelry, furniture, and art. Though celluloid could be formed into a variety of products, from photographic film to table-tennis balls, it was not exactly the ideal consumer material industrialists had hoped for: It could be tricky to mold consistently, and tended to lose its shape when reheated. Plus, celluloid proved to be extremely flammable. Then came Bakelite, the world’s first synthetic plastic, created in 1907 by Belgian inventor Leo Baekeland. To make his plastic, Baekeland tapped fossil fuels, which were rapidly gaining popularity as replacements for whale oil and other early animal- and plant-based fuels. On the day of his discovery, Baekeland wrote in his diary, “I consider this day’s very successful work, which has put
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АЛИНА БУЗУНОВА
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Don’t Let Consumerism Co-opt the Zero-Waste Concept The movement began as anti-consumerist. Yet now there are marketing ploys, feelings of inadequacy, and misplaced responsibility. Alden Wicker
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A worker from the Cuauhtémoc borough separates organic and recyclable waste at the back of his truck. Over the last few years, Mexico City has worked to implement a more efficient waste-management system, though much of the sorting still falls to workers.
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One of the World’s Biggest Cities Outlawed Single-Use Plastic Mexico City’s 22 million people discovered change is not that simple. Story and photos by José Luis Granados Ceja
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CULTURE SHIFT Powerful Ideas Emerging
Books + Films + Audio Tough Love for Mediocre White Guys | 63 Why Are We Expected to Love Our Jobs? | 65 Survival as Transformative Justice | 69 Reflection | 71 Crossword Plastic Pollution | 72
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BOOKS+FILMS+AUDIO
Illustrations by Fran Murphy
Tough Love for Mediocre White Guys Robert Jensen
I AM WHITE, MALE, AND AMERICAN. When I taught at the University of Texas at Austin, I routinely joked that “the secret to my success is that I’m mediocre, and I know it.” That comment came in conversations with students about inflated faculty egos, partly as a caution to myself. In universities, the coin of the realm is being a big thinker with original ideas. But most of us aren’t big thinkers, and original ideas are rare. Rather than being satisfied with being competent—a hard enough standard to meet—professors too often puff themselves up, a weakness to which White guys are especially vulnerable. My quip wasn’t the result of a lack of self-confidence; I was simply suggesting that an honest self-assessment helps one do useful work. I’m not special, but I live in a culture that designates people who look like me as the standard. A White supremacist, patriarchal, and capitalist society props up White guys not because we’re superior but precisely because we’re not. White guys need the unearned advantages to keep alive the fantasy that we deserve to be on top. That fantasy is not harmless—our embrace of dominance means subordinating people who don’t look like us, which creates an incentive for White men to remain clueless. That’s why Mediocre: The Dangerous Legacy of White Male America (Seal Press, 2020) by Ijeoma Oluo is not a threat to White guys but a gift, offering the social/ political tough love that we need to see society—and ourselves—more clearly. “I am not arguing that every white man is mediocre,” writes Oluo. “... What I’m saying is that white male mediocrity is a baseline, the dominant narrative, and
that everything in our society is centered around preserving white male power regardless of white male skill or talent. The rewarding of white male mediocrity not only limits the drive and imagination of white men; it also requires forced limitations on the success of women and people of color in order to deliver on the promised white male supremacy. White male mediocrity harms us all.” Mediocre offers ample evidence for her thesis. The first chapter grounds us in the pathological American mythologies of brave men taming the frontier, embraced by Buffalo Bill at the end of the 19th century and still present in the self-indulgent anti-government fantasies of Nevada cattle rancher Cliven Bundy and similar “patriots” in the 21st. From there Oluo takes us on a painful tour through White masculinity in higher education, social movements, sports, politics, labor, and business. The sick and sad yes ! summer
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CULTURE SHIFT
“Think about it this way: Your life is your justice. Look at the life you created for yourself.”
Beyond Survival: Strategies and Stories from the Transformative Justice Movement Ejeris Dixon and Leah Lakshmi PiepznaSamarasinha AK Press, 2020, annotated edition
you shut up?” that’s TJ, you know? Building community safety strategies and squads proactively is transformative justice. Creating resources for mental health disability, for emotional crisis, that don’t rely on calling 911 is transformative justice. It’s a really big ecosystem. It’s not just: You take out the cops and replace them with something that fits in the same spot, but it’s a different color. It’s a completely different worldview. Ejeris: We know that there are so many conditions that create a more violent society. And for every person who caused harm, there are people in their lives who looked away. So I think it’s also about the role of community and what are all of these other roles? I have a history of doing this work with stranger-based violence, which is complex. Because you’re like, “What’s the relationship?” But there’s so much of the work that’s actually building relationships between people and building
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relationships between communities because people change and we change conditions in connection. What makes TJ more possible is also practice, right? We practice this work, we practice learning, we practice deepening. We learn from our mistakes. It’s pretty impossible to commit to TJ without also committing to the relationship-building work and the small and big parts of practicing transformation. I got asked to apply for a job at the Audre Lorde Project where they had a really long history of doing work around police violence. There’d been a series of attacks on queer and trans people of color, mostly Black and Latinx folks, in central Brooklyn. There weren’t a lot of models for stranger-based work, and that’s often what’s happening in many forms of homophobic and transphobic violence. Through that process of literally being on my street and recruiting friends and loved ones, and outreach in the club at 3 a.m., I started to understand myself as a survivor and understand a broader sense of the work, and through building conversations and strategies with other folks in community around how we were going to keep each other safe. What do we do if we’re running from violence? What do we do if someone’s been attacked and we want to support them? How do we get each other home safely? ... Leah: I was in a relationship that became abusive physically, with somebody who was a movement comrade, who was my lover, who had already done time, was a working-class, queer kid of color, and who was my immigration sponsor. So I was just like, “Well, I can’t call the cops on you because you’ll be arrested and I’ll be deported. So I guess I’m going to figure something else out.” So many people have a version of that coming into TJ. Everyone I know who
co-created TJ got into it because we were survivors. I’ve heard Ejeris say, “I was a queer Black kid trying to get home alive.” And yeah, I was a queer Brown femme trying to stay alive. That’s where it came from. Sometimes you hear people saying, ”This has never been done before. There are no models.” One thing that [Ejeris and I] were adamant about was, “No, we’ve been doing this!” You can go back to 2005 to Safe OUTside the System, which Ejeris was co-leading in New York, to all the many different people who’ve already done this work, role models to learn from and study and emulate. There are more TJ success stories than we think. I want many people to write many, many different TJ how-to-do-it books with examples, or zines or podcasts or whatever. I want some things to come out that are both documenting what we’ve already done and documenting the works-in-progress that are going to be happening in this moment of abolition. adrienne: Transformative justice really is about community. So thank you so much for everything that you’re offering us and our movements right now. And for leading with a bad-ass, no-holdsbarred way of dealing with it directly. We’re really grateful to be in the same time as y’all. y Edited excerpts are from the October 8, 2020 “Beyond Survival” episode. Follow adrienne maree brown and Autumn Brown’s podcast on Twitter: @endoftheworldPC Ejeris Dixon has 20 years of experience as an organizer, consultant, and political strategist within racial justice, LGBTQ transformative justice, anti-violence, and economic justice movements. Twitter: @ejeris Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha is the Lambda Award-winning author of numerous books, including Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice. A lead artist with Sins Invalid, she’s a long-time cultural worker, educator, and organizer within disability and transformative justice communities. Insta: leahlakshmiwrites
REFLECTION
What gives me hope ...
I am inspired by ...
5 very good ideas ...
What I can do ...
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“YES! gives us a shared space to focus on solutions —the emergence of a culture that weaves together the best of our past with the sweetest of our dreams of the future. YES! is a reminder that every day there are people choosing to shape what’s next, and we can all inspire each other to greatness.” adrienne maree brown Author, activist, YES! contributing editor
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