Green guilt
Feb. 4th, 2015 23:48![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
torquillI live in Northern California, among progressives, and get a bunch of my information from intellectual and progressive media. I was brought up with a respect for the environment and conservation of resources, emphasized by growing up during a couple of the severe droughts in recent history. I heard about climate change when it was just starting, and how fossil fuels were going to destroy the climate. My background in agriculture makes me keenly aware of water use issues and rainfall (or lack thereof).
It's not surprising that, alongside the usual Liberal guilt (other people are suffering while I prosper), I have a decent helping of Green guilt. Every drop of gasoline contributes to global warming, so we should stop driving everywhere. We should eat less (or no) meat to stop straining our resources. We shouldn't use so much electricity and natural gas. We should conserve as much water as possible, everywhere we can.
I've been to the desert. I know what real scarcity is like: no running water, limited greywater storage, no electricity, no heat. It takes me weeks to get back to using more than a trickle of water to wash dishes or hands. As a result, I am keenly aware of how much water, power, and fossil fuel I use all the time.
I cut my showers to every other day, because other people had made that sacrifice... and we'd all live with it, like seeing brown lawns. So people smell a little more like people; that's worth it to save water. It's like occasionally I pay a little extra (it always costs more) to ride BART somewhere, and save the gasoline. I turn lights off in the house in the evening, because I didn't need all that much light, and it's just using more electricity.
But the guilt doesn't let up even when you make sacrifices. I still feel bad. I've cut where I can -- but I need to cut *more*. Sacrifice is noble, we all need to do our part, there are people who have gone to extremes and isn't that admirable?
Green guilt is as bad as Catholic guilt. It's baked-in to the progressive mindset. It's never really satisfied, because there's always one more thing you can feel like you've come up short on. You can't shed it, you can't satisfy it, it just lurks in the back of your mind and whispers that you're a bad person because you let the water run while you lathered up your hands. Or you went through a half a tank of gas driving to a party. You're left feeling like you never have any fun (because you can't have those luxurious 30-minute showers anymore) and you still feel like a terrible person.
I finally, firmly, declared that I would go back to having a shower every day when I realized that I get ill if I don't. My compromised detox system tends to shunt partial breakdown products, most especially those I'm sensitive to, into skin oil and sweat; they end up sitting there until I wash them off, and while they're on my skin they can be partially reabsorbed. So until I shower, I am literally coated in mildly toxic crap. Sometimes it's better, sometimes it's worse, but if it builds up for two or three days, I feel nauseated, tired, and foggy. For me, daily showers are a health issue, not a hygiene issue.
I'm burningly aware of how much more water I have to use to do that, even with Navy showers, almost no water lost as the water warms up, and low pressure. And I realized I feel guilty about using it, even though it is unequivocally necessary. I feel guilty about driving to clear my head, though it's hands-down the best way I know to calm down and think. Green guilt is one of the forces telling me to practice self-denial, that I am not allowed to use the resources that I require. That self-sacrifice is a noble ideal, standing above self-fulfillment and happiness.
I think about it every time I shower, now, and this morning was no exception. This time, while I was musing about the ideal of sacrifice, I found a way to clarify the progressive ideal of conservation in a way I could live with. Everyone needs to make sacrifices for the greater good, and to make sure there's enough to go around. But I think what I need to say, to put bounds on the Green guilt, is this:
Sacrifice your wants, not your needs.
Looking at it that way, I don't have a lot more to cut. My personal resources are so small that I can't afford to make a lot of demands on public resources. I use only what I need, except in rare circumstances. I need to shower every day; I need to occasionally drive to clear my head, or meditate, or preserve my physical strength; the lights in the house need to be on because while I can see very well at night, my aging parents can't, and my dad gets very depressed without adequate light. I'm not careless about using limited resources, and I'm mindful of the fact that other people may also need them. I'm already doing my part.
I think that instead of always scolding people by telling them the dire consequences of using limited resources, progressives need to emphasize mindfulness and awareness (at least among their own ranks). And, perhaps, give a nod to the fact that once in a while people need to lift the restrictions and indulge themselves. Like the WWII family using half their flour and all of their sugar ration on a birthday cake for their daughter, sometimes we need to splurge so that we feel human again, and special, and deserving. To show the sacrifice the rest of the time is worth it, and that life is still worth living.
Taking what you need is not selfish, even in times of scarcity. In this, progressives are just as judgmental as so many other parts of society. Needs differ; the means of meeting them differ. Just because I take a shower every morning does not mean I'm deliberately ignoring that this is the worst drought in centuries. Just because I drive a gas-powered car doesn't mean I don't believe electrics are better. I'm meeting my needs as best I am able. I guess I should just start flipping the bird when the imaginary hemp-clothing bicycle-riding vegan who lives in the back of my head scolds me.
It's not surprising that, alongside the usual Liberal guilt (other people are suffering while I prosper), I have a decent helping of Green guilt. Every drop of gasoline contributes to global warming, so we should stop driving everywhere. We should eat less (or no) meat to stop straining our resources. We shouldn't use so much electricity and natural gas. We should conserve as much water as possible, everywhere we can.
I've been to the desert. I know what real scarcity is like: no running water, limited greywater storage, no electricity, no heat. It takes me weeks to get back to using more than a trickle of water to wash dishes or hands. As a result, I am keenly aware of how much water, power, and fossil fuel I use all the time.
I cut my showers to every other day, because other people had made that sacrifice... and we'd all live with it, like seeing brown lawns. So people smell a little more like people; that's worth it to save water. It's like occasionally I pay a little extra (it always costs more) to ride BART somewhere, and save the gasoline. I turn lights off in the house in the evening, because I didn't need all that much light, and it's just using more electricity.
But the guilt doesn't let up even when you make sacrifices. I still feel bad. I've cut where I can -- but I need to cut *more*. Sacrifice is noble, we all need to do our part, there are people who have gone to extremes and isn't that admirable?
Green guilt is as bad as Catholic guilt. It's baked-in to the progressive mindset. It's never really satisfied, because there's always one more thing you can feel like you've come up short on. You can't shed it, you can't satisfy it, it just lurks in the back of your mind and whispers that you're a bad person because you let the water run while you lathered up your hands. Or you went through a half a tank of gas driving to a party. You're left feeling like you never have any fun (because you can't have those luxurious 30-minute showers anymore) and you still feel like a terrible person.
I finally, firmly, declared that I would go back to having a shower every day when I realized that I get ill if I don't. My compromised detox system tends to shunt partial breakdown products, most especially those I'm sensitive to, into skin oil and sweat; they end up sitting there until I wash them off, and while they're on my skin they can be partially reabsorbed. So until I shower, I am literally coated in mildly toxic crap. Sometimes it's better, sometimes it's worse, but if it builds up for two or three days, I feel nauseated, tired, and foggy. For me, daily showers are a health issue, not a hygiene issue.
I'm burningly aware of how much more water I have to use to do that, even with Navy showers, almost no water lost as the water warms up, and low pressure. And I realized I feel guilty about using it, even though it is unequivocally necessary. I feel guilty about driving to clear my head, though it's hands-down the best way I know to calm down and think. Green guilt is one of the forces telling me to practice self-denial, that I am not allowed to use the resources that I require. That self-sacrifice is a noble ideal, standing above self-fulfillment and happiness.
I think about it every time I shower, now, and this morning was no exception. This time, while I was musing about the ideal of sacrifice, I found a way to clarify the progressive ideal of conservation in a way I could live with. Everyone needs to make sacrifices for the greater good, and to make sure there's enough to go around. But I think what I need to say, to put bounds on the Green guilt, is this:
Sacrifice your wants, not your needs.
Looking at it that way, I don't have a lot more to cut. My personal resources are so small that I can't afford to make a lot of demands on public resources. I use only what I need, except in rare circumstances. I need to shower every day; I need to occasionally drive to clear my head, or meditate, or preserve my physical strength; the lights in the house need to be on because while I can see very well at night, my aging parents can't, and my dad gets very depressed without adequate light. I'm not careless about using limited resources, and I'm mindful of the fact that other people may also need them. I'm already doing my part.
I think that instead of always scolding people by telling them the dire consequences of using limited resources, progressives need to emphasize mindfulness and awareness (at least among their own ranks). And, perhaps, give a nod to the fact that once in a while people need to lift the restrictions and indulge themselves. Like the WWII family using half their flour and all of their sugar ration on a birthday cake for their daughter, sometimes we need to splurge so that we feel human again, and special, and deserving. To show the sacrifice the rest of the time is worth it, and that life is still worth living.
Taking what you need is not selfish, even in times of scarcity. In this, progressives are just as judgmental as so many other parts of society. Needs differ; the means of meeting them differ. Just because I take a shower every morning does not mean I'm deliberately ignoring that this is the worst drought in centuries. Just because I drive a gas-powered car doesn't mean I don't believe electrics are better. I'm meeting my needs as best I am able. I guess I should just start flipping the bird when the imaginary hemp-clothing bicycle-riding vegan who lives in the back of my head scolds me.
