Being Radical, Touching Grass

Getting to the Root of Resistance

One of the best ways to resist is to play a different game.

We all know of and have, I hope, participated in direct resistance of one kind or another: registering voters, talking about important issues, including with decision makers and legislators, protesting, calling and visiting legislators, donating to causes, even signing petitions and posting on social media. It’s all worthwhile, win or lose.

But there is another kind of resistance that provides a refuge, and helps rekindle a guttering fire in the belly if yours is in danger of going out. Jack Gilbert writes about the value and virtue in taking joy in life in his great poem, A Brief for the Defense.

If we deny our happiness, resist our satisfaction,
we lessen the importance of their deprivation.
We must risk delight.

Buckminster Fuller said that the best way to effect change is not spending energy pushing back on what is advancing, but to build a world, or a part of the world, that makes the thing you oppose obsolete.

Think of the great Emma Lazarus poem, The New Colossus. You may know it as the “Give us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses” poem. But it begins by defining America’s greatest strength, and it’s not to be found in the power we wield, but in the light we offer.

NOT like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome . . .

Voltaire advised us, in Candide, that we should cultivate our own gardens. Too often it is assumed that, like the parables of Jesus, this was a poetic flourish, a metaphor. And yes, we can read more into his advice. But really: we should, you know – cultivate our own gardens. Because we will not force justice, peace, and goodness onto a reluctant, proudly ignorant populace. We often think now of Christianity as a bunch of people trying to force on the world racial purities and sexual mores never obliquely alluded to by the religion’s founder – who was, you recall, not a king or general, but a radical of a different sort. Feed the hungry. Clothe the naked. Go out of your way for the victim. Love your enemy. Basic. Fundamental. Radical. Nothing about economic or political models.

I’ve been reading a bit about violence recently: arguments for and against. It’s in the air these days. Trump has fomented it; a number of attempts have been made on his life; and others – political figures, private citizens, and at least one corporate CEO – have been murdered for political reasons in recent years. Adam Serwer writes in The Atlantic

The greatest delusion of all—one shared by both the would-be shooter and the president he targeted—is that violence is an expression of strength, and nonviolence a symptom of weakness. Now, I am not a pacifist. I do not believe that violence is always wrong. And I am not arguing that it is always ineffective. But the Trump administration’s greatest failures have been connected to its obsession with violence, and its opponents’ most dramatic victories have resulted from the organized and courageous use of nonviolence.

Concerning the use of power, George Leonard, in his book, Mastery, talks about Aikido, a purely defensive martial art founded by Morihei Ueshiba. He tells a story about a bully making a scene, threatening someone, attracting a crowd. An Aikido practitioner moved to the inner circle of the crowd and positioned himself within view of the bully, and assumed a ready stance. Just that. No Bruce Lee moves to declare his presence. But it was enough to make the bully understand that escalation was less advisable than de-escalation, and he left in a huff. He left. No fight, no harm done, even to the bully.

It doesn’t always work that way, and force is sometimes needed. But it seems wise to point out how frequently it backfires (as Serwer points out is the case with the Trump administration), and how infrequently it yields the desired results – all the Marvel and DC superhero films notwithstanding. Violence is an expression of impatience, frustration, and misplaced trust in its efficacy – none of which is cause for confidence.

It would serve us well, and keep us from misallocating our limited energies, to lower our expectations of power and violence. And to raise our estimation of light.

“All politics is local.” In spite of growing up in the age of the American empire (now ended) and being inculcated with the belief that each of us was born to be a Master of the Universe, reality as well as humility tells us that the sphere of our influence in the world is small. The great Native American sculptor, Roxanne Swentzell, has been a Permaculture practitioner for decades. The short video above shows the way she has used that Aikido-like philosophy to change her world. It’s what gave rise to this meditation.

Everything about Permaculture and Aikido is counter-cultural and in keeping with Emma Lazarus’s advice to embrace being a light, instead of seeking to wield or be a power. In our simplistic time, some will say that this is a “womanish” or unmanly way to be in the world, which is nonsense. Being a light is not the province of one gender rather than another. Aikido was founded by a man. Permaculture was founded by two. Hegseth’s reductionist view of masculinity is as insulting to men as his revanchist misogyny is insulting to women. What’s delusional is thinking you can bend the world to your will by the force of your manly physique and stern mien.

Please. The same is true of political activism. We are mostly not world-historical men and women. (Trump is, and that’s a bad thing for millions of people and other living things.) But we can, still, change our part of the world. The Stoics advise that one of our most fundamental responsibilities is to figure out what is within our reach to influence, and what is not. A good person is one who does good within their reach. That is our work.

Raise good children. Treat co-workers well. Give of your resources to those who have need. Be respectful and kind to the less fortunate, the young, the old, the poor, the sick.

And cultivate a garden. A real, not a metaphorical, one. Being in touch with the Earth and its rhythms is as radical as it gets, especially in these exploitative, extractive times. The planet needs those who love it in sustained, practical ways, like the protesters at Standing Rock, like the climate scientists, and like the gardeners.

How did the Irish save civilization? With monks, scribes, artists, and librarians. Not armies.

After all, what is a radical, but someone who gets to the root of things? The book of Genesis, Voltaire, Monet, Frances Hodgson Burnett, Wendell Berry, and Joni Mitchell were all onto something. Let’s give Emerson the final word, and then get ourselves back to the garden.

The polite found me impolite; the great
Would mortify me, but in vain:
I am a willow of the wilderness,
Loving the wind that bent me. All my hurts
My garden-spade can heal. A woodland walk,
A wild rose, or rock-loving columbine,
Salve my worst wounds, and leave no cicatrice.
For thus the wood-gods murmured in my ear,
Dost love our manners? Canst thou silent lie?
Canst thou, thy pride forgot, like nature pass
Into the winter night's extinguished mood?
Canst thou shine now, then darkle,
And being latent, feel thyself no less?
As when the all-worshipped moon attracts the eye,
The river, hill, stems, foliage, are obscure,
Yet envies none, none are unenviable.