2016: A Year of Turmoil, Interesting Times and Why We Need the Peace of Wild Things More Than Ever

15/12/2016

There's an old Chinese curse: 'May you live in interesting times.'

2016 has certainly seen its fair share of interest. Brexit, Trump about to enter the White House, Syria, a rise in nationalism and popularism... to name just a few events that show the way we've believed the world to be, is perhaps not how it is.

It could be tempting to see these as a blip, in an arc of history that we think always tends towards peace and justice, but as Paul Kingsnorth writes in this blog on the Dark Mountain Project there are deeper issues that need addressing:

"When I look at the state of the world right now, I see an arc bending towards something that dwarfs any parochial concerns about particular presidential elections or political arrangements between human nations, and which should put those events into deep perspective.

I see a grand planetary shift that has not been seen for millions of years. I see that half the world’s wildlife has gone, and half the world’s forests, and half the world’s topsoil.

Why Nature Connection is Important

11/12/2016

Humanity's disconnection from nature is the greatest crisis, and the greatest challenge, that we face.

I came across this in a blog post by Ed Gillespie:

"We’re at a very real and severe risk of a self-reinforcing cycle of disconnection – where those who grow up with less direct firsthand experience of nature are consequently less likely to care about and act to protect it. This is not inevitable however...

...we need to actively address one of our generation’s core issues – how to fall back into what story-teller Martin Shaw calls a ‘love tangle’ with our one and only wild and wonderful planet."