Summary Of Paul Brooks The Pursuit Of Wilderness

"We shall never understand the natural environment until we see it as being an organism," wrote Paul Brooks in The Pursuit of Wilderness. Paul Brooks was accurate with his statement because if land isn't treated as an organism, it becomes property. Property requires ownership, and ownership then leads to a need for money. Where money is involved, a corrupt system develops, and a vicious cycle is sparked into action. Therefore, it is our duty to stop this cycle. First off, land is an organism by definition. It consists of grass, trees, and plants; all of which are living. Therefore, land demands respect, but it has gotten little to none. Over the centuries, there have been many wars over land because it was thought of as a way to gain power,
money, or both. Native populations were practically wiped out due to the crave to obtain more land, and slavery was started because people were greedy and couldn't take care of all of the new land obtained through unjust means. So another piece of "property" was obtained. Slaves were organisms as well, people for a matter of fact, but they were treated much like land. A civil war and more violence erupted from this new idea of owning human beings, and although slavery had been abolished, land was kept enslaved. As you have observed, ownership becomes a messy situation.
Unneeded violence sprouts from the system because by nature, we are greedy. One can never have enough land or money, and greed in turn causes human morals to dissipate. Thus, focal points must be altered in such a way, where one does not feel the need to obtain land in order to feel successful in others' eyes because philosophically, we want to people to look up to us. So instead of emphasis on ownership and property, perhaps emphasis could be put on the beauty of unaltered nature. This viewpoint would not only halt the cycle, but it would also spare the land. For where there is ownership, for the most part, a home follows, and to build a home means to destroy the land. Rarely does one see farmland, but instead a current day of site seeing is one in a city where one is permitted to view the lovely hustle and bustle of people, buildings that extend upward, and smokestacks which release toxic gases into our environment. My mom had described life when she had been a teenager, which was only half a century ago. Farmlands dominated the majority of the land, and the land was cared for. That time was only fifty years ago, and now farmlands are few and far between. What are we doing to our
world? We certainly aren't embracing the beauty of nature. Instead, we are killing it. Every new set of apartments or new shopping centers tear down and clear acres of land. We act as if it is disposable, but what happens when we have nothing left? We must changed our ways before it is too late, before we are left with no healthy land from which to glean food. We are no longer just speaking about treating land justly and not as property, but now we are discussing long term issues that may have possibilities to lead to extinction. Perhaps, some would say we are a far way off, but it will happen, if land remains a mean for profits.