Buell and McKibben: Toxic Discourse

Toxic Discourse

Deep-ecologist Bill McKibben’s The End of Nature exemplifies many of the basic defining features found in Lawrence Buell’s chapter on “toxic discourse”. This essay will focus on two of those features and will show that McKibben’s piece is highly representative of both. From Writing for an Endangered World, Buell analyzes the nature of toxic discourse and the very recent, overwhelming evidence that seems to be backing it up. McKibben posits his own wisdom on the subject, and proves to be an excellent example of Buell’s sense of toxicity.

Defining Criteria:

• An expressed anxiety arising from the perceived threat of environmental hazard due to chemical modification by human agency.

o McKibben highlights this point by essentially calling out our very human history of exploiting the earth and our mass production of greenhouse gases. He sees polluting institutions such as American agriculture vis-à-vis American capitalism as nature’s death and dying.

“… The carbon dioxide and other gases we were producing in our pursuit of a better life­­­– in pursuit of warm houses and eternal economic growth and of agriculture so productive it would free most of us from farming– could alter the power of the sun, could increase its heat… We have produced the carbon dioxide– we are ending nature” (McKibben, 719).

o He grieves no only for nature, but for us as well. Using the recent example of impure rainfall, McKibben uses this environmental phenomenon to weep for wilderness and humanity alike. He reflects on how environmental woes can and will fuel mankind’s despair as well.

“Instead of a world where rain had an independent and mysterious existence, the rain had become a subset of human activity: a phenomenon like smog or commerce or noise… all things over which I had no control, either… And that was where the loneliness came from. There’s nothing except us. There’s no such thing as nature anymore…” (McKibben 722).

• Vocal, intense, pandemic, and recently (late 20^th century) very evidentially grounded.

o McKibben’s lamenting statements “assume a pre-existing, pure, pristine, and stable ecology prior to human pollution, especially carbon dioxide” (Rouzie, essay feedback). The deep-ecologist evidence he offers up comes from a pseudo-scientific observation by McKibben as he wanders through the woods. Is he still evidentially grounded in his observations, even though they are largely perspective-based? Since McKibben also criticizes the power structures that privilege corporate economic agendas over environmental ones, his remarks can also be tied to a social-ecologist perspective as well.

“As I walked in the autumn woods I saw a lot of sick trees. With the conifers, I suspected acid rain. (At least I have the luxury of only suspecting; in too many places, they know). And so who walked with me in the woods? Well, there were the presidents of the Midwest utilities who kept explaining why they had to burn coal to make electricity (cheaper, fiduciary responsibility, no proof it kills trees)” (McKibben, 723).

o Another example of this sweeping “vocal” and “intense” rhetoric can be found in the last paragraph of The End of Nature. McKibben takes Buell’s assertion of the intense human-ness of global warming, and explains the philosophical side of “the greenhouse effect”.

“The greenhouse effect is a more apt name than those who coined it imagined. The carbon dioxide and trace gases act like the panes of glass on a greenhouse– the analogy is accurate. But it’s more than that. We have built a greenhouse, a human creation, where once there bloomed a sweet and wild garden” (McKibben, 724).

R. Crumb lays it all out

Robert Crumb is one of the first, and of the most memorable comic illustrators in U.S. history. His 12-panel strip titled "A Short History of America" is an honest, artistic depiction of some of the topics we have discussed thus far in class (i.e. suburban sprawl, over-development, deforestation, etc.).

First panel: No human element present. This panel is flora, fauna, and lots of sky. Everything seems to be in its place, as far as the wilderness is concerned.

Second panel: We see a fallen tree and a different skyline in comparison with the panel before it. The most obvious addition is a railroad cutting through the treeline. The locomotive is likely a coal train, signaling the onset of the Industrial Revolution, and is spewing a fat, noxious cloud of black smoke, contrasted against the sky. The sky, consequently, is free of birds. The land, too, does not show any sign of animal inhabiting.

Third panel: Outside of the context of the remaining nine panels, this panel could, for all intents and purposes, be a nice postcard or landscape painting. Drawn with a kind of pastoral nudge toward development, we see a modest farm house, a buggy, and power lines. In this panel, America has not only harnessed its animals, but its resources as well. The birds are back, but in smaller numbers than Crumb's first panel.

Fourth panel: Industry has taken another nip out of the skyline. In this panel, crumb is commenting on the fences we put around ourselves and out homes. We can see the presence of a mail box which means by this time, America has organized our means of communication with one another, outside the restrictions of space, location, and most importantly, wilderness.

Fifth panel: We now have a little neighborhood under our power lines. The neighbors are adequately, if not comfortably clothed, there are more houses to shelter these neighbors, and the first bud of a local business looms [arguably] in the distance (perhaps a general store/mill).

Sixth panel: American infrastructure appears to begin its bustling at this point. This panel shows the presence of street signs and a variety of businesses mixed in with residential areas. This panel is significant as it is pointing out the development of suburban lifestyles, the most egregious offenders of wilderness we have today.

Seventh panel: Cable cars, many more power lines, many more businesses, and even street lights are found in this seventh panel. This is the panel where life begins to resemble our own modern-day contemporary existences. Our basic needs for survival are cushioned by the luxuries we've adapted in this particular moment of American history.

Eighth panel: Amongst street lights, superfluous shopping choices, and sidewalks, this panel is important due to the traffic jam taking place right in the middle of town. Crumb is making a statement regarding our petty need to consume (cars, fuel, lunch, time, etc.) and how this can become eerily prophetic. Thank goodness for the streetlights that quell these potential disasters (it is my belief that Crumb is being sarcastic here).

Ninth panel: In this ninth panel, Americans have cut the proverbial oak trees down from our live. Unfortunately, trees are no longer relevant to development and will not survive in a city unless it is serving an industrial purpose. For years, the town grew the tree for what seems to be the purpose of scenery, and at this stage in U.S. history, scenery is no longer a part of modern life.

Tenth panel: Major familiar neighborhood brands (i.e. Texaco, Carls Jr., etc.) can be found as we near Crumb's final panels. City life now fully resembles many U.S. streets, almost completely devoid of any trace of wilderness. It is ugly and barren. We begin to see more cars on the street.

Eleventh panel: Even more cars make up the focus of this picture. Industry booms, new businesses come and replace ones that have recently fallen. The skyline is concrete and fluorescent with the light bulbs of entrepreneurs and big businesses alike.

Twelfth panel: A real depiction of how we live today (or maybe 40 years ago). The town has been modernized, streamlined, and made to be more efficient for our fast-paced lifestyles. This is proven in the presence of signage, public transportation options, and convenience stores.

Hogan on home

I've encountered the concept of "home" throughout the writings of many memorable authors, from Kipling to Tolkein. Linda Hogan's Dwellings is a super well-organized essay, as it presents little nuggets of nature-inspired profundity in a number of contexts. The essay reads like a collection of barely incomplete vignettes which are subtly tied together not only by the piece's interesting arrangement, but the very concept of "home" as well.
Hogan, a woman who stated that she feels God not while she is visiting the house of the Lord, but under a tree where her senses take over. Dwellings explores the universal spirituality of living spaces and habits of various types of people, animals, and insects. Hogan continues to wax philosophical/poetic as she discusses what our homes are made of.

Like Thoreau, Hogan expresses her admiration of the Native American people throughout this essay. However, Thoreau's perspective was old school, and that of the "noble savage". He poeticized their culturally unaffected and spiritual lifestyle, but at the end of the day he deems them nothing than human beasts of virtue. Hogan maintains the same romantic tone when she describes some of the legends and traditions of the residents of Zia. She does not, however, represent them as anything other than consistent purveyors of their own culture and history, much worthy of dignity and respect.

Cronon is dronin'

Cronon is examining the similar works and styles of John Muir, William Wordsworth, and Henry David Thoreau by linking them all together using one commonality amongst their writing: scripture. Religious texts have been used time and time again to analyze writers who seem to seek some sort of transcendental reward - a metaphysical consolation prize of sorts.

On these occasions, God kind of becomes everyone's favorite English major. These three nature writers are most definitely seeking something spiritual in the natural world, but perhaps using the Bible to explain this phenomenon is not the best route. Thoreau, Wordsworth, and Muir are seeking The Good Life - not necessarily a "cathedral", but meaning in austerity. Cronon uses scripture to examine our human conception of nature as a cultural construct, but I'm not sure this is what these writers were going for...

This is problematic, even within their own writing. Muir explains the Yosemite Valley as a place "so compactly filled with God's beauty, no petty personal hope or experience has room to be." He compares the water to champagne, claims the Valley is devoid of "dull empty hours" and free of pain. In actuality, nature is not really experiencing hope, experience, dullness, champagne, pain, or even beauty. These are human concepts, backed by a human conception of a creator. Nature is separate from our human existence, though we judge it with our senses and perceive it as beautiful and ethereal. Free of petty personal hope and experience? Some would say merely admitting a creator God has bestowed the landscape before us is entirely hinged on personal hope. One cannot compare the sweetness of mountain water to French champagne if one has not known the drink many times before. This is Muir's observation which is based entirely on his personal experience. When he notices the Valley filled with God's beauty, is he referencing a memory of beauty he has known of nature his whole life, or perhaps a dramatic landscape painting (which were so popular at the time of his writing)?