sparrowwright

[sparrowwright]

The Panopticon

School’s Architectural Responses to Violence May Determine Our Future

On December 14th, 2012, Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, was host to an unspeakable horror. After murdering his mother at home, 20-year-old Adam Lanza shot and killed 26 people, 20 of which were children between the ages of 8 and 6 (Britannica). What ensued was a nationwide period of mourning that affected the entire school industry. It was such a shock that even president Barack Obama called for stricter gun safety measures, although his legislation was struck down by the U.S. Senate (Sandy Hook School Shooting, HISTORY).

After the tragedy of Sandy Hook Elementary, it was completely torn down and renovated from scratch (Britannica). The architect, Jay Brotman, designed the new Sandy Hook Elementary with an organic-feeling touch. The lovely wood façade of the school’s entrance illudes to its naturally-decorated interior, lush with massive windows that let in natural light and colorful murals. Looking inside, you couldn’t tell that it was built to stop a school shooting, but it very much was.

“The ubiquitous black globes of cameras in the ceiling are a reminder that this is also a school designed with the unthinkable in mind.” Says Grabar. “The glass In the double-row of doors is bulletproof, a feature that costs 10 times what normal glass does. Each classroom door is propped open with a wall magnet, which is connected to a centralized lockdown button that sends all doors swinging shut at once. The below-grade rain garden doubles as a mote that limits the school to three entry points and allows child-level windows to stand, on the outside, high above the ground” (Grabar).

Brotman’s approach to preparing this iteration of Sandy Hook is to make the precautionary features nearly invisible. “You’re not going to raise a good person in a prison.” Says Brotman. Unfortunately, it seems that his vision is not ubiquitous.

Fruitport High School in Fruitport, Michigan, was renovated by Bob Szymoniak (“Fruitport Designs New $48M High School with Places to Hide from Mass Shooters”). His renovations include cement half-walls to hide behind, long, curved hallways meant to shelter children from gunfire, small corners invisible from the hallways meant as a hiding spot, and last but not least, something that Szymoniak calls an “Educational entry panopticon” (Grabar).

This school was built for violence. There is no disguise, no prettying-up, no delicate touch. Its militarism is clear, and its purpose explicit. Entering this school, you know exactly what those hallways were built for, what the black ceiling cameras are there to survey, and who the educational entry panopticon is meant for. This school is built like a prison.

Increased militarism has always, in almost every case, been applied and enforced more strictly to black and Latino communities. In schools with a more than 50% student body of color, it becomes 18 times more likely that the school they go to will be enforced by police, metal detectors, and offensive measures (Patrick).

“I thought about a 12-year-old girl living in Washington, D.C. … who told me that she begins her day flanked by law enforcement officers, standing in line waiting to go through a metal detector.” Kayla Patrick says. “She’s only in middle school, and yet this Black child is made to feel like a criminal walking through the school doors” (Patrick).

I think now is a good time to be reminded of the line that Brotman said about his design for the Sandy Hook Elementary School.

“You aren’t going to raise a good person in prison.”

Are these designs conductive of a kind classroom atmosphere? Do these prisonlike attributes make students feel like they are safer instead of in more danger? How will children being raised in these environments later grow and develop as people?

Truly, there is no way to know for certain how a panoptic school will weigh on a developing mind, but there is evidence to believe that it will not be good. There is no age where kindness becomes obsolete. If we as a society and as a country want to stop cruelty, we should not treat people with cruelty, especially not potential victims of a horrific crime. People should not be reminded of their fragile mortality every day at school, and staff members should not be reminded that the lives of their students may be at risk. If we want to raise good people, people with healthy minds and kind hearts, we should not raise them in a prison.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Ray, Michael. "Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting". Encyclopedia Britannica, 7 Dec. 2022, https://www.britannica.com/event/Sandy-Hook-Elementary-School-shooting. Accessed 13 December 2022.

Grabar, Henry. “How Do You Design a School for the Era of Mass Shootings?” Slate Magazine, 27 Aug. 2019, slate.com/business/2019/08/school-shootings-design-architecture-sandy-hook-columbine.html?src=longreads.

Editors, History com. “Sandy Hook School Shooting.” HISTORY, www.history.com/this-day-in-history/gunman-kills-students-and-adults-at-newtown-connecticut-elementary-school#:~:text=In%20the%20aftermath%20of%20the%20Sandy%20Hook%20shooting%2C. Accessed 13 Dec. 2022.

“Fruitport Designs New $48M High School with Places to Hide from Mass Shooters.” WZZM13.com, 2019, www.wzzm13.com/article/news/new-high-school-in-fruitport-designed-with-subtle-spaces-for-students-to-hide/69-6ee8154f-76a6-45bd-87c5-e3c60a0dce2f. Accessed 13 Dec. 2022.

Patrick, Kayla, and Kayla Patrick. “It’s Time to Consider Removing Metal Detectors from Schools Now.” The Education Trust, 14 Jan. 2021, edtrust.org/the-equity-line/its-time-to-reconsider-removing-metal-detectors-from-schools-now/#:~:text=However%2C%20there%20is%20no%20evidence%20to%20support%20that. Accessed 13 Dec. 2022.

#essay

[sparrowwright]

Introductory

Hello! My name is Sparrow A. Wright and this is my page where I showcase my work. Below you will find the featured tags where you can find the type of writing you're looking for.

Essay

Flash fiction

Poetry

Thank you very much for stopping by.

Have a great day!

#Essay #flash fiction #poetry

[sparrowwright]

BLOOD AND SOIL

“It’s cold out.

The night’s darker than usual.

Or is that just me?

My eyes can’t seem to focus right,

And the stars just look

like spatter from here.”

“…”

“I always thought,

if I had any other life…

I’d wind up being an astronomer,

or something like that.

Always loved the stars. Always loved the sky.

Do you love the sky?”

“…”

“Well, no need to be so shy. Surely,

you can spare an old man

some conversation in his last hour?”

“… Sorry.”

“No need. No need.

You did just what

You set out to.”

“I’m still sorry.”

“Well…

I guess I can’t talk you out of everything.”

“You knew that already.”

“I sure did…”

“…”

“Heh…

I’ll be honest,

This isn’t how I thought I’d die.”

“No?”

“No. It’s a bit embarrassing, but

If you promise not to laugh,

I’ll tell you.”

“I promise.”

“Well, I suppose,

Despite the cliché,

I did always see myself

Surrounded by people I loved,

Looking up at the stars

Holding hands

with someone who loved me back.”

“Really?”

“Yes. I know it’s a foolish thing to want.

 I chose the wrong path for that ending.

I guess half of it was fantasy,

The other half

Just hope.”

“… when I was little, I didn’t think I’d live this long. Now that I’m here, I don’t know what to think. In my mind, I died years ago, By some consequence Of an action I’d long forgotten. And now, it’s only a matter of time Until it catches up to me.”

“I guess,

the chase was always

a part of you, then?”

“Guess so.”

“… What made us do this?”

“That’s a fine question.

 A bit too late now, no?”

“I remember, Just hating you. Despising. The fires of hell inside me Summoned just by the thought of you Keeping me warm in winter. Keeping me alive. Keeping me sane. With you, I knew My purpose. My calling. I always had somewhere to go. I always had something to blame. I always had… You. And now… I can’t even remember Why I hated you.”

“Funny,

You make it sound

Like love.”

“…” “I’m sorry I killed you.”

“I’m sorry too.

And might I say

You deal a mighty fine blow.”

“…” “Thanks.”

And trees swayed in cold autumn breeze And blood soaked into soil While fingers interlaced Holding each other Watching the stars Pass them by.

#poetry

[sparrowwright]

A Message to Fossils

You must have been so lonely,

A young, pale blue dot

Circled by stillborn rocks.

You must have grown so restless.

Your hands were always busy, it seems

Tinkering, making, fixing, breaking

Something to fill dead air.

For all that you’ve created,

It never was enough

Never filled the void of space

You spiral so endlessly through.

But though you are gone,

Your bones filled with gleaming opals

Dug up and hung to dry in museums lightyears away,

You did not die twice.

Your soft bodies turned to dirt and stone,

But your progeny remained in your wake.

Your children of steel and wires, more durable

Than silken flesh,

Lived on, orphaned and alone, now,

Just like their fathers.

You must have been so lonely,

You must have been so restless,

To, like a god, create another life in your visage,

Because you had no one but yourselves

To look to in wonder.

Did you look to the stars,

Little ancient ones,

And hope? Did you dream?

Of worlds far away, alive,

Just like you?

Were you happy? Were you scared?

What would you have said?

What would you have heard?

We wonder, too.

We were happy. We were scared.

We are lonely and we are restless.

Maybe, in another time, another place

We could have known each other

And maybe, we wouldn’t be so lonely

So restless.

#poetry

[sparrowwright]

The Passion Principle:  How Loving Your Job Can Backfire

Have you ever been super excited about working on a new project? Maybe it’s a piece of woodworking, or a drawing, or a song you’re writing, or whatever other hobbies you just love to do. But whatever it is, you just can’t wait to get home and start working on it again. You have a feeling that this is really going to be something great. It’s not just the final product that keeps you hooked, though:  the process itself is satisfying too. Doing something you love is fulfilling in a multitude of different ways. As you’re happily chipping away at that amazing project, you think to yourself, wouldn’t it be wonderful if I just did this for a living?

Many people have thought that exact same thing. In fact, passion-led careers are often the most sought-after. According to The Atlantic article Loving Your Job is a Capitalist Trap, over 75% of college-educated workers say that passion is an important part of finding a career that suits them, and 16% say that they would rather have meaningful work than a high-paying or stable job, or a healthy work/life balance (Cech). When it comes to career advice, it is always seen as a positive to go for a career that you have some passion for. Everybody, it seems, wants a job that is rewarding outside of just a paycheck.

In this essay, we will go over (1) what it means to have a rewarding job, and what it means to be “passionate”; (2) what happens when businesses try to capitalize on passion, including a history of “crunch culture” in video games; and (3) some common justifications used for these actions, and why employees endure these conditions.

Many people want to work jobs that have meaning or are fulfilling or rewarding. But what is a rewarding job? Rewarding jobs are jobs that one enjoys doing; these can be creative, transformative, relaxing, or challenging. Whatever the case may be, the main component of a “rewarding” job is that the worker is passionate about working. Maybe you’re an artist, or a music producer, or a videogame level-designer. You might sometimes go above and beyond when you become really invested in a project in ways that, say, a bank teller just wouldn’t. When a labor of necessity becomes a labor of love, you’ll stretch yourself out trying to achieve your goal.

This is quite common for an artist to experience. An artist might neglect all other facets of life, like food, sleep, or socializing if they are extremely focused on completing a project that they are passionate about. Disrupting an artist’s focus can throw off their “groove,” as one might say, and it can be difficult to get back on track. I know that whenever I’m extremely focused on finishing a drawing, I can be sitting at my desk for hours getting all the details right and not even realize that time has passed. There is nothing inherently wrong with putting more hours into a project that you like working on.

When passion meets paycheck, however, several ethical issues can arise. First, is it ethical for companies to profit off of workers’ extra, uncompensated labor just because of their passion? It’s been observed that many companies will specifically seek out passionate employees just because they are more likely to do additional unpaid labor (Cech). Companies do this because workers who enjoy their labor are more likely to work faster, more efficiently, or extra hours, even when they are not being paid. This is great for companies, because they get work done at a higher quality, faster, and at less cost. However, it can lead to passionate employees being uncompensated for a lot of their work.

Another problem arises when an employee is expected to work those unpaid hours outside of their own volition. That above-and-beyond approach fueled by pure excitement is then treated as a new standard. When the average employee is expected to work just as fervidly as the most passionate worker, it can lead to exhaustion, burnout, and numerous negative effects to mental health.

In the video games industry, depending on the studio, it’s not at all uncommon to see employees work for 70- to even 100-hour workweeks (Gilbert). Co-workers will even work extra hours alongside overworked colleagues in solidarity (Shreier). Extraordinarily long workweeks, though it puts undo pressure and stress onto the employees who have to scramble and stretch themselves thin to get their work done on time, are just part of the culture of some studios.

This phenomenon is so common that it actually has a name: “Crunch.” Crunch is when a game studio makes its employees work extreme and unethical hours to meet a deadline, oftentimes just to set another deadline as soon as the first one is finished. This destructive cycle will repeat until the game is released. Many studios are guilty of engaging in crunch culture; but a notable selection, and some of the most widely known, are Telltale Games, Rockstar Games, Electronic Arts (often abbreviated to EA), and even Cary, North Carolina’s own local game publisher:  Epic Games.

In November of 2004, an essay was posted on Live Journal called “EA: The Human Story,” by a user, Erin Hoffman, known at the time as “ea_spouse.” The post detailed the harsh and unethical work environment that EA forced upon its workforce during the development of Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle Earth (Gameqol). At the same time, employees filed a class-action lawsuit against EA for similar business practices. The lawsuit was successful, and the graphic designers received a $15 million settlement while the programmers received $14 million.

Many other whistleblowers have followed in ea_spouse’s footsteps:  for example, an anonymous employee of a different videogame developer, Rockstar Games, calling themselves “Rockstar Spouse,” posted a letter to Gamasutra Blogs in 2004 detailing similar workplace abuses at Rockstar Games (Gameqol). It’s safe to say that the open letter and subsequent successful lawsuit sent ripples through the games industry and continues to reverberate today. However, though the issue of worker’s rights in and outside of the games industry has been ever-present and increasingly more pressing, little has changed over those 15 years (Lefebvre, “EA”). Workers are still rarely paid overtime, and crunch culture has not slowed down a bit.

A more recent and massively popular game is Fortnite, an online multiplayer first-person shooter developed by Epic Games Studio that first launched in 2011. Many people find this game absurdly fun, but its creation came at a great cost. One Epic Games employee told Polygon, “I work an average 70 hours a week, there’s probably at least 50 or even 100 other people at Epic working those hours. I know people who pull 100-hour weeks" (Gilbert). Another employee said, “I hardly sleep. I'm grumpy at home. I have no energy to go out. Getting a weekend away from work is a major achievement."

Grueling labor has more than a mental effect on workers. Physical symptoms can arise from overworking as well. Game designer Clint Hocking reported memory loss as a result of crunching on a game. Brett Douville, a respected veteran of game development, described being temporarily unable to step out of his car after working on a game too hard (Schreier).

Similar reports came out of Rockstar Games where they were caught actively bragging about their crunch period when working on Red Dead Redemption 2. Responding to backlash on Twitter for boasting about their 100-hour work weeks, Rockstar Studios asserted that nobody at Rockstar was being “forced” to work those hours, but that they simply put in “additional effort” as a “choice” (Lefebvre, “Rockstar”). “We have some senior people who work very hard purely because they’re passionate about a project, or their particular work, and we believe that passion shows in the games we release. But that additional effort is a choice, and we don’t ask or expect anyone to work anything like this” (Lefebvre, “Rockstar”).

This is a great example of what is called “the passion principle.” The passion principle is defined by Erin A. Cech as “the prioritization of fulfilling work even at the expense of job security or a decent salary.” The passion principle is something many companies that oversee creative or fulfilling jobs seek out in workers. Though not as obviously morally wrong as practices like overseas child slave labor, passion exploitation is still a form of exploitation that often escapes our attention (Kim, 3). Writing in The Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Jae Yun Kim uses the term “passion exploitation” to refer to a means of justifying exploitation of workers on the excuse that the workers are just naturally passionate about the subject and are glad to do the uncompensated work of their own choice, even if it is demanding or outside of the job description (Kim, 6). Kim further defines the term as “maltreatment of workers that uses attributions and assumptions of passion as a justifying tool” (Kim, 5).

There have been studies on the passion principle that show how effective it can be. In the essay “Love Your Job? Someone May be Taking Advantage of You,” Aaron Kay found that participants who were given a situation where a worker was being exploited by their boss were more likely to say that the exploitation was justified if the worker was more passionate about their job rather than less passionate. This exploitation included being asked to do work that was not in the job description, such as leaving a day with family at the park to clean the office bathroom (Kay).

But why would someone being passionate about a job they’re doing lead to employers thinking it was okay to exploit those people for additional or excessive labor? Do they really think what they’re doing is justified? There are two cornerstones to the justification of passion exploitation: first, the belief that, to the enthused employee, work is its own reward; and second, the belief that the worker would have volunteered to do the labor anyways, just out of sheer enjoyment (Kim, 10).

The belief that work is its own reward is widely held. In South Korea, some workers use the term “passion wages” to cheekily refer to the expectation that they should work for little to no pay because it is presumed that the work itself is its own reward (Kim, 5). Likewise, it has been proven via study that there is a correlation between a job’s perceived passion and people’s belief in the legitimacy of its exploitation on the basis that the worker would have volunteered for the work regardless (Kim, 20).

But a counterargument to the passion exploitation theory is that, while sometimes employees put in extra hours on their work, and sometimes employers benefit from this free labor, if it really is the employee’s choice, then what does it matter? Wouldn’t forcing an artist away from the work that they’re passionate about be counterproductive and borderline cruel? That would be a good argument if employees truly did choose to work overtime. But, in most cases, this is not exactly true. If an employer asks an employee to do a menial task that is outside of the job description, like cleaning an office bathroom, it can look like the employee has a free choice in the matter and can decline if they so choose. But, to the trained eye, the power dynamic is obvious:  an employer has a substantial amount of power over an employee, like controlling their job security and promotions. It is likely that an employee may not feel entirely safe saying “no” to an employer for fear of some sort of repercussions (Kim, 7). Going back to the videogames industry, crunch culture happens when people “crunch” to meet a deadline. If that deadline is not met, it will result in dire consequences. People may lose their jobs, their livelihoods, or they may be demoted. This does not give the employees a meaningful choice about whether or not they want to crunch.

To conclude, people often prioritize fulfilling or enjoyable work over high-paying, stable, or less demanding jobs. Companies will seek these people out, because they can be coerced to provide free labor if they are passionate about their jobs. Some companies will hire passionate employees and then work them arduous and unethical hours on the excuse that they should be loving it, since they love this line of work. Employers justify their actions by saying that the work is its own reward, and that the employees would have volunteered for this work anyway if they had the chance. Employees often endure this treatment because of intimidation inherent in the power dynamics of the workplace. Employees need protection in the form of effective workplace regulation to avoid falling victim to their own “passion”.

Works Cited

Cech, Erin A. “Loving Your Job Is a Capitalist Trap.” The Atlantic, 12 Nov. 2021, www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2021/11/danger-really-loving-your-job/620690/.

“EA Spouse.” GameQoL, www.gameqol.org/ea-spouse/. Accessed 4 Oct. 2022.

Gilbert, Ben. “Video Game Industry ‘Crunch Culture’ Explained: Epic, Rockstar, EA.” Business Insider, 9 May 2019, www.businessinsider.com/video-game-development-problems-crunch-culture-ea-rockstar-epic-explained-2019-5#a-trio-of-recent-blockbusters-red-dead-redemption-2-anthem-and-fortnite-are-the-subjects-of-major-investigations-detailing-the-messy-work-of-creating-blockbuster-games-4.

Kay, Aaron. “Love Your Job? Someone May Be Taking Advantage of You.” www.fuqua.duke.edu, 24 Apr. 2019, www.fuqua.duke.edu/duke-fuqua-insights/kay-passion-exploitation.

Kim, Jae Yun et al. “Understanding Contemporary Forms of Exploitation: Attributions of Passion Serve to Legitimize the Poor Treatment of Workers.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, vol. 118,1 (2020): 121-148. doi:10.1037/pspi0000190.

Lefebvre, Eliot. “EA Spouse Was 15 Years Ago, and Not Much Has Changed in Games Development.” Massively Overpowered, 11 Nov. 2019, massivelyop.com/2019/11/11/ea-spouse-was-15-years-ago-and-not-much-has-really-changed-in-development/.

Lefebvre, Eliot. “Rockstar Boasts of 100-Hour Work Weeks on Red Dead Redemption 2.” Massively Overpowered, 15 Aug. 2018, massivelyop.com/2018/10/15/rockstar-boasts-of-100-hour-work-weeks-on-red-dead-redemption-2/.

Schreier, Jason. “Opinion | Video Games Are Destroying the People Who Make Them.” The New York Times, 25 Oct. 2017, www.nytimes.com/2017/10/25/opinion/work-culture-video-games-crunch.html?searchResultPosition=5.

#essay

[sparrowwright]

Reforesting With Soil Ecology

23 Nov. 2021

            The common response to deforestation, especially when it comes to clearing, is to simply plant more trees to make up for forest that has been lost. However, that approach often leads to failure. The science of reforestation is much more complex than what you see at first glance. Heavy deforestation does more damage to forests than just removing trees: if nothing is done in time, a clear-cut forest could become uninhabitable for future reforestation efforts. Replanting trees is only one step of the process, and many other factors must be taken into consideration when attempting to reforest a region – most of those factors lie in the soil.

            It has been shown that certain methods of reforestation are more effective than others. What makes a reforestation effort succeed or fail all factors back to the soil biome. Planting a tree or a forest in a plot of land not suited for it will, in most cases, cause the tree to die or not reach its full potential. That is because the underground ecosystem is not suited for a forest, and thus cannot support it properly. The way around this is to expand upon an already existing forest by planting trees close to the forest’s edge. Once this row of trees has grown and is thoroughly established in the belowground network, which could take many years, a new row of trees would be planted, and then another, and so on. This allows the forest to expand, while the newly planted trees still get to tap into that premade forest-sustaining soil biome.

            Although the belowground ecosystem is vital for forest health, people in the past have attempted reforestation without accounting for it time and time again, often with little to show for their efforts. What made their attempts unsuccessful? How can they learn from these failures and improve their efforts in the future?

            China recently pledged, along with over 100 other countries, to end deforestation by 2030 in the climate talks this year in Scotland (Catrin, 1). As part of a reforestation program to revive drylands in the Gobi Desert, China has been trying to reforest the sandhills that have been expanding at the desert edges (Gerlein-Safdi 99). America has been able to monitor China’s progress using satellite images and microwaves that measure water and photosynthesis in dryland vegetation (98). Research gathered indicates that both of China’s reforestation methods, active (planting trees) and natural (protecting land and letting foliage develop naturally) increase photosynthesis and water content of vegetation in areas that have more water (99). However, neither method worked on areas that were now too arid. The problem with their methods is that they are focusing on planting trees in an environment where they are not primed to thrive. China’s attempts to combat desert expansion with reforestation are achieving some plant growth, but they are missing the key component in good forest health: good soil. That soil has not yet been developed enough to sustain trees, even though it had supported vegetation in the past. If China found a way to cultivate their desert soil to retain moisture better, it would be massively useful in their reforestation effort. Soils infused with organic matter, such as roots and decayed vegetation, usually retain moisture better than sandy, sterile desert soils.

            Attempts at boosting reforestation efforts can have damaging effects if done incorrectly. The legacy of misguided reforestation efforts of the Douglas fir forest of the Pacific Northwest from 1920 – 1940 can still be seen today. Forest scientists tried many different methods of reforestation, for example, forester J. V. Hoffman’s Seed-Storage Theory or the Plant Climax and Succession theory (Brock, 63). Not all of those theories were very accurate, however. For example, Hoffman’s Seed-Storage Theory was a hypothesis in which J. V. Hoffman posited that Douglas firs, when faced with stress, shed their seeds as an automatic response. Those shed seeds then lay dormant in the duff (the layers of decomposing pine needles blanketing the forest floor) waiting for a forest fire to sweep through the region. The forest fire would then trigger the seeds to germinate and start to grow into trees. Hoffman therefore tried to induce germination of these seeds he assumed lay waiting for a forest fire by setting fires himself. Those fires sometimes burned out of control and did not germinate any seeds. Another experiment was attempted in which Douglas fir seeds would be planted and then retrieved after a year for examination of growth rate, but it was cancelled after rodents ate the seeds for the first year. It was never attempted again (66). It is worth noting that Hoffman’s theory was deduced from his own non-rigorous observation and other people’s research and experiments. Another thing worth noting is that the entire time Hoffman was theorizing about his new hypothesis, he was being tasked with catering to the lumber corporations that were causing the deforestation to begin with. His theory could not implicate them too much, and he was under instruction not to suggest any “artificial” reforestation tactics, as they were unpopular at the time (65). If Hoffman had been given adequate resources and money, and had been allowed to maintain some independence from logging companies, he may have proposed some genuinely effective techniques.

            The Plant Climax Theory was a hypothesis from the late 19th century that combined the concept of ecological climax with early interpretations of evolution. It posited that forests had a natural state they would always revert to – their “climax” state – no matter what disturbance occurred. A forest was thought to follow an exact, predictable series of steps, or a “succession”, on its way to realizing its climax state. The goal that ecologists in the Douglas fir forests were trying to achieve was to suspend the forest in an earlier stage of succession through constant disturbance like logging and controlled burning (63). This also did not work, as this hypothesis about forest stages was incorrect. Forests do not follow a predictable set of steps, rather they grow and develop less predictably over time.

            These and many other errors were, in part, caused by logging companies and misguided forest scientists focusing only on replenishing the valuable Douglas firs and neglecting all other factors of forest health; they were so focused on having more Douglas firs to sell that they forgot the majority of the forest. Viewing ecology and any other science through a purely economic lens is extremely dangerous, and a recipe for disaster. If reforestation is to succeed, it should be for the benefit of the forest first and foremost, not just the logging companies, and must acknowledge the importance of the entire forest biome.

            Forests are an incredibly complex web of flora and fauna working together to develop an environment over many years where they can thrive. They cover 1/3rd of the world’s total environments and hold 70% of all biodiversity (Stohr 1). Surprisingly, only a small portion of that biodiversity is found aboveground (3). Belowground, there are thousands of different microbes, fungal mycorrhizae, insects, and tree roots that all play a part in making the soil habitable for plant life. According to Whitney Stohr in Belowground Ecosystems: The Foundation for Forest Health, Restoration and Sustainable Management, “[b]elowground ecosystems facilitate critical hydrological and biogeochemical processes essential for maintaining productive forests[.]” That is, the belowground ecosystem is very important for forest health.

            Because this underground ecosystem is so complex and important to ecological wellbeing, disturbing it has a massive effect on the forest’s health as a whole. Studies have shown that disturbances in the food web belowground affect forest health aboveground, and disturbances aboveground affect forest health belowground. Disturbances like, say, a forest being converted into farmland can change the soil microbiome and decrease plant diversity, as well as decreasing or increasing belowground macrofauna to a harmful degree (5). If the belowground ecosystem is changed to the point that it is not sufficiently sustainable for a forest, a forest will not be able to grow there. For example, reforestation efforts of clear-cut coniferous forests in northern Finland often failed due to a significant increase in invertebrate and bacterial life in the soil after clear-cutting (Huhta 1). If efforts are made to reforest a region, the most effective way is through consideration and understanding of the belowground ecosystem and its contribution to forest health (7). For example, mycorrhizal fungi play a major role in belowground nutrient cycling, and its absence will affect the forest negatively (7). In order to incorporate mycorrhizae back into the reforested region, the role it plays in the ecosystem must be thoroughly understood.

            Though researching and protecting forests should be a high priority, wood is still an essential resource. However, clearcutting forests destroys the biome and soil ecology of the forest and risks making the land difficult to reforest. Thankfully, there are ways loggers can still get wood from forests without taking excessive amounts or significantly damaging the ecosystem. The main problem loggers have posed to forest ecology has been due to clear-cutting large swathes of forest at a time, leaving the land barren and completely unrecognizable. This was a method of logging especially popular in the early 20th century (Brock, 60). This large and sudden depletion of trees affects the ecosystem significantly and puts it at risk of becoming infertile for future forests. Instead, cutting down trees few and far between is a much more sustainable approach to logging. This is called “selective logging,” and was the main logging technique used in the 19th century before it was phased out by modern clear-cutting techniques (59). Clear-cutting was much more affordable than selective logging, and by the 20th century, due to a mix of financial reasons and the rugged topography of the Northwest, it became the norm for loggers.

             When loggers only take small amounts of timber at a time while letting the forest properly heal afterwards, it reduces forest degradation significantly. Taking small amounts of timber at a time ensures that there are no significant changes in the forest ecology, and waiting for the affected areas to heal and regrow ensures the forest does not get too damaged.  

            To conclude, when considering the reforestation of a desecrated region, there are many ecological factors that need to be taken into account. There have been several attempts over the years at reforesting certain regions, but most have failed to acknowledge everything that factors into forestry, and only focused on the main attraction: trees. The biology of the soil is a strong determinate of what areas can and cannot sustain forests, and disturbances in the above- or below-ground ecology can make soil inhospitable to the trees that once lived there. Reforesting that land is sometimes impossible by simply planting a bunch of new trees in the now barren field; it requires correcting the soil and environment before planting anything that relies on the benefits of a soil ecosystem.  Protecting forests does not mean stopping any and all wood consumption – there are ways of ethically and sustainably collecting lumber from forests by replacing clear-cutting with selective logging. In addition, remaining forest can be expanded upon by planting trees near the forest’s edge so that they may benefit from the established soil and root network and expand the soil biome outwards. Successful reforestation just requires some patience and a willingness to cooperate with adequately-resourced forestry professionals.

Works Cited

Brock, Emily. “The Challenge of Reforestation: Ecological Experiments in the Douglas Fir Forest, 1920-1940.” Environmental History, vol. 9, no. 1, [Forest History Society, Forest History Society and The American Society for Environmental History, American Society for Environmental History, Oxford University Press], 2004, pp. 57–79, https://doi.org/10.2307/3985945.

Einhorn, Catrin. “Global Leaders Pledge to End Deforestation by 2030.” The New York Times, 2 Nov. 2021.

Gerlein-Safdi, Cynthia. Satellite Monitoring of Natural Reforestation Efforts in China’s Drylands.  Elsevier Inc., 2020.

Stohr, Whitney G. “Belowground Ecosystems:  The Foundation for Forest Health, Restoration and Sustainable Management.” Journal of Environmental Assessment Policy and Management, vol. 15, no. 4, World Scientific Publishing Co., Inc., 2013, pp. 1–17, http://www.jstor.org/stable/enviassepolimana.15.4.04.

Sundman, Veronica & Huhta, Veikko & Niemelä, Seppo. (1978). Biological changes in northern spruce forest after clear-cutting. Soil Biology and Biochemistry. 10. 393-397. 10.1016/0038-0717(78)90064-0.

#essay

[sparrowwright]

Plato, Lamentations, and Suffering.

Plato’s Allegory of the Cave and Lamentation’s Great is your Faithfulness both posit that the way to avoid suffering is through making changes to yourself in order to alleviate distress. Suffering is defined by the author of each work as ignorance. The only way to reach a state of happiness therefore is to educate yourself on your deficiencies so you may correct them. The reason these texts are so similar is that they both are trying to answer the same problem of trying to explain pain, its causes, and its remedies.

Both texts talk about self-improvement and education as the means to better oneself and one’s situation in order to escape suffering. These texts present two variations on the theme of changing one’s behavior or the way one thinksto change a bad situation. In Lamentations, one’s suffering is caused by displeasing God or sinning in some way. To stop one’s suffering, one only needs to find what they are doing that is displeasing God and change it. As the author of Lamentations puts it, “Why should a living man complain, a man, about the punishment of his sins?” (Lam. 3.39).  In the Allegory of the Cave, one needs an enlightened teacher to show them how to step out of the cave and into the light of understanding the perfect forms of concepts such as goodness rather than their shadows or misunderstood versions. However, enlightenment does not absolve one from responsibility: “[The enlightened] must be made to descend again among the prisoners of the cave, and partake of their labors and honors” (Plato 203, para. 57); the enlightened person becomes a teacher for someone else stuck in the cave.  These are both examples of someone changing something about themselves to change their environment.

If education and self-improvement – knowledge – changes suffering, then it isn’t a stretch to say that these texts define suffering as ignorance. If the texts agree that knowledge creates bliss, the opposite of knowledge must create the opposite state. So therefore ignorance, the opposite of knowledge, creates suffering, the opposite of bliss. Through education, then, people can discover enough to change the nature of their situations and rise up from their distress. Such enlightenment can be achieved from, in the case of the Allegory of the Cave, the help of a teacher, or, in the case of Lamentations, the word of God.

The idea that you can have control over your life if you change yourself gives a person a sense of power over their life that they did not feel before, and makes them feel they have control over their situation. Feeling trapped in a stressful place in one’s life can be terrible, and believing that you can do nothing to change it can be soul-crushing. The little sliver of hope offered by these texts that that they actually can do something to remedy their situation gives people a little sense of that power that everyone craves. This thought process is the backbone of these philosophies: the ability to help oneself.

               Similar modes of thought are an attempt to take back power in a situation where one has none. Philosophy is practiced to try and understand life and the world better:  philosophy tries to use human reasoning to find an explanation, a reason and a solution to life’s problems. Religion does the same thing, but leans on supernatural forces instead of or in conjunction with human reason; religion cleanly presents an explanation, a reason and a solution:  here’s what’s wrong, here’s why it’s wrong, here’s how you can fix it.  The Lamentations author does not replace human reasoning with a divine entity or supernatural force, but rather has them rely on each other:  one has to use human reasoning to determine how to act in accord with the supernatural.                In Lamentations, what’s wrong is that God is upset. It’s wrong because you are God’s child, and he wants what’s best for you: “…but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion according to his steadfast love…” (Lam. 2.32) You can fix your bad situation by assessing yourself and figuring out what sins you have committed. After all, according to the author of Lamentations, God does not punish innocent people: “To crush underfoot all the prisoners of the earth, … to subvert a man in his lawsuit, the Lord does not approve” (4.34-36). In Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, what’s wrong is that you are unenlightened. It’s wrong because you are not experiencing the true nature of what life has to offer. “To them, I said, the truth would be literally nothing but the shadows of the [true forms of concepts]” (Plato 199, para. 13). You can fix your suffering by finding an enlightened teacher that will show you the true ways of the world. Plato describes such teachers, or “guardians,” as “the men… wisest about affairs of state… who [have] a better life than that of politics.” (Plato 205, para. 71)

Lamentations and the Allegory of the Cave both share this philosophical principle:  that the explanation of one’s suffering is ignorance, that the reason ignorance causes suffering is that you are not understanding or comprehending fully the steps you need to take in order to improve your life, and that the solution therefore is to educate yourself or be educated on your misdoings or misunderstandings and take steps to correct them. Assuming both of these texts’authors follow their own advice, it is safe to say that the author of Lamentations would suffer more than Plato. Lamentations’ philosophy preaches taking responsibility and waiting for a situation to improve; for some, it is empowering and helpful to think that they have control, but this approach can also cause people to blame themselves for problems they did not cause. The line “[i]t is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD” (Lam. 3.26)encourages people to stay in the situation that is causing them harm and wait for God to help them instead. This can lead to people blaming themselves for their misfortune, and not trying to leave a harmful situation that is the actual cause of their stress. Plato’s philosophy is also about taking responsibility, but it’s much less accusatory, as the people stuck in the cave are chained in place and in need of help rather than actively doing something wrong. In fact, it’s the enlightened person’s moral duty to return to the cave and show everyone else what they have learned: “[The enlightened] must be made to descend again among the prisoners of the cave, and partake of their labors and honors” (Plato 203, para. 57).This absolves the unenlightened of blame, as they are only doing what comes naturally to them, and it is up to the highly educated to help them.

One obvious issue with Plato’s solution to the problem of suffering is that, if suffering can only be lifted with the help of an enlightened teacher, how can this chain of teachers and students begin? How does the first teacher achieve enlightenment? And if no teacher appears to you, are you powerless to achieve enlightenment on your own? If so, then Lamentations must offer a more practical prescription for ending suffering:  the supernatural has already intervened to give humanity the tools to achieve a good enough understanding to cure them of suffering. In effect, God is Plato’s first teacher. As Plato acknowledges,  it must be possible for a person to achieve enlightenment through their own introspection, or as he puts it, “the power and capacity of learning exists in the soul already” otherwise there would never be a first teacher (Plato 202, para. 45). Therefore, according to Plato, while it is easier to achieve enlightenment with the help of a teacher, bettering one’s understanding must be possible on one’s own as well. Therefore, Plato’s prescription gives suffering people the tools to improve their situations without the unhelpful guilt of having displeased God created by the Lamentations author.

In the end, both texts are about ways people can improve themselves in order to improve their current situations. One can improve themself by learning the cause of their suffering in order to change their suffering or prevent it. The reason why these texts are so similar in subject matter, theme and prescription is that they both address a common problem that people want to solve: why suffering had come their way. While the texts have many similarities, the Lamentations author probably suffers more since that author’s approach adds a layer of guilt that Plato avoids.

Works Cited

Plato. “The Allegory of the Cave.” Wake Tech English 111 Reader, edited by Wade Vickrey, et al, Hayden-McNeal, 2020, pp. 198-205. Lamentations. “Great is your Faithfulness.” The Bible. English Standard Version.

#essay

[sparrowwright]

. .Midnight Eucharist. .

. .——†——. .

          The warm wood glistened with dim autumn light filtered through the small windows of the cabin. The dark lacquer gave the wood paneling a lively air as the honey-toned splashes of light stretched across the floor like golden shadows. Father Theodore, standing in his quarters, unclasped the silver crucifix necklace from around his neck. He placed the jewelry gently in his cupboard, somewhere he’ll recognize. The sacred cross gave one last glint before the drawer was sensibly shut.

            He laid his rosary delicately before the painting of The Last Supper that hung above his study. His eyes glanced to Judas, bending down to adorn Jesus with that damning kiss. He looked away. No point.

            It was bound to be dusk soon. He should be there. Making his way to the door, he paused as his hand reached the doorknob, reminded by the glint of silver. He hesitated, then carefully slid his wedding ring off his finger, placing it on a shelf by the door. He looked back for a moment, just a moment, before he shut the door behind him.

            Dusk was approaching quickly, yet some few tendrils of light peeked out from the horizon, not yet drowned by the night sky. He made his way to the church, like he had one million times before.

            Wet grass and gravel crackled beneath his feet. His black leather boots went well with his cassock, but were not well suited for any manner of hiking. They were past the church now, wading through the courtyard to the patch behind the cemetery. He weaved through epitaphs etched in stone, bathed in the golden-red light of the ever-dwindling sun.

            Beyond the town, beyond the Church’s consecrated grounds, lay a dark stretch of land. An informal continuation of the cemetery, only bereft of its holy blessing. Bodies lay there all the same; some before the church’s time, but simply not graced by consecrated earth; others buried when the church denied the dead a holy funeral on godly grounds, be they undesirable to them in some way. A cruel damning, indeed.

          At the far end of the graveyard, broken up by brush and stones and unkempt paths forgotten for years, the great shining bones of what once was a grand manor lay, stripped bare and sun-bleached and picked clean by the toll of neglect among nature. But however decrepit and rotted it may be, it was not dead, for something in it was very much alive.

          Before him, now, that great skeleton lay. The fossilized remains of a home once raucous with laughter and life. He finds the spot in the front yard with the sapling cypress tree. It’s grown since he last saw it, twisting itself in contortions to look for light that wasn’t there. It had grown thinner, but it was alive. He remembered planting it, still. After all this time.

          He sat himself alongside the twisted cypress. The night was full and alive, the new moon only a dark spot in the endless black sky. The mist had rolled in, and the dark was growing colder. His lamplight flickered, threatening to leave him in the pitch black. He wouldn’t mind. He kept waiting.

                              “Teddy.”

          A voice, soft and sweet, but desperate in recognition. Theodore whipped around to what he thought was the source of the noise, the name only so sweet on that tongue, the name only music in that voice.

          “Sergei?” Theodore asked with trembling voice. In the distance, if his eyes do not deceive him, a figure stood tall and dark against the fog. A figure in a shape he knew so well.

          The mist was thick now, the grass becoming heavy with dewdrops, bowing their heads in the frigid night air. The anticipation, the longing. It had been too long – it always was too long.

          The figure, now taking form more tangible, approached Theodore. Despite the cold air, a warmth came over the both of them.

          “Sergei,” Theodore said as he took Sergei in his arms, pressing him to his chest, cold skin against skin. “I missed you. I missed you so much.”

          “I missed you, too.” Sergei spoke through bitter tears. “How did you…?”

          Theodore pulled back, enough to face him. “A new moon.” Theodore said. They looked overhead to see the vast, empty sky. “It moves the fabric of this realm as if it were a tide.”

          “You knew it would be a new moon tonight?” Sergei asked. Theo nodded.

          “Of course. The veil is thin, as thin as it will get in the next few decades, and the mists grow thicker this time of year. I thought, it may be easier for you to step through on a colder, foggy night, when the veil is thinnest.”

          “Someone’s been a studious fellow!” Sergei joked, tussling Theodore’s hair, sending him to fits of childish giggles. “Leave it to you to memorize lunar charts for a date. Ever the considerate one. How long have you been planning this?”

          “I…” Theo hesitated, almost a little embarrassed. “I started planning for our next meeting the second I arrived home from our last. That was… three months ago.”

          Sergei looked down at the grass dappled with crystal dewdrops. “It’s been that long already…?”

          Theodore deflated a bit. “They seem to only be getting longer. I don’t know what it is, but…”

          “Funny, time feels so different here.” Sergei looked up at the stars with a weak smile. “I can’t tell if the last time I saw you was yesterday or last year. It’s all foggy nights and in-betweens. I don’t even know how long I’ve been here for.”

          “Two years, now.”

          Sergei looked at Theodore with a surprised expression. “Two years?”

          Theodore paused, momentarily too ashamed to look him in the eye. “…As of today. It’s… been two years since…” He swallowed, not able to finish the rest of his sentence.

          A moment of silence filled the frigid air.

          “It’s okay.” Sergei squeezed Theodore’s hand slightly. “You know that, right? You did all you could for me. And that’s all I could ever ask.”

          “I could’ve… could’ve talked to them more… s-said the right things, they’d have given you a proper Christian burial…”

          “Then I wouldn’t have you.” Sergei cut through Theodore’s inklings of a spiral. “And that’s all I really want. They didn’t want me in their holy earth, and frankly, I didn’t want to be there either. If their ideal world is one without us, then let us find our own world, free of them.”

          Theodore looked away. They both knew where this conversation was inevitably headed. The unspoken message in the words.

          Finally, Sergei said it. “I just don’t know why you’re still with them – “

          “I can’t, Sergei. You know, you know I can’t.” Theodore squeezed his eyes closed.

          “But why? They’re hurting you. They always have been, from the moment your father put you up on that pulpit and made you read words you didn’t understand from that lectern – “

          “It’s my life, Sergei!” Theodore cried. “Without the Church, without God, what would I be? Who would I have?”

          “You would have me.”

          The words stunned Theodore into silence. Slowly, his shoulders fell.

          “We could go anywhere, Teddy. Anywhere away from here. Together. I could bring you with me. Don’t you want that?”

          … I do, Theodore thought. I do so, so badly.

          “I don’t need a Christian burial. I don’t need to be laid to rest as just another one of God’s creatures, whittling myself down until I fit into the parameters of His conditional love. I never needed that.” Sergei looked Theodore straight in the eyes. “I don’t exist to placate those who want something from me. And I don’t think you do, either.”

          “I do not whittle myself.” Theodore flicked a bitter glance at Sergei. “I cannot simply abandon my duties for a personal affair. I serve a purpose higher than myself--”

          “All you do is whittle! All you do is serve!” Sergei burst. “I saw you grow thinner every day! You’d whittled yourself down until you could snap like a twig, and yet you worship the knife that carves you still! Hell, sometimes it feels as if your church can do no wrong in your eyes, even when they’re denying a holy burial to a man because he doesn’t love the same – “

          Silence came over the woods once more. Fireflies blinked like yellow embers in the blue dust of moonlight, and crickets sang distantly their discordant tune.

          “… Teddy…” Sergei said, his voice soft and warm. Delicate. Apologetic.

          Theodore broke away from him, wandering a few steps forward. He needed to collect himself.

          “Teddy, I didn’t mean – I… I’m sorry.”

          Theodore put his hand on the twisted cypress to steady himself. He slowly sat down beside it, tracing his fingers along the warped bark.

          “I remember planting this.” He said. “The thought of forgetting where you were made me sick. I couldn’t bear to… to lose you again.” Theodore took a bough in his fingers, pouring over the needle-like leaves. “I planted it over your heart. Two years ago.” Theodore sighed, lost in reverie. “I came every day to this spot after mass. In the night, while the town slept, I would lie here, half hoping the cold would take me – take me to you – but knowing my immortal soul would be damned to wander restless on unblessed ground. Laying there, in the dirt, knowing you were below me, an eternity wandering with you seemed more merciful than another day in my empty home.”

          Sergei knelt beside Theodore. Theodore continued, not acknowledging or simply not noticing the gesture.

          “But then… then, on that night the moon was black as pitch and the veil was so thin you could feel it when you breathed, you rose from that grave, like the son of God himself. And I was terrified, but you were beautiful. So pale and beautiful, like the moon, but so cold and so still and…”

          Theodore trailed off. Sergei put a hand on his shoulder.

“Why are you telling me this, love?”

          Theodore looked down. “I’m afraid, Sergei. I can’t be a new man, like you. I have… so many people in town need me to – “

          “Theodore,” Sergei said in his downy soft, ever-comforting voice. “Look at me. Every single person in that church, in that town, who told you they would keep you safe as long as you behaved were already hurting you. Strip away their words – all the obligations, the expectations, the rituals, the routines, the normalcy. With all of those gone from your mind, what do you want?”

          Theodore paused. Truly banishing such things from his mind felt like banishing his skin from his body: an agonizing, impossible task. What was he but obligation? If no one was around towant, toneed him, to ask of him a favor, or forgiveness, or penance, would he exist at all? Or was he only what others make of him, an apparition that would fall into shadow and dust once he becomes obsolete?

          “I want to go with you.” Theodore said, his voice little more than a whisper. “More than anything. I want to be with you and only you, I want to be together without fear, I want to…” He was choking back tears now, determined not to cry in front of Sergei tonight. Sergei squeezed Theodore’s hands.

          “And I do, as well! Is that not enough?” Sergei seemed to light up at his words, a light in his eye not unlike the glow of the fireflies around them. “Is it not enough that we love each other and wish to be away? What more could love be, other than the letting go of old hurt and embracing of new light? You have let yourself be bled by these leeches, and now you are sullen and pale. We can heal, together.”

          “But…” Theodore hesitated. “Just… disappear? What would they make of it? What about poor Mina, my wife?”

          Sergei looked Theodore in the eyes earnestly. “If she loves you truly, she will want what is best for you. And this place…” He gestured to the direction of the church. “This place is not good for anyone.”

          Theodore looked down at their intertwined hands, feeling the difference in temperature. He ran his thumb along the ridges of Sergei’s knuckles. Slowly, he nodded, his eyes squeezed shut as a tear fell to the ground. “I want to come with you. Take me with you.”

          With that, Sergei pulled Theodore in for a kiss, which warmed them both more than any sun ever could. Sergei looked him in the eye, dusting his cheeks with butterfly kisses. “Let us go, then. Beyond the veil.”

#flash fiction #short story #drama