We read earlier about socialism for the rich, now lets read a bit on the idea of entitlement. One can often hear objections to socialism, re-appropriation of wealth, and entitlement when it comes to the poor and exploited, but what about when it comes to the rich?
. . . A perpetual-growth economy is not only insane (and impossible), it is also by its very essence abusive, by which I mean that it’s based on the same conceit as more personal forms of abuse. It is, in fact, the macroeconomic enshrinement of abusive behavior. The guiding principle of abusive behavior is that the abuser refuses to respect or abide by limits or boundaries put up by the victim. As Lundy Bancroft, former codirector of Emerge, the nation’s first therapeutic program for abusive men, writes, “Entitlement is the abuser’s belief that he has a special status and that it provides him with exclusive rights and privileges that do not apply to his partner. The attitudes that drive abuse can largely be summarized by this one word.”
The relevance of this word applies on the larger social scale. Of course humans are a special species to whom a wise and omnipotent God has granted the exclusive rights and privileges of dominion over this planet that is here for us to use. And of course even if you subscribe to the religion of Science instead of Christianity, humans possess special intelligence and abilities that grant us exclusive rights and privileges to work our will on the world that is still here for us to use. Growth economies are essentially unchecked and will push past any boundaries set up by anyone other than the perpetrators: certainly the fact that indigenous cultures already are living on this or that piece of ground has never stopped those in power from expanding their economy; nor is the death of the oceans stopping their exploitation; nor is the heating of the planet stopping the exploitation; nor is the grinding poverty of the dispossessed.
And the truth is, you cannot talk abusers out of their behavior. Perpetrators of domestic violence are among the most intractable of all who commit violence, so intractable, in fact, that in 2000 the United Kingdom removed funding for therapy sessions designed to treat men guilty of domestic violence (putting the money instead into shelters and other means of keeping women safe from their attackers). Lundy Bancroft also says this: “An abuser doesn’t change because he feels guilty or gets sober or finds God. He doesn’t change after seeing the fear in his children’s eyes or feeling them drift away from him. It doesn’t suddenly dawn on him that his partner deserves better treatment. Because of his self-focus, combined with the many rewards he gets from controlling you, an abuser changes only when he feels he has to, so the most important element in creating a context for change in an abuser is placing him in a situation where he has no other choice.”
How do we stop the abusers who perpetrate a perpetual-growth economy? Seeing oiled pelicans and burned sea turtles won’t move them to stop. Nor will hundred-degree days in Moscow. We can’t stop them by making them feel guilty. We can’t stop them by appealing to them to do the right thing. The only way to stop them is to make it so they have no other choice.
Read more . . .
And remember, “The only way to stop them is to make it so they have no other choice.”
In an apparently legal move, the Lakota Nation is unilaterally withdrawing from treaties signed with the United States of America and 
Taking advantage of Saving the World Week to spotlight a BIPT Project that we’re pretty fond of: Urban Assault Forestry, which has a threefold aim: 1) to select and create an arsenal of voracious plants specially adapted to urban soils for various purposes, 2) to identify and infiltrate areas where nature is beginning to break through the cityscape, and 3) exploit these weak spots to accelerate nature’s reclaiming of our cities.
Night falls on Grange Park on a cool Sunday in late spring and a small band of urban guerrillas embarks on its first operation of the summer. Their mission: to sow the seeds of a green revolution. Their arsenal: trowels and gardening claws, 10 kilograms of compost, wildflower seeds and a tiger lily. Just after 9pm, the group heads east to the patch of stones outside Above Ground Art Supplies on the corner of McCaul and Grange. Like many plots of land between buildings and curbs, the space outside the art store is barren. A few clumps of grass grow randomly among the rocks. 
Another source of inspiration is BIPT favorite 
New York City, most famous for its skyscrapers and worldly population, is also home to an estimated 5.2 million trees {Nowak, 2002}. New York City’s vegetation is comprised of a patchwork of remnant forests, inherited estates, neighborhood parks and playgrounds, green streetscapes, parkways and private backyards and roof gardens. New York City Parks & Recreation has jurisdiction for over half of the estimated 5 million total trees in the city. In 1996, Parks & Recreation mobilized over 700 volunteers to conduct a comprehensive census of all the street trees in New York City. The census counted over 498,000 street trees in New York City, comprising of approximately 70 different varieties. The vast majority of trees, however, comprise a small number of species; over 40% of the street tree population consists of just two species. New York City’s street trees are relatively small, with almost 60% measuring less than 12 inches diameter at breast height {Watt, 1998}.
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