Post # 13 Land ethics

Ethics has been touchy subject for many years through out all types of situations. One situation that is never really thought of is the ethics of the land. In the article it compares land to how Odysseus treated his slave girls as just property. To this day there still are no real ethic dealings between man and their relationship to the land, plants, and animals that all strive on this planet. Ethics is said to be a premise of that the individual is a member of a community of interdependent parts. One of the topics that stuck with me through this article is the idea that everyday Americans pledge their allegiance to “land of the free and the home of the brave”. The article goes on to explain that we do not do what we preach, the land that we love we treat unfairly. We demolish plants and ecosystems as if it is nothing, we pollute our waters, and we infect our soils. If all our land was “human” or so called “useful”  we would have rules or ethics put in place to regulate these issues. Although there are not land ethics being implemented yet there are a few baby strides slowly taking place. The majority of plants or animals can not be “used” as something to eat, sell, or put to economic use. Because of this lack of necessity of these certain plants or animals they are casted to the side until they are in danger. Once these non-economical species are in danger people then find a way to make them seem important. An example that the article speaks about it the use of the songbird controlling insects, there is very little information or data on this but as long as it seemed economical it seemed important. I agree with Leopold when he speaks that land ethics cannot exist without a true understanding, love, respect and admiration for the land. Without these traits our country and our world will continue to be stubborn and our land ethics will never develop, education is the key to sucess.