Don’t get me wrong: I certainly don’t wish for corporations to destroy the environment for their own benefit, but primarily because I believe that if the environment is to be exploited for industry the rewards of that should be shared equitably amongst the workers in a worker-owner cooperative structure, and the spoils of it should be shared equitably across mankind, and not only those alive today, but also those in the future, hence we need sustainability.
Insofar as actually wanting to preserve it for its own sake though - I think it’s meaningless, in a vacuum I would in fact prefer less biodiversity, especially when it comes to insects, and I would really like it if we could exterminate all species of fungi, mosses, lichen as well.
Where others see untouched ecosystems I see unused land that could be a nice city.
I’m an anarchist but I am firmly anti-degrowth, I would genuinely side with neolibs against anprims because they made a far better world even for all it’s flaws. Doesn’t help that neolibs have actual arguments and all anprims have is the “noble savage” and “appeal to nature” fallacies. Superficially I’m more on the side of soviet tech optimism if that makes sense.
Beyond the political, I don’t really have any affinity for it, there are people who say various nonsense like “green spaces improve our mental health” whereas I find them mostly depressing and kind of out of place.
I am okay with parks in cities as long as they’re empty and within reach of civilization, but green spaces like parks in cities aren’t nature, they’re a well curated almost entirely artificial human creation, an expressionist pastiche of green.
Actual nature is wildfires, cancer, floods, earthquakes, predation, parasitism, prions, wasps, itching, pain, burning, poisons, toxins, spores, fungi, spores, lichen, moss, mosquitoes, wasps, bacteria, sun overly bright, needing to pee, being itchy, negative emotions, reptiles, spiders, no amenities, dirt, dirty water (swamps), viruses, bacteria, thorns, stinging nettles, mites, ticks, lyssavirus, people turning to religion etc.
Flowers smell okay, but really air freshener smells better.
I find it all absolutely disgusting, and what’s even more disgusting is that these things can affect my unfortunate meat flesh prison, it could make me sick with some COVID-over9000 - another of mother nature’s little treats, and then ruin my plans for the day, or even my life.
Nature is pain and agony, and when it’s not trying to kill you, it’ll damn well do it’s best to make you uncomfortable 24/7, it makes me long for the eternal sanctity of steel in lieu of flesh, and the safety of concrete paved city roads lit under a warm orange glow of an artificial street lights. Some nice brutalist architecture, flat colours, sharp geometric shapes - urban and industrial environments feel like home.
As long as there isn’t crowds though - people are nature too and pretty disgusting as well, they are as irrational as any frightened animal and a vector for disease.
I never understood what the big deal was with staying inside during the pandemic. It’s one thing if you have a shit place and you have to house share or live with parents, if you rent a semi-modern apartment for yourself, I don’t see the issue. As long as you’re comfortable and have plenty of space, what else is there? All the things one could want are on the internet anyway.
I much prefer the internet tbh, here I have control, if there’s something I don’t like, I don’t have to ever see it again, but I can also engage with it freely without the interaction ever escaping my control, my agency is never impeded. The digital space is much more liberating.
Outside I can’t really use an adblocker, or a waspblocker, or a sporeblocker, or a people-blocker.
I’ve read a number of posts like this on Reddit before and to get ahead of the usual replies:
You have allergies!
No. I don’t have any as far as I know.
You just need to do shrooms
I have several times, though I kinda hated it, I much prefer acid myself, and it didn’t change my opinion in the slightest. Best place to trip is at home, I can’t imagine the panic attack I’d have tripping outside. Actually I can because I have. Would not do that again. At least it was in a business district and not in some ugly forest so I could duck into a Starbucks.
You hate animals
No, I’ve actually had pets. That said while I value the companionship I would prefer an artificial companion instead.
You just need to spend more time in nature
I’ve already spent way more time in nature than I’d ever want.
You should read about nature more
Yeah I have. I actually quite like reading about ancient creatures and whatnot, especially from the Cambrian period.
You’re just born after 2000!
Idk how that one is relevant but I’m from 1998.
But you’re part of nature
Yeah, I hate that. The bits about myself that I love are all that I managed in spite of it, not because of it. I will hate growing old as my meat prison rots and breaks down and I will hate having to confront mortality knowing there is so much to do.
You just haven’t visited [x]
I’ve visited the French Alps as a kid and it smelled like pig shit and made me exhausted, I’ve visited farms and it smelled like horseshit and was dirty, I’ve visited Times Square and it was the happiest memory I had as a kid. As an adult I’ve visited all up and down the UK and Russia (the Baikal and Ural) and idk about the nature there, it’s all just whatever and blends in.
At one time a field in the UK offered me peace when I needed it due to material struggles and I enjoyed it, (despite the unfortunate fact it was a reminder of wealth inequality because it was all privately owned by some aristocrat) or at least I thought I enjoyed it, now that I fixed it by improving my material circumstances and have no need for it.
EDIT: Because people cannot read, I’ve highlighted that I do not in fact think we should destroy mosses and lichen etc. and I am in fact aware that destroying any natural ecosystems has has serious negative cascading effects on everything else including human life and I do not wish for it because I’m not a moron
That’s why I said “in a vacuum”, as in -isolated from other factors. I’m glad this post has encouraged discussion but please just actually read it before engaging. The lack of reading comprehension on Lemmy is genuinely worrying.
I suppose this qualifies as an unpopular opinion, but it’s some of the most cringeworthy pseudo-intellectual garbage I’ve ever read.
You view nature as useless and hostile, but you ignore its most basic undeniable benefits – food, oxygen production, climate regulation. You view cities as clean and efficient utopias, while ignoring that they’re plagued by crime, air pollution, industrial waste, disease outbreaks, noise, social isolation, and the urban heat island effect. Your preference for steel and concrete over living ecosystems doesn’t change the fact that those ecosystems keep you alive.
You identify as an anarchist (lol, of course you do) but you admire “Soviet tech optimism” which was based on central planning, state control and authoritarianism. You argue in favor of neoliberalism which is directly opposed to anarchism. You claim to be anti-degrowth and pro-sustainability, yet degrowth promotes sustainable technology. Your political viewpoints are a confused, incoherent mess and maybe someone more knowledgeable than me in that area will take the time to point out your other contradictory statements and misrepresentations.
You don’t consider what happens if most plant and animal species die, or its devastating effects on food production, the climate and human survival. None of that matters to you because your worldview doesn’t extend beyond your home and wifi network. Of course the fact that billions of people find comfort and purpose in nature is incomprehensible to someone like you whose life is devoid of meaning.
Your “meat flesh prison” comments are especially pathetic considering that all human experience (including your miserable urban-online existence) is mediated by biology. You can delude yourself into believing you’re above the disorder of the natural world, but you still rely on the very biological processes you claim to despise.
This is an embarrassingly bad take and you come across as someone incapable of forming real human connections. Most of the rest of us will be out embracing the chaos, beauty and unpredictability of the real world while you wither away, unhappy and unfulfilled, in the sterile prison you’ve created for yourself.
These are not in contradiction. Soviet tech optimism was a naive general societal belief in the power of technology to solve problems, but unlike American tech optimism it was about the problems of the proletariat and disconnected from the profit motive. I absolutely do not simp for the soviet union itself and have never stated as such. Generally speaking technology has solved a lot of problems, hence why I’m sympathetic towards the belief, as opposed to “degrowth” which is often tied in with Anarcho-Primitivism and anti-civ movements that have many problematic aspects when it comes to their distaste for technology in practice working to rob the disabled of independence.
I side with them as opposed to Anarcho-Primitivists and degrowth/anti-civ people.
They’re not my first choice because as you said - it’s not very left-wing or anarchist, but I genuinely believe that if these were the two options, I would side with neoliberals even though anprims are fellow anarchists because the former built a genuinely better world than what I think would result from the ideology of the latter.
It’s called having nuanced, clear positions.
This isn’t correct.
My political viewpoints are sound, but you’re right - maybe someone more knowledgeable than you, which I imagine is a lot of people, (though given some recent elections in the world maybe not), could engage with this and actually have a reasonable discussion.
Eh, I wouldn’t be able to have most of those experiences if not for technology. My eyes are meat and flesh, but without the silicone contact lenses on top, they’re as good as not being there really.
So in many ways, it’s mediated by technology also.
Never said I didn’t? I would prefer not to, hence why I said I’d long for sacred steel in lieu of flesh lol.
Of course I do? I never said we should go out and destroy the environment now. Are you struggling to read, or something?
That’s some crazy projection. I’m happy and fulfilled in my sterile prison, thank you very much!
More projection. My life is fucking bursting with meaning these days, every year is better than the last ever since COVID tbqh.
But yeah I actually made the post to see what the arguments were for liking nature, so maybe I could see it differently and enjoy it as well, but so far it seems the only commonality is a genuine inability to argue without resorting to ad-hominem and a shocking lack of reading comprehension.