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Thailand is a unique and proud country. Its languages and spirituality stem from a particular intersection between Pali, the sacred language of Theravada Buddhism, and Sanskrit, the sacred language of Hinduism. The Thai monarchy is prominent, and a focus on wealth emanates from not just the culture as a whole, but specifically from people’s spiritual devotion. Any tourist in Thailand is prone to get “templed-out”; there are so many temples, of all sizes and in every corner, that, even in short trips, a foreigner may feel like they’ve had enough and have lost track of which ones they’ve visited. These temples, which are often newly built and thoroughly maintained with white paint and gold leaf, are by no means made for the foreign gaze. In fact, non-practitioners should be made to feel like intruders, surrounded by locals worshipping passionately. This Thai paradigm thoroughly deconstructs the dominant perception in the West that spiritual and material riches are at odds with each other, that all wealth (or a desire for it) is a reflection of soul-less capitalism. It seems to me that the expat community in Thailand is largely composed of white men who married Thai women. The issue of sex tourism, in combination with a newly instated lift on weed criminalization, gives some spots of Bangkok a vivid red-light Amsterdam vibe. And even though there is widespread religious conservatism perceiving these expressions of drug-use and sex-entertainment as taboo, the vision of wealth and material prosperity somehow trumps other aspects of religious morality. Perhaps wealth and prosperity are significant parts of Thai devotion, and are not necessarily at odds with other spiritual practices and beliefs. Temples have safes, there is no shortage of gold, and both money and gold leaf are ritualized. This, in itself, is far from unusual to anyone who grew up witnessing Catholic devotion, and the ornate set-up of cathedrals. But what stood out to me, due to my fascination with mini ponds, is the amount of expensive water features in public spaces. “Water plays an important role in many religions” (page 5), and the idea of holy water is familiar enough to Christians. But in Thailand, water features seem to go beyond the realm of temple; they have a personal function, and are implemented at every opportunity. Ceramic potted ponds with gorgeous (and pricey) water lilies, water pumps for fountains, reflecting pools etc, are everywhere. Not to mention city-wide festivals, which are all about throwing water at everyone and everything on the streets. Thai tradition clearly observes water in a particular way. When inquiring about why so many entrances of establishments have small but lavish water features, people explain it in different ways. Expats will say it’s just pretty, or it comes from Feng Shui. Some locals will say that, traditionally, it was common to have water available for people to drink during drought season, or for people to wash their feet before entering the house. And some will say frankly – it is something that attracts wealth. A 2022 paper from Naresuan University, named “Water” in the Regime of Thai Traditions and Rituals, describes this observance of water as stemming from “great” and “little” traditions – “great” as in from Buddhist and Hindu scriptures, and “little” as in from farming and ancestry. Obviously, farming requires water, but rice farming, in particular, requires flooding. Rice doesn’t need flooded land to thrive, but it does thrive in it while other plants don’t. So, historically, this staple of the Thai diet has informed Thai culture and how it approaches the ebbs and flows of drought and rain seasons; the comings and goings of water as a practical approach to prosperity and abundance. The Isan people of northern Thailand, for instance, are said to consecrate water in a ritual for rice growing (page 116). Water, in Thai tradition, as it observes Buddhist and Hindu scriptures, symbolizes “the medium to connect this worldly to the sacred world”. Water is a Goddess named Phra Mae Thorani, who is portrayed in the logos of water distribution companies all over Thailand and of the country’s oldest political party. Water is also where Nagas live (page 30), mythical beings which protect treasures, among other things. According to ancient Thai legend, snakes, as the animist representation of these deities, are not to be feared but to be admired. Though they may represent danger when angered, they may also grant wishes of wealth and prosperity. This is perhaps the most apt representation of a bifurcation in wealth seeking – prosperous agency, or exploitative greed. Nagas can bring you rain, and it will either water your crops or flood your home; a reminder to always nurture a righteous heart when seeing riches. Alongside water and its fauna, flora seems to hold tremendous spiritual significance in Thai folklore. Aquatic flowers such as the lotus (Nelumbo nucifera) and the water lily (Nymphaea) are also symbolic in both Buddhism and Hinduism, and they are named the same in Thai (ดอกบัว). Water lilies, in particular, can be widely seen in ceramic potted ponds surrounding temples, shrines, royal buildings, and even store fronts in Thailand’s major cities, usually accompanied by small beta fish, which are native to the country. None of these water features, with or without fish, seem to have mosquito larvae; they sometimes have tadpoles, snails or backswimmers (when they are not chemically treated or are mechanical fountains). A pink cultivar of the Nymphaea, native to Thailand, is named after Nang Kwak, the goddess of fortune. This “Beckoning Lady has long been used by low-level merchants and vendors, and is the one charm whose initial meaning lay with the market” (page 365 of the article The Sacred Geography of Bangkok's Markets). In this research, the author describes ‘mercantile spirituality’ as nothing new, though its popularity has increased in recent decades. A modern ‘prosperity religion’ shows that, in light of a rapidly expanding capitalist landscape, spirituality, folklore and tradition are not at odds with modernity. Thai culture shows how animism and polytheism are contemporary spiritual practices by definition. In the West, where monotheistic religions have brutally instated themselves as the norm, paganism is so often framed as of the past, and its practitioners reduced as historical reenactors. But framing Buddhism as a replacement of paganism, for instance, is completely irrelevant and inadequate when observing the civic religion of Thailand. The amalgamation of Thai folklore, Buddhism and Hinduism is anything but waned in the face of rampant metropolization. There is nothing inherently contradictory about bringing these spiritual traditions and beliefs into the realm of contemporary capitalist societies, in fact, they may be a lifeline in the soullessness of major cities. Mirna Wabi-Sabi Mirna is a Brazilian writer, site editor at Gods and Radicals and founder of Plataforma9. She is the author of the book Anarcho-transcreation and producer of several other titles under the P9 press.

Indigenous people in Brazil mirror the situation of those displaced by war, in the sense that they don’t comply with the principle of dividing up land according to property ownership or national borders. Perhaps instead of trying to save Other people from destruction, we ought to stop destroying. And this is work we have to do for ourselves, not for the other. We need the eradication of the paradigms which threaten Indigenous peoples more than we need to tell Indigenous peoples we validate them. Written by Mirna Wabi-Sabi Read it at Abeautifulresistance.org

Rather than looking to ‘save’ others, we should aim to dismantle the hatred and exploitation of those who reject property and national borders. It is commonplace in Brazil for people or institutions to make a symbolic gesture towards an Indigenous community, and then frame it as a major advance for their rights. One familiar example, for instance, is a museum paying Indigenous people to build a traditional structure of theirs on its site. Or, a person showing up at an Indigenous settlement and saying hello, taking school kids to visit, or buying jewellery from communities – as if any of these things were a major political statement. They’re not. They’re basic decency, like paying for goods and services, or treating someone else as a human being. Written by Mirna Wabi-Sabi Read at Opendemocracy.net

Originally published at OpenDemocracy in Brazilian Portuguese. Implementing a foreign principle on weapons policy can further exacerbate economic inequalities. The year 2021 was marked by legal incentives by the Bolsonaro administration to loosen restrictions around gun ownership in Brazil. In an effort to emulate the United States’ approach to guns, the president ran his election campaign on this platform, popularizing the gun hand gesture and eventually introducing 30 decrees on the subject. Of the decrees passed loosening “registration and acquisition of weapons and ammunition by hunters, collectors and shooters” (among other things), some later faced resistance from Senate. This resistance is unsurprising since, according to a census from 2019 (his first year in office), the majority of the Brazilian population strongly disagreed with the idea that loosening gun laws would translate into more public safety. There is also widespread agreement among researchers and NGOs that lax arrangements around gun ownership will exacerbate violence, and will encourage the already existing illegal arms trade in the country to grow and cheapen. Deviation from legal arms into illegality was already an issue before these decrees, with nearly 20 thousand weapons in the 10 years leading up to 2016, when the report was published by a parliamentary inquiry commission. This means that popularizing gun culture in Brazil is not about combatting organized crime, to the contrary — it will increase its supply of weapons. The issues with implementing a political principle from the United States regarding guns in Brazil, aside from it not even working in its country of origin, is that Brazilian society has starker wealth inequality. This class disparity is represented in the demographic which takes a stance on the gun issue. According to the census report from 2019, “of those interviewed who said they were in favor of making firearm ownership more flexible, most earn more than five minimum wages”. Meanwhile, “seven out of ten residents of Brazilian peripheries disagreed with the flexibilization gun possession”. In other words, the vast majority of those in support of strict gun control live closer to where organized crime operates. While a wealthier portion of the population which can afford to live in so-called safer neighborhoods tend to be supportive of loosening restrictions. In the United States, the issue of class permeates the debate on gun control from a slightly different place. A 2017 study describes “economic setbacks” as a main source of emotional attachment to gun ownership, a right which is already vastly granted in the country. This means that in the US, financial insecurity may motivate gun ownership — as a source of empowerment. The demographic of Brazilians who earn at least five times more than minimum wage may not be as distant from the demographic in the United States of people who feel economically disenfranchised. The social and historical context, however, informs not only how this demographic is described, but also how these individuals describe themselves. Someone who considers themselves upper middle class in Brazil could be considered lower middle class in the United States. Nevertheless, an aversion towards poverty, and the poor, is a common ground. Gender and race also mark gun control sentiments in both countries. In the US, those “who have expectations about what it means to be a white man in America today that are not being met” are more likely to be interested in gun ownership. In Brazil, race is more difficult to dichotomize due to a colonial history which encouraged miscegenation as opposed to segregation. Nevertheless, race does tend to follow class lines, since black Brazilians make up over 70% of the poorest segment of the population, and whites make up 70% of the richest. Considering these numbers, it should be noted that, in both countries, poorer black people are more likely to become victims of gun violence. Another major concern around loosening gun laws, perhaps more so in Brazil than in the United States, is a potential increase in femicide. “The term ‘femicide’ (femicidio) was particularly embraced in Latin America”, but it doesn’t mean it’s more widespread in that region. Brazil’s off-the-charts level of violence against women is a direct result of the fact that there has been an effort to name the issue. In the US, categorizing femicides as any other homicide may mask the fact that 92% of them are perpetrated by men the women knew. Apprehension around stating that these homicides happened because these victims are women doesn’t change the fact that the majority of the assailants are their boyfriends or husbands. It also doesn’t change the fact that “poverty is associated with domestic abuse”. Making it easier to own guns and keep them in family homes will likely exacerbate the already existing issue of domestic violence and the vulnerability of women faced with financial insecurity. For each situation a gun can be used to protect a family from a break-in, there are several other situations where this gun can be used to inflict harm on this family, either by inflaming domestic violence, expansion of the illegal arms trade by organized crime, or disproportionally victimizing marginalized households. Trigger Warning — The photos below are disturbing and show death. Operation of the Military and Civil Police, on July 21, leaves 19 dead in Complexo do Alemão | Fabio Teixeira The Role of the Police Police operations in Brazilian peripheries are notoriously deadly, and those killed are often uninvolved in criminal activities. They are just at the wrong place at the wrong time. If law enforcement institutions were excelling at their job, there would be no need for the State to transfer the responsibility of providing security to civilians. However, Bolsonaro’s encouragement of force, of violence, resonates with military police officers — who often become his avid supporters. As a researcher of public safety puts it, for an individual to support a politician who encourages amateurs to take on a role which is one’s professional responsibility is a "merely ideological question, not practical". This ideology, which loosely signifies traditional family values, conservative religious principles and gender roles, have no practical bearing in lowering violent crime rates, combatting organized crime, or protecting families in their homes. Last month, nearly 20 people were killed in a shoot-out between the military police and alleged drug traffickers in a neighborhood of Rio de Janeiro called Alemão Complex. Less than half of those killed had criminal records, at least two of them weren’t suspects at all, and one was a cop. This scenario is reoccurring; a recent report by the federal university of Niterói (UFF), financed by a German political foundation called Heinrich Böll, states that between 2007 and 2021, “17,929 operations were carried out by police in Rio de Janeiro. Of this total, 593 police operations resulted in massacres, totaling 2374 deaths.” There is no evidence showing these operations have been effective in combatting or stifling organized crime organizations, they have been effective in sustaining a prolonged reign of terror in marginalized communities. The one thing everyone seems to agree on is that wealth inequality is progressively becoming intolerable. Poverty, crime, and the need for a safer society are concerns which possibly transcend ideological lines. The question is what the practical steps are to improve a social condition which leads to brutal violence from north to south of the globe. Could the solution be more guns, or more human dignity? _____ Mirna Wabi-sabi

Mirna Wabi-Sabi Tate Modern is the one museum people talk about when they discuss art in London. Never have I heard the Courtauld be mentioned in this context. To be fair, it’s really more of an institute or gallery, and the collection is less vast and diverse than Tate’s. But it has some major pieces on display, most notorious of them perhaps being Van Gogh’s self-portrait without the ear, and several pieces by Gauguin, who was somehow involved in the ear-cutting situation. The whole place is a succinct gathering of major artists like Manet, Degas, Cézanne, Renoir, and several Flemish, Medieval and Renaissance masters, in a fantastic building with embellished cantilevered stone stairs. Perhaps even more attention-grabbing than the pedigree of the collection in the classic limestone building is the exhibition that opened on the 17th of June. “Fakes from the Collection” Yes, fake as in forgery. The Art and Artifice expo explores not only several types of fake pieces but also different types of intent behind their production. Of course, some were produced for financial gain, such as those made to look old and expensive but containing paint pigments or nails which didn’t exist in the period they were claimed to be from. Nineteenth century forgeries of medieval paintings on wood, for instance, were uncovered because nails from the alleged date of the work were not produced in the size and standard shape revealed in the x-rays of the pieces. Others had fake signatures and were claimed to be from the “study” days of the artist. The most fun, though, are the ones with unexpected stories. Some pieces were created to fool Nazis, as was the case of the forger Han van Meegeren. He created fake Vermeers during the Second World War and sold it to elite members of the Nazi party. The one on display at the exhibition is a forgery of a painting by van Baburen, a piece featured on the background of two of Vermeer’s paintings. Van Meegeren was applauded for this scheme, not only because of its disruption of the notorious looting and mistreatment of fine art by the Nazis, but also because his forgeries became a valuable technique investigation tool for art students at the institute. Other pieces were just artists practicing their craft by replicating classics, which were never meant to deceive a buyer. And in some cases, researchers still don’t know the true authorship of the piece, as is the case of a Boitard drawing. The technology for producing smooth, grid-less paper wasn’t widely available until decades after his death, but it is possible, though unlikely, that he came across it in the last year of his life, around the time of the ‘revolutionary invention’. Attendees are invited to closely examine the paper with large hand-held magnifying glasses to identify the differences between each drawing. It’s hard to not see parallels with generative artificial intelligence today and its potentially deceitful images. Deceit is nothing new, in media or art, and whenever a new technology comes around, we must adapt our methods of interpretation and consumption of its content. If it’s a new paper-making method, paint pigment, nail type, or digital image-editing feature, innovation is unstoppable, and change is inevitable. How we handle the technological changes of our era, and our ability to keep up with them, defines whether innovation symbolizes the advancement or detriment of society. Earlier in June, just a few days before the opening of the Courtauld expo, NPR published an article with suggestions on how to identify if a digital image was fake; meaning, generated by AI. As a tool, we know that nowadays generative AI is unable to realistically portray hands, teeth, accessories such as jewelry, and complex backgrounds. Holding up a proverbial magnifying glass to these details can give away fake images with relative ease. Some of the images believed to be real and widely shared online, such as the one of the Pope wearing a large white puffy coat, could have easily been, and were, exposed as fakes, though not soon enough to prevent them from going viral. Looking at history, we see that the struggle to identify forgeries is not unprecedented in the realm of images made to deceive in high art or in mass media. The same way it is possible to be unsure of the veracity of a signature, we may be unsure of the source of a realistic-looking digital image. All this means is that we must keep up with technological advances and invest in a modernized education system. Anyone is bound to slip occasionally and fall for a fake. Some details might slip through the cracks, some days the vetting process might be sloppier than others, that’s natural. Not to mention that it’s just a matter of time until digital technology is updated to make AI better at portraying things like hands and we will be caught off guard once again. AI’s current inability to produce realistic images of hands it quite comical, considering hands may be the very first subject of human artistic expression. From ancient pictographs made 40 thousand years ago until classics of the 19th century, hands have been a major focus of human art, especially for painters. Even when they are hidden, hands stand out and become a source of speculation and conspicuous meaning. Da Vinci was notorious for his study of hands, and Michelangelo created one of the most reproduced pair of hands in Western history–in The Creation of Adam. Between the 18th and 19th centuries, when a wave of elite European portraits depicted men with hands hidden in their jackets, it was speculated that perhaps paintings were cheaper when the painter didn’t have to focus on drawing fingers. There is no evidence for that. The pose most likely symbolized power and status, as it was popular with people like Napoleon, for whom money was no obstacle. Either way, we were never expected to take art, and media, at face value. For hundreds of years, we’ve had to keep vetting processes and analyses up to date, we’ve had to learn to ask the right questions at the right time, and this just happens to still be as true now as ever. High-tech is not synonymous with high standards, and nothing corroborates this idea more than high art. Will a robot soon produce a perfect forgery, or perhaps its own masterpiece? If it does, this threat is possibly a tale as old as art itself. Trying to halt innovation will be futile, and expecting change to not meet any resistance is also unrealistic. We’ve known that art made without heart, made as nothing more than a replica, is not valuable. And perceiving value does take training. It takes a robust education that incentivizes critical analysis and requires resources. A better use of our time is learning how to hold up a magnifying glass, and not so much campaigning against technologies which may or may not be used for malignant deceit. +++ Mirna Wabi-Sabi

By Mirna Wabi-Sabi ChatGPT is a subject that provokes much debate about the future of education in the world of writing. Artificial Intelligence which writes these texts, correct and well researched, is a threat only to educators and writers who expect good writing to be mechanical and inauthentic. I rarely describe texts as “poorly” written, because often writing problems have more to do with failing to achieve a purpose than with the quality of word grouping. If your purpose as a writer is to reach a certain audience with a certain message, but your writing isn't meeting that goal, that's not bad writing, it's ineffective writing. On the other hand, a text full of grammatical “errors” can be extremely effective, therefore very well written. Every person who writes has created texts that failed in their purpose. Nobody is born knowing how to write effectively, and the great challenge of writing work is to be willing to fine tune the message you want to convey to an audience and sharpen the tools you use to deliver that message. ChatGPT is a robot. When a robot is authentic, using its writing as your own would be plagiarism. But this is not the reality we live in. A text generated by Artificial Intelligence is nothing more than a text vending machine. And the nutritional value of what comes out of it is just that — something ultra-processed, industrialized, that comes out the same from all machines, it's effective in times of scarcity, but if you live on only that, you'll probably die early. What are we doing, as writers and educators, to encourage authenticity? If authenticity does not exist in the classroom, the class is mediocre and encourages students to be mediocre. If a test is easily hacked by a robot, it is not effective, and anyone who passes it will not do an effective job. Not to mention that there are already tools like GPTZero that aim to reveal whether a text was mostly written by Artificial Intelligence, just as there have been, for a long time, several tools that aim to detect plagiarism. ChatGPT is not a threat, the threat is a long-standing educational system that fails year after year to train young people to produce truthful and impactful intellectual content. If we are concerned about ChatGPT, in reality we should be panicking about how the education system encourages imitation and insincerity.

It feels like we live in unprecedented times, and, indeed, no one alive has witnessed a viral pandemic of this magnitude before. This isn’t, however, the 1st viral pandemic in history, which is why political commentators have drawn parallels to others such as SARS, Ebola, Influenza, etc. Based on where I live, though, the parallel that stands out is with mosquito-borne infections; Dengue, Chikungunya, Yellow Fever, and so on. Public health campaigns about Dengue prevention in Brazil were constant throughout my lifetime, and it never occurred to me or anyone around me to question its message — mosquitoes transmit it, and clean stagnant water is what they need to proliferate. Therefore, everyone ought to do everything they can to minimize these vectors for disease, since the mosquito born in your house respects no property line and will feed on anyone. This has never become a partisan issue, the science behind it has not been questioned, and slacking on the public health requirements is frowned upon. Despite not having learned to distinguish between mosquito larvae and that of other animals, and considering I am highly suspicious of government and authority in general, questioning the science behind the life cycle of a mosquito that transmits disease never occurred to me. I am a woman who lives alone, and the Dengue inspector is the only strange man from the street I allow in my home. Every small artificial body of water I see comes with a flashing danger sign, and I have developed muscle memory from flipping over water-gathering containers. In 2008, NPR published a piece describing mosquitoes as “nature’s Viet Congs”; defenders “of ferns, butterflies, beetles and ants from humankind”. At the time, I thought that made sense. Cities grow, take the place of the forest, and mosquitoes are the nuisance which remains. But upon further reflection, especially in the COVID context, the analogy seems inept. Aren’t Viet Congs part of humanity, and humanity part of nature? Most importantly, weren’t there humans living in the forest before mosquitoes began trying to repel humanity from ‘nature’? How did indigenous people handle virus-drenched-mosquitoes? The answer is: they didn’t. There was no Dengue before colonization. It is widely known that viral infections were weaponized against native civilizations by settlers, the chicken-pox blanket as the most notorious example. The Aedes aegypti, the mosquito which spreads Dengue, Chikungunya, Zika, Yellow fever and other viruses, came as eggs in water brought in ships from Africa in the 16th century. By the 18th century, there had been outbreaks of infections in 3 or more continents at once. Well, we are here, now, still struggling to keep this virus under control. The approach has been to make our urban living environment unwelcoming to these creatures. Meaning: no excess of plants that give them shade and block the breeze which sweeps them away; no organic matter because they contain plant sugars mosquitoes feed on; no irregular, dirty surfaces that can hold the liquid for them to lay eggs in. What this also leads to is the expulsion of any other living thing aside from humans. No plants also means no butterflies; no organic matter also means no worms and fertility for plants; no water also means no frogs and dragonflies. The paradox is the need for more water, plants and organic matter to attract more animals that are natural predators of mosquitoes and their larvae. Biodiversity has a positive cascading effect, where water attracts mosquitoes, which attract frogs who eat mosquitoes. If adding to the mix beetles, birds, spiders, lizards, snails, ants, butterflies, dragonflies, worms, water striders, etc., we can see that mosquitoes come alone when there is a random tire getting rained on by the side of the road. In some ways, it’s like the principle of a vaccine — don’t avoid the problem, safely expose yourself to it and find a healthy organic balance to fight it. Balance is no simple thing to achieve, much less in the scale of a whole planet. Perhaps the change towards balance we can achieve lies in the realm of our personal lives and a shift in perspective. This is already a lot of work, but it’s where every great idea starts. To question authority and its untrustworthy institutions does not come at the expense of learning biology. In fact, it relies on this knowledge — how else will we know the fallacies of the system and gather the tools to speak the truth about power? Written by Mirna Wabi-Sabi She is site editor of Gods and Radicals, founder and editor-in-chief of Plataforma9, author of the book Anarcho-Transcreation, and a political commentator through writing, editing, teaching and translating. Originally published at Abeautifulresistance.org

The average citizen knows very little about nature and their local ecosystems. It has become easier for us to imagine a mosquito that is genetically engineered to be sterile, than to learn about which animals in our area are their natural predators. This is probably because it is easier to vote for a politician who might endorse research and implement anti-dengue-fever policies, than to observe and study the behaviour of local wild-life. Most of us don’t have the time and resources for this type of research, but, most importantly, we lack interest or motivation (who knows which came first). We don’t need to look closely, however, to see that government policies and politicians are flawed and misguided, specially with regard to environmentally sustainable practices. An alternative to continuing relying on them could be taking certain things into our own hands, even in the microcosm of our own lives. Written by Mirna Wabi-Sabi Read it at Abeautifulresistance.org

The debate of whether or not to vote, or for whom, ought to be replaced with the conversation of whether voting is the only way to be politically active, or if the National scale is what matters the most. The Bolsonaro administration has made it difficult to refrain from voting in the upcoming presidential elections. For those who avoid engaging in electoral politics, it is no simple task to continue this practice in face of his grotesque stances and policies. On the one hand, it seems to me that Presidents do less in terms of actual policy and more in terms of ‘selling’ to the general public and manufacturing support for whatever policy is already on the way — which is in the interest of a global Capitalist economic system as opposed to the interests of voters. On the other hand, the principles held by these individuals in major administrative roles have the power to stir public discourse and behaviors, normalizing retrogressive values which have concrete repercussions in society at large. Engaging in local lobbying initiatives, however, puts into perspective what the actual outcomes of voting are in our immediate environment. I live in an area of Brazil with unique rocky Atlantic forest vegetation — unique enough to grant the demarcation of a nature protection reserve called Tiririca ‘Mountain range’ (Serra da Tiririca). This demarcation came after plenty of damage was already done by the swift and massive real estate industry of the last 40 years. The land my house was built on used to be a swamp, where alligators and birds lived, as well as rare plants. Unfortunately, my house is one of the few if not the only one in the neighborhood where spontaneous growth is allowed, and animals are welcomed rather than shunned or killed. Written by Mirna Wabi-Sabi Read it in full at Abeautifulresistance.org

As a concept, ‘Natural Capital’ is contrary to what environmentalists have been trying to achieve for decades, and it is also contrary to the nature of capital. What is natural for capitalism is maximum profits, not minimum damage. For decades, the commodification of nature and agriculture to the detriment of the planet and population — be it of humans, animals or plants — has been criticized by the scientific community and society at large. Rampant deforestation threatens all life on earth, and most damage done to ecosystems in Brazil, the most biodiverse region in the world, is due to industries that are not aimed at immediate human needs such as food and clean water. Instead, they are directed at fuel, cattle feed, oils and so on — all of which intensely rely on pesticides. “[T]he land, this common good, meets the demand of capital, but it does not meet the human demand.” (Bombardi, 2017) Arguably, agriculture can be a natural process, but the industrialization of it, particularly through the use of dangerous pesticides, are harder to perceive as such. Researcher Larissa Bombardi argues that the conversion of food production into ‘commodities’ is done through “the massive use of pesticides” (2017). Meanwhile, “Brazil has been the world’s largest consumer of pesticides since 2008”; its “consumption has increased by 190% in the last decade” (N. M. X. Faria et al., 2014). The “30 million hectares” used — or deforested — for soybean cultivation in Brazil are the destination of more than half (52%) of the “pesticides sold in the country” (Bombardi, 2017). When considering that this soy is transgenic in its overwhelming majority (95.5%) (Bombardi, 2017, p.35) and “its main role in the food industry is as raw material in livestock” (D. Carreira, et al., 2015), we can undoubtedly categorize it as a ‘commodity’. Therefore, as more data about the dangers of pesticides and deforestation are accumulated, one of the largest and most biodiverse countries in the world not only fails to slow down the process of commodification of natural resources but accelerates it instead. Data outlining the environmental damage and its repercussions are well known by academics and journalists, but they have not been enough to bring about significant change. Possible solutions to this unsustainable land use by the agribusiness have been tossed around among the most powerful world leaders in summits, treaties have been forged, signed and promoted. But time and time again, we see ourselves moving faster and faster towards the obliteration of natural ecosystems across the globe. Written by Mirna Wabi-Sabi Read it in full at Abeautifulresistance.org

Written by Mirna Wabi-Sabi and photographed by Fabio Teixeira. Originally published at G&R. Recycling and single use plastics are often talked about in mainstream media in the context of environmental sustainability. Meanwhile, fossil fuels and the meat industry are brought up as sources of greenhouse gas emissions. Food waste seems to have taken a backseat in both of these discussions, and when it’s brought up, it’s more so within the framework of morality than measurable environmental damage. Kids are told to finish their dinners because “there are children starving in Africa”, or that food shouldn’t be wasted because of the environmental cost of producing and transporting food to the table. The carbon footprint of food waste is associated with other, related, unsustainable industries such as packaging, transport and factory farming — but not only. The difference between food waste and loss is that loss happens before the food arrives at the consumer’s table; in farms, storage and transporting. Waste, on the other hand, is in our garbage bags. But unfortunately, there isn’t yet a robust incentive to collect data on it. According to the 2021 UN Food Waste Index report: “An estimated 8-10 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions are associated with food that is not consumed (Mbow et al., 2019, p. 200) – and yet none of the Nationally Determined Contributions to the Paris Agreement mention food waste (and only 11 mention food loss) (Schulte et al., 2020).” (UNEP, 2021, Page 20.) Food waste is as significant to the discussion of sustainability as food loss — more significant if we consider that mitigating its damage is within the reach of anyone in an average household. Food decomposing in landfills releases methane into the atmosphere, amounting to 4.4 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide (GtCO2 eq) annually (UNEP, 2021). This means over 4 times the global emissions from flights in 2018 (1.04 GtCO2, Our World in Data, 2020), 87% of “global road transport emissions” (FAO, 2015), or “32.6 million cars’ worth of greenhouse gas emissions” in the U.S. alone (WWF). Of all stages of food production which contribute to greenhouse gas emissions, household consumption has the highest carbon footprint. When added, waste from production and storage emit about the same amount of greenhouse gases as from consumption alone. And not all foods contribute equally to this footprint. While meat, for instance, amounts to less than 5% of total food wastage, it contributes to over 20% of the footprint. Starchy roots, on the other hand, have the reverse effect, where they represent almost 20% of the total wastage, but only 5% of the footprint (FAO, 2015). It will come as no surprise that high income regions of the world waste more food than lower income regions, even if data isn’t systematically collected in some countries. In European countries and in the United States, grocery shops have been known to pour bleach over expired commodities, leading France to be the first nation to ban the practice in 2015, unanimously passing a law aimed at cutting down on food waste (Time, 2015). Nevertheless, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN reasonably assumed a “larger progress margin” for “developing” countries on what can be achieved in food waste mitigation by 2030 (FAO, 2015). Few behavior changes necessary for handling climate change overlap the issue of poverty and carbon footprint so blatantly. A shift in how food is consumed can combat food insecurity and reduce greenhouse gas emissions at the same time. It should be unimaginable to choose food waste over distributing food for free and sharing basic-need resources. If not at the corporate food industry level, at the very least we can do something in the realms of our own kitchens, those of us who have kitchens. What can we do to ensure no food ends up in our garbage bags? Some of the most intuitive suggestions are: avoid over-buying, avoid over-cooking, store properly, freeze, consciously prioritize your meals based on what will expire first, share meals with other families/your community, and compost. Discarding food waste in the drain is not a solution, because it not only can negatively affect wildlife, organic material left over from water treatment will end up in landfills anyway (Cary Institute, 2016). Composting is the best solution for disposing of non-edible foods because methane is produced “by microbes in the absence of oxygen”, and the composting process is aerobic, meaning, involving/requiring oxygen (Government of Western Australia, 2021). Many believe that composting is not possible in an urban setting, but that isn’t the case. When executed properly, the process can be done in small places with minimal odor (that is when a community initiative isn’t realistic). It may even be done with cardboard, which can considerably reduce the amount of waste produced in a household by disposing of both organic waste and paper recycling at the same time (Conserve Energy Future). To live with and handle one’s own waste goes a long way to incentivize members of a household to produce less waste in the first place. And we wouldn’t be painting a clear picture of the issue of food waste management if we didn’t acknowledge the intersectional nature of how many households operate. Gender roles are still a factor in most families, and domestic chores disproportionately fall on women, as well as domestic workers being mostly women (ILO). A recent U.K. study reveals that the pandemic has exacerbated the gender inequality of domestic chores, as women maintained their social-isolation level of “involvement in housework and childcare” after they went back to work, while fathers did not (Demographic Research, 2022). In this sense, any solution to minimizing food waste should involve the interest, understanding and actions of all household individuals past their pre-school years. “Solving problems, being creative and getting results for … efforts” are things people as young as grade-schoolers should be experiencing (Healthy Children), especially when it involves such an indispensable and habitual human practice — eating. “Several studies highlight that if current dietary trends are maintained, this could lead to a significant climate-change emissions from agriculture of approximately 20 GtCO2-eq per year by 2050.” (FOA, 2020) Clearly, there is a problem to be solved, minimal levels of creativity are required for the solution, and our efforts can not only have measurable results, but can also improve the health of our families, our communities and our planet. Glossary Carbon footprint: The total amount of greenhouse gases emitted by an action (Nature Conservancy). CO2: Carbon dioxide. CO2e: All greenhouse gases. Food Loss: Occurs in the production stage of the food industry; at farms, in processing and transport. Food Waste: Occurs after food arrives at the consumer when it is discarded. Greenhouse gases: Carbon dioxide (CO2); Methane (CH4); Nitrous oxide (N2O); Industrial gases — Hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) Perfluorocarbons (PFCs) Sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) Nitrogen trifluoride (NF3). (EIA, 2021) GtCO2: One billion tonnes of carbon dioxide. (Law insider) GWP 1 (Ecometrica). GtCO2eq: Carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2eq) stands for a unit based on the global warming potential (GWP) of different greenhouse gases (Climate Policy Info Hub). GWP: Global warming potential. Methane: “1kg of methane causes 25 times more warming over a 100 year period compared to 1kg of CO2, and so methane [h]as a GWP of 25.” (Ecometrics). “Methane is emitted during the production and transport of coal, natural gas, and oil. Methane emissions also result from livestock and other agricultural practices, land use and by the decay of organic waste in municipal solid waste landfills [emphasis added].” (EPA, 2022) Bibliography Cary Institute (2016) “Stop putting food waste down the drain” . Climate Policy Info Hub . Conserve Energy Future. “Is Cardboard Compostable?” . Demographic Research (2022) “Gender inequality in domestic chores over ten months of the UK COVID-19 pandemic: Heterogeneous adjustments to partners’ changes in working hours” . Ecometrica . EIA, U.S. Energy Information Administration (2021) . EPA, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (2022) . FAO, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (2020) . FAO, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (2015) . Government of Western Australia, Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development (2021) . Healthy Children . ILO, International Labour Organization . Law Insider . Nature Conservancy . Our World in Data (2020) . Time (2015) “French Parliament Unanimously Approves Law to Cut Food Waste” . UNEP, United Nations Environment Programme (2021) Food Waste Index report . WWF .

In 2015, Brazil “produced” 136 million cubic meters of logs, worth about 250 million US dollars. In Brazil, ‘timber’ and ‘wood’ are the same word: madeira. There is no distinction between the material and how the material is utilized — we don’t specify its utility in its definition. Wood is, nevertheless, utilized frequently all over the world. For those who don’t know, Brazil is the only country named after a tree. The importance of this tree, pau-brasil, is highlighted by the function of its timber, therefore, by its economic significance. The trunk is red, the sap is red; it, in a way, bled. By Mirna Wabi-Sabi Read it at Abeautifulresistance.org