Hurricanes and Survival: A demonstration of natural emergent strategy
We broke another record in 2020. It is officially the most active hurricane season on record. This morning, Subtropical Storm Theta developed, just days after Hurrican Eta terrorized Central America.
Folks living in the Gulf South are used to rainy autumns. We’re used to tropical storms and streets becoming rivers and power outages that tinker with our already precarious internet connections.
But we’re in the fourth consecutive year of “above normal” activity and we are weary.
The global stress of COVID-19, unemployment rates, collective grief over closing local businesses, and the threat to our lifeblood, the music industry, already has our bones tired. Not to mention police brutality and continued racial injustice, threats to bodily autonomy and horrific Supreme Court cases (the Court is hearing ACA arguments as I write this), and a toxic, fascist administration that still refuses to concede an election.
Putting on rainboots now feels like dragging bricks.
Does it feel good to know that President-Elect Joe Biden has the most progressive climate agenda of any President? Sure. Does that mean that it’s anywhere near what we should be doing? Absolutely not.
We have years to make up for. We have to convince elected officials and our fellow Americans that science is real. We have real people, real communities who have already lost their homes to rising tides, deadly storm surges, and uncontrollable wildfires.
A progressive climate agenda does not fix the past and it certainly does not ensure that adequate attention will be given to the very real “climate refugee” crisis we are about to enter.
Truly, it seems insurmountable, this mountain we have to climb to save ourselves (particularly when you consider that roughly 70 million folks don’t believe in climate change). And yes, I spiraled. Even after the election was called for the Biden-Kamala ticket, I spiraled. It’s not enough.
Imagine my surprise when I opened Emergent Strategy and found myself reading about our environment. Particularly, my beloved Gulf environment:
When Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast, almost everything lost its footing. Houses were detached from their foundations, trees and shrubbery were uprooted, sign posts and vehicles floated down the rivers that became of the streets. But amidst the whipping winds and surging water, the oak tree held its ground. How? Instead of digging its roots deep and solitary into the earth, the oak tree grows its roots wide and interlocks with other oak trees in the surrounding area. And you can’t bring down a hundred oak trees bound beneath the soil! How do we survive the unnatural disasters of climate change, environmental injustice, over-policing, mass-imprisonment, militarization, economic inequality, corporate globalization, and displacement? We must connect in the underground, my people! In this way, we shall survive.” Naima Penniman
adrienne maree brown once again highlighted where I was lacking: interdependence instead of independence. My framework for addressing these issues focused solely on what I/we, those who believe in climate change and seek justice for its impacts, were going to do to fight climate change only. “It is not always up to us as individuals, but there is a complex interconnection of power at play,” adrienne says.
“We’re basically this very young species, only 200,000 years old. We’re one of the newcomers, and we’re going through the same process that other species go through, which is, how do I keep myself alive while taking care of the place that’s going to keep my offspring alive?” Janine Benyus
I firmly believe that the power of the people is neverending. I previously wrote about the idea of swarming, murmurations, and how, when we work together, we become attuned to our neighbors’ and communities’ needs. That can look like a community fridge collective, a little free library, or even just bringing a meal to a neighbor’s house. It can also look like mountain-moving, as we saw in Poland where the largest protest in their history paused an abortion ban from taking immediate effect.
This swarming, adrienne says, helps build our networks and connections. It builds the strong, wide, and interconnected roots of our oak trees. The same trees that held fast during Hurricane Katrina and so many other storms, outliving manmade structures and our god complex.
“It is only in relation to other bodies and many somebodies that anybody is somebody. Don’t get it into your cotton-picking mind that you are somebody in yourself.” Jimmy Boggs.
When we structure our networks like oak tree roots, we withstand unexpected external forces that seek to uproot our progress. When we decentralize and step away from hierarchical structures that seek to promote a singular charismatic leader, and instead work to ensure that every skill and every strength is uplifted so as to strengthen the whole of the group, we create a system that can withstand new leadership, new challenges, and even the occasional devastating hurricane.
Ants tell each other where food is, not hoarding individually, but operating on a principle that the more of them that gather the food, the more food they will have as a community.
How do we do this? We do deep, slow, and intentional work. Especially us white folks. Especially us folks who have been conditioned to constantly be in a space of scarcity- and urgency-thinking. As we know from fractals, what is individual is local, and what is local is regional, and what is regional is national. It is up to us individual folks to look inward, deconstruct what we think a “productive,” “effective,” “fundable” movement looks like, and instead focus on what is needed.
It looks like removing the shackles that we created for ourselves, both within a capitalist society and a hierarchical one. The structure of authority, the idea that there must be a singular leader who has all of the answers, is a conditioned expectation. And it is one that must be removed if we are to grow like oaks. “When we can stand in knowing another person’s power without feeling threatened, that can be powerful in itself…Being able to really see another person’s expertise without being upset by it.”
It looks like de-institutionalizing knowledge and seeking wisdom that is not demonstrated by a degree or a certain level of achievement. It is understanding that classist ideas keep discussions about social justice and “what to do” plans far from the communities that are living the impacts. It looks like capturing ancient wisdom, elevating generations of sacrifice, and breaking down the barriers that prevent folks from influencing policies and laws that create systems of oppression. For a concrete example, it looks like Gulf South Rising, Gulf Coast Center for Law and Policy, and SisterSong.
It looks like oaks.
“Do you understand that your quality of life and your survival are tied to how authentic and generous the connections are between you and the people and place you live with and in?”
