A Place-Based Campaign

By Mike Roselle

I just read David Quaman’s new biography of Charles Darwin, The Reluctant Mr. Darwin. It’s a great read for anyone who wants to know what sort of person the great scientist was, and how misunderstood he remains even today. For me, reading this book was a religious experience. Writing with great admiration for his subject, Quaman describes eyewitness reports that even at the moment of death, Darwin made it a point to say he was not afraid to die. This simply meant he did not fear the fires of Hell, because he knew there was no Hell, and no Heaven either. At the time, this was a proposition even more radical than his theory of evolution. Instead of simply standing up for what he believed, he was standing up for what he did not believe. He didn’t believe in God, or gods, or any sense of a divine presence. Even today, most of the people who accept Darwin’s theory in principle do not share his agnosticism, or as Darwin himself referred to, his materialism.

 Quaman makes clear the shocking fact that even today, over a century after Darwin’s “Origin of the Species” was first published, people still don’t seem to understand the theory of natural selection and what it means. They remain, in their heart of hearts, devout pagans or monotheists, and live in a world inhabited by spirits, both benevolent and malicious that Darwin would see as superstitious. Most people today believe in an afterlife, and of invisible forces such as karma, sin, and other forms of Devine retribution. They believe that somewhere a supreme intelligence directs events from a hidden vantage point, even directing the thrust of evolution, and that the apex of this evolution being the spiritual human, moral and enlightened by knowledge. This knowledge is either revealed through ancient texts or created wholly out of thin air, and is the preordained and paramount achievement of all celestial evolution.

Understanding natural selection, and I mean truly understanding both the theory and more importantly its implications, seems to be beyond the reach of the mere 17 percent of U.S. citizens who profess to accept Darwin’s  theory as the best explanation for life on Earth. I’m not going to get too deep into this, but basically natural selection means humans are an accident, not something ordained to be. We are no more complex than bacteria, in fact we are simply many of them hooked up together to better achieve our own survival, which means passing along our DNA to a second and third generation. It precludes any sense of purpose, any great plan. We have no guarantee that we humans also won’t become extinct one day and that some other organism will replace us with similar feelings of superiority.

This, of course, accepting natural selection means no Easter Bunny, no Astrology, no Feng Shui, no Leprechauns, no Fairies, no Angles, no Reincarnation, no Magic and so sorry to say, no Luck. But don’t discount Darwinism as a mystical experience. Richard Dawkins, in his An Ancestors Tale suggests Darwinian materialism offers a look into the deepest mysteries of the universe, and pondering the course of natural selection is as a profound an experience as reading the Bible or going into a Voodoo trance.

Dawkin’s suggests that the reason many of us do not truly except natural selection is because we are intellectually lazy. Truth trumps fiction every time, but fiction sells much better at Barnes and Noble. Intelligent design of any kind is simply easier to believe than accepting that our life has no other purpose other than the purpose we assign ourselves. Religion may not be the opiate of the masses, but it has certainly become an antidote to truth, science and even nature. How can we say that we appreciate and accept the natural order of things when we see a god or spirit acting behind a curtain, giving events not only direction but also their intrinsic meaning? As another famous scientist, or rather Science Officer, once said; “That is not logical”.

I do not enjoy the faithful about Darwin anymore than I enjoy telling a child that there is no Santa Clause. Children will eventually learn the awful truth about Santa, but they will likely remain ignorant about the meaning of Darwin’s theory of natural selection until the day they die, when prayers will certainly be offered over their graves. And I admit, I revert to this awful, hypocritical paganism several times a day. I instinctively think that there is some higher power that can hook me up with a parking place in North Beach or a Beer in Kentucky on a Sunday, a smoke anytime in Washington D.C., or a fourth quarter San Francisco 49er touchdown pass.  Of course, I know that such events are as improbable as winning the Powerball Lottery without buying a ticket. I know this, but I can’t help but offer up an occasional prayer anyway. Sometimes, except in the case of the 49ers, it will actually help. What then? Actually, nothing; I park; I have a beer, have a smoke and I continue to pray for the 49ers. They do not have time to evolve.

At the moment I’m at Ed and Debbie Wiley’s house up Rock Creek in southeastern West Virginia. Floyd is over at Bo’s place talking to his new pig. The pig seems to appreciate the attention, and Floyd is attempting to consol him, knowing his fate as only a Shaman would. Bo is still wondering how to tell his children that the pig is not a pet, even though the pig happily cavorts with the hound dogs in their yard. Bo wishes there was a children’s book he could buy, to help explain to their young impressionable minds what was coming, something like “Daddy Killed My Pig!”  My guess is Floyd is trying to comfort the pig, but I would also bet that the pig already knows by now that he has at least a chance at reaching a ripe old age as long as he continues playing in the yard with the kids and dogs.

It’s a rainy morning and Debbie is on the computer, Ed is cooking up some wild game meat and Bo has come by and we are sharing a bottle of his homemade wine. The football game is on but no one is paying attention. We are all talking about the coal industry. Out here in West Virginia this is not just an ordinary conversation about energy policy. The very mountains we are gazing at from Ed’s new back porch are slated for removal to extract the thin seam of coal that is supposed to be the answer to our energy problems. When the mountaintop is gone, we will be able to see Bo’s house on the other side, five miles away by road. It’s a chilling thought.

Never mind that burning coal, and burning fossil fuels in general is not only our energy problem, and our air pollution problem, our water quality problem, and a climate problem, it is also the greatest threat to our democracy and to world peace. For the big energy companies the only problem they want to solve is simply one of kilowatts, gallons of fuel, and most importantly, their profits. As long as the lights are on, there is cheap gas in the tank there is no price too high to pay, weather it be the leveling of whole mountains, the ethnic cleansing of a local population or the destruction of entire river systems. This mindset will soon destroy Rock Creek and the view from Ed and Debbie’s Kitchen. It’s no wonder we drink.

The fact is Massey cannot now afford to lose on Marsh Fork and concede to the need for a new school. To do so would admit that they created, and concealed, a situation that exposed hundreds of children to cancer and other deadly diseases. Massey has created a danger to the whole community and if they admit to the problems they have created at Marsh Fork Elementary they will have to compensate the victims and clean up the site, costing them many millions of dollars. That is why Massey, under the phony front organization “Friends of Coal,” has been spending millions of dollars on advertising in local papers and television stations since Ed’s walk began. It would be far cheaper for Massey to simply build a new school. They seem desperate to counter the claims of wrongdoing made by Ed Wiley and the other residents of the Coal River watershed. Clearly, Massey is now on the defensive.

It is so clear to me sitting and staring out the window at the rippling waters and sheer sandstone cliffs of Rock Creek; the problem with strip mining in West Virginia will never be solved by the locals simply choosing to drive new hybrid cars or by turning down their thermostats. They have made their stand here at the Marsh Fork Elementary School, and to do this they know they have to take on the Massey Coal Company on their home turf, where Big Coal owns both the government and the media. The Wiley’s are not afraid, but surely everyone here understands the odds they face. This struggle has been going on for over a century, and roughly half of the mountains, rivers and streams are gone in southern West Virginia. Nevertheless, the resolve is to fight on for the next hundred years for the other half of paradise is evident. This is a placed-based campaign, as the consultants in San Francisco and Washington D.C. would say.

They are god-dammed right!

Mike Roselle is not sure how much coal it takes to fire the engine of a pink Caddy.