buzztail
Posts by: pj finn
‘Be fair’, say the temporizers. ‘Tell both sides of the story.’ But how can you be fair to both sides of a rape? A murder? A massacre? — Edward Abbey
Or the rape and pillage of our wild earth?
So-called objectivity, fairness, is way overrated. Passion… outrage… boldness… subjectivity… this [...]
This was originally posted on the old buzztail in July 2007.
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Let’s face it. As a society we are far too comfortable, far too insulated in our cocoons to really be in touch with the wild. Our lives, our living environments, our working environments, all of it, are largely artificial. [...]
priceless
By pj finn On December 2, 2011 · Leave a Comment · In experiences, featured, hiking/backpacking/outdoors, opinion, wilderness
Some things are too valuable to measure. Priceless is the term — they’re too sacred and profound to demean with a simple dollar figure no matter how high that figure may be. Dollars are a poor measure of life.
How can you put a dollar figure on the experience of waking up to early morning [...]
Philip Hyde was truly a master landscape photographer. He studied with the likes of Ansel Adams, Edward Weston, and Minor White among others. He went on to pioneer the use of color in landscape and wilderness photography. He loved the wilderness, dedicated himself to protecting it, and his intimate and moving photographs were a mainstay [...]
I still go through the archives from the old version of this blog on occasion to see if I can glean something to revive here on the front page. I have several hundred old posts, but most are dated now — in large part they’re action alerts or political posts that have no current relevance. [...]
by pj finn
Literature on wilderness is always a treasure. Much of it ranks among the best of writing, regardless of subject or genre. That it’s about wild country makes it very special.
I grew up on the lakes of northern Minnesota, not far from the Boundary Waters. One of the greatest voices in wilderness [...]
by pj finn
Wilderness has a music all it’s own, and if you spend enough time out there you come to recognize it. It’s not a music of scales or time signatures. You don’t hear it as notes or melodies. You simply feel it in your muscle and sinew and bones and in the beating [...]
It’s kind of funny how certain seasons trigger memories of past travels and experiences in wild country. When fall rolls around, late season canoe trips in the Boundary Waters come to mind. Winter reminds me of snowshoe and ski trips over those same frozen waters. There are too many from [...]
In my wilderness wanderings I’ve run into quite a few moose. Some pretty close up, some not so close. They are an impressive animal to say the least.
Back when I lived in northern Minnesota I used to spend quite a bit of time at my friend’s cabin near the Boundary Waters. Moose country. Now [...]
Looking at maps of places like Montana and California, we have what appears to be a lot of wilderness. But is that really true? We have much of what can be called ‘island wilderness’ or ‘rocks and ice wilderness’ but little in the way of connecting corridors or far-reaching ecosystem protection. But what is wilderness, [...]
BrandObama and the State Department seem hell-bent on permitting the Keystone XL pipeline and moving tar sands oil down the length of the US. But:
The leading NASA climate change specialist James Hansen summed up what’s at stake saying: “If the tar sands are thrown into the mix it is essentially game over” for a [...]
Image via Wikipedia
Who knows what’s in store for the next few years as far as wilderness protection is concerned. Efforts to protect our wild lands have always taken a back seat to other concerns, mostly economic. I’m not at all sure that they haven’t now been locked away in the trunk.
[...]
(This is another post from the original archives of buzztail done in the spring of 2008. Other environmental threats have of course come to light since then, notably the Keystone XL pipeline project and proposed tar sands development in the greater Canyonlands. Nonetheless, I feel this post is still timely and valid. In fact, with [...]
For the past few years I have been posting alerts, online petitions, and other ways people can get involved and take action on issues that concern them.
I am now posting them on twitter rather than here on the blog. Please take a moment to follow us there, and feel free to retweet to your [...]
I mentioned the other day that Tim DeChristopher was sentenced to two years in federal prison for disrupting an illegal lease auction by the BLM. This sentence is being appealed, and Tim could use some help to cover the legal costs.
This is an outrageous and heavy-handed sentence for a courageous act of civil disobedience, [...]
Maybe you remember Tim DeChristopher. He’s the man who, a couple of years back, walked in to a BLM auction and started bidding up the prices on oil and gas leases. His action brought the bidding to a sudden halt, and the entire auction was later invalidated.
The government and drilling interests were outraged at [...]
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