After going around from apartment to apartment, I was able to have most residents sign the petition. I met up with my building manager, Nate, and I explained to him why we were upset about this and that they should replant every tree and bush they cut down. Nate was very understanding and agreed with me that they should replant. Although it hasn’t begun, steps will be taken so that my building can hopefully begin to replant every tree and bush that they cut down!  Obviously, I won’t just take his word for it and I expect to see what he has promised me. If they go back on their word, I have his bosses’ contact information and I have a few other contacts as well that would be of use to me. 

(How it looks after they removed the cut trees and bushes outside of my apartment)

(After clearing out the cut trees and bushes)

Although my plan was successful, I think it was weakly executed. Luckily, my building manager is my next-door neighbor and I know him better than one would normally know their building manager. He helps one of roommates out a lot and that’s another reason I know him pretty well. I think it helped my case that we knew each other because if I did this with any other manger, I don’t think they would’ve listened to me. I would absolutely handle it the same way but I think I would have to speak to the higher ups about it because I would be turned away. 

(Trees and bushes that were just cut down outside of my apartment)

Last week, my apartment building sent out an email stating that they would “be removing the trees and bushes from in between the buildings in an attempt to upgrade the community”. After reading this, everyone assumed that it was going to be three to six trees, maybe, because none of the trees or bushes were dead or even close to dying. They started on April 3 2019 and they are still cutting down trees today, April 14 2019. From what I have seen, they have cut down over 50 trees/bushes and that’s probably not even half of it. I felt sick to my stomach the moment I walked out of my door and saw trees lying all over the place. They cut down the only life this apartment building had and they did it for absolutely no reason at all. I hate whenever anyone cuts down trees but especially right now, it’s extremely important that we preserve all natural life on this planet. 

(While they did mention removal, “trimming” was an understatement)

(This is a few of the trees/bushes that were cut down in the front of the building)

For my plan, I want to handle it from a more general level. I’m planning to go around to each apartment in every building with my roommates and we’re going to ask them sign a petition saying that our apartment building must replant every single tree that they just cut down. After we get signatures, I’m going to speak to my building manager about this to ask them to replant the trees and if not, I will be contacting the higher ups. If none of this works, I will go to social media about this as well. I think this will be effective because (hopefully) every resident will say that is wrong and they won’t have any other choice but to replant what they have taken away. 

For forever now, people have constantly associated women with nature. People often describe the earth as “Mother Earth” and often use female pronouns when discussing the earth (her trees, she’s hurting, etc..). In the readings, I can see many connections being made between the oppression of women and nature. For one, Gebara goes into detail about how ecofeminists and intersectional feminists will discuss ideas about the world but while they’re doing this, our world is being destroyed along with women and children. “While all these discussions are going on, the destruction of the Amazon forest, the rain forest, and others continue… lots of paper is being used, lots of trees are being cut down and used by industries, polluting the rivers and the air… lots of women and children are starving and dying with diseases produced by a capitalist system able to destroy lives and keep profit for only a few.” (Gebara). The problem is not talking about these theories, it’s talking about them and trying to understand them while lives are being destroyed at the exact same time. Gebara explains how different groups of women in Latin America are tasking themselves to provide a new order of meaning including marginalized people. “The option for the poor is an option for life. Our goals should be to build a world where poor and marginalized people have a place to live with peace and integrity. We know that without this option we are not building a world with justice and love” (Gebara). We have to respect nature and all living beings or we will never find peace, “we choose to die by our own bad decisions” (Gebara). 

In the Speak Truth to Power reading, they explained that women in Africa are the ones who interact with nature on a daily basis. Because of this, the women can tell when their food is full of pollutants and impurities (Maathai). In direct response to these problems, Wangari Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement in 1977, this is meant to encourage farmers to plant “Green Belts”, as it would “stop soil erosion, provide shade, and create a source of lumber and firewood” (Maathai). Today, “the movement has planted over fifteen million trees, produced income for eighty thousand people in Kenya alone, and has expanded its efforts to over thirty African countries, the United States, and Haiti” (Maathai). 

I absolutely agree that disempowerment and environmental degradation are behind the material deprivations and cultural losses of the marginalized and the poor. Marginalized groups aren’t able to get resources and things they need to better themselves/their communities and environment because the greater populace is dismissive of them and doesn’t allow people who they view as “below them” to change things for the better. 

Works Cited:

Gebara, Ivone. “Ecofeminism: A Latin American Perspective.” Cross Currents , vol. 53, no. 1, 2003. Arts Premium Collection, search-proquest-com.libproxy.umassd.edu/docview/214936990/abstract/1516EEDAA5CD464DPQ/1?accountid=14573.

Maathai, Wangari. “Key Speeches & Articles: Speak Truth to Power.” The Green Belt Movement, 4 May 2000, www.greenbeltmovement.org/wangari-maathai/key-speeches-and-articles/speak-truth-to-power.