Tossing Around the "F" Word in the Garden (...or is it the "EF" Word...?)

You have a plot.  You have some seeds.  You have your water, your gloves, your gardening tools.  All that's left is... a FEMINIST??!?  Damn skippy!

And I know what you're thinking.  I know it.  "Those man-haters ain't got any time to garden!"

The Internet agrees with you.  Google the following phrases:

• "feminists who garden"
• "gardening and feminism"

You got a lot of fluff and anger, didn't you?

USE YOUR WORDS!  Apparently you can't equate an everyday "feminist" with gardening and have a pleasant experience.  But you can, apparently, equate "ECOfeminists" with gardening and get a whole new set of variables.

Google it.  I'll wait.  If you don't find it, give this link a try.

What the heck is a ecofeminism?

According to this paper written by Leila R. Brammer, ecofeminism was coined by (Francoise) d'Eaubonne in 1974.  A feminist, d'Eaubonne conceived of ecofeminism as "a joining of environmental feminist, and women's spirituality concerns."  Ecofeminism finds the relationship between the degradation of the earth and the degradation of women in general.  As the familiar phrase is "Mother Earth," it can be thought that ecofeminists fight for the same equality for the planet that feminists fight for among the sexes.

Ecology (the study of the earth and how we all interact with/on it) is something we all should care about.  After all, with NASA in a constant state of defunding, it's not likely we'll have another planet to live on any time soon.

That means we need to start looking at what we're doing to the world today.  Ecofeminists strive to find a union in people and the earth.  They want us to get out and get dirty.  Grow things.  Share experiences.  If this isn't a familiar concept to you by now, read some other posts in this blog you're already reading.

We only have one planet.  We can muck it up, as we've already done:

Or we can strive for something better, something cleaner, something more akin to the world as it should be: full of sustainability that brings each generation cleaner air, reduced noise pollution and healthier living:

Suddenly, "feminist" and "ecofeminist" and any other variation of the word isn't looking so dirty, is it?