BP Oil Rapes Mother Nature http://bit.ly/vNwTrj

Article by Elaine Wilkes, Ph.D., N.C. M.A., LEED

Wam-bam-thank-you-mam. This was BP Oil's attitude before the spill-as long as it's good for me, who cares about Mother Nature? Like a pimp on a prostitute, BP kept pumping away, moving faster to get quick results.

Ironically, if they had taken extreme caution to protect nature, they could have saved lives, billions of dollars, their company, and yes, the sea and its invaluable eco system. When we don't consider and work with Nature, then these are the unfathomable consequences. Nature doesn't like to be on our leash... hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.

This was not the case in the past.

Consider how ancient cultures respected nature and felt receiving food was like making love with the planet. They believed fruit was love showered upon them as gifts from God. In order to give back, they'd take the seeds from the fruit and return them to the ground to continue the cycle. (What a concept-giving back.)

Native Americans would place tobacco or a hair from their head on the ground as a harmonious offering before uprooting plants to build on the land. Ripping out the trees and plants without first making an offering would have been seen as terribly disrespectful. What would the ancients think now?

In his book We Talk, You Listen, published in 1970, Native American advocate Vine Deloria, Jr., argued that pollution, corporate greed, and lack of accountability were destroying the earth:

"Every now and then I am impressed with the thinking of the non-Indian. I was in Cleveland last year and got to talking with a non-Indian about American history. He said that he was really sorry about what happened to Indians, but there was good reason for it. The continent had to be developed and he felt that Indians had stood in the way and thus had had to be removed. "After all," he remarked, "what did you do with the land when you had it?" I didn't understand him until later when I discovered that the Cuyahoga River running through Cleveland is inflammable. So many combustible pollutants are dumped into the river that the inhabitants have to take special precautions during the summer to avoid accidentally setting it on fire. After reviewing the argument of my non-Indian friend I decided that he was probably correct. Whites had made better use of the land. How many Indians could have thought of creating an inflammable river?"

When will we learn that it's not nice to fool around with Mother Nature?