Outdoor Recreation: Settler Destruction and Escapism, are you consuming or reciprocating?

“I don’t think the ‘recreational outdoors’ lifestyle is justified for white people at all anymore. It doesn’t matter if you know whose land it is and acknowledge it if you’re going to ‘play’ on it anyway. They really feel so entitled to everything! To every place! They get to go out and ‘connect’ with that land that isn’t even theirs. I think camping/outdoor adventure lifestyles only have deep settler roots, going back to the transcendentalists and Sierra Club. If you really want to be a good ‘ally’ or comrade, then drop your outdoors adventure lifestyle! Just stop, there’s no ethical way to dot it” - Jennifer Marley

I've been reckoning with my relationship to "nature" and I agree with Jennifer Marley.
"Outdoor recreation" is a product of settler-colonial-capitalist-patriarchy, I don't think it is salvageable. And I say this as a person with a collection of National Park magnets, handkerchiefs, and postcards and a map on which I've highlight every road I've been on  (mostly to go visit those Nat'l Parks).

Nature, wilderness, outdoors were only created after the land (and its Peoples) had been "tamed". once nearly everything was civilized and suddenly the "Indian Savage" becomes romanticized as a “Noble Vanishing Indian" fading (destroyed) with the land's "virginity." Only then did settler begin recreating in, finding solace among, escaping (the city) to, and conserving what was left at the margins of our cities, towns, farms, dams, and roads. We literally named it as the opposite of our homes: out(of)doors.

Nature / Wilderness are the opposite of colonization / civilization only in that they were created that way. “Nature” didn't exist before colonization in the same way that race didn’t exist before white-supremacy. The one created the other in order to define itself as “not that” (see: Wastebin Taxon). They are opposite sides of the capitalist-coin. 

The Department of Interior which manages the National Parks was created in 1849 (a year after Mormons first began invading the Great Basin) in order to manage the imperial invasion of Indigenous lands west of the Mississippi. The Bureau of Indian Affairs was then absorbed by the Department of Interior making dominating the land and its Peoples one project. And the whole thing was housed in the Department of War.  

Secretary of Interior Stuart stated in 1851 that the U.S. must, “civilize or exterminate'' all Indigenous people. About 30 years later, Secretary of Interior Schurz echoed this saying, “The alternative to civilization is extermination.” 

Land is the place life comes from, so I am not suggesting anyone (further) distance themselves from land. I am saying deeply consider the way you consume (financially, digitally, nutritionally, socially, spiritually) the land. How are you actually reckoning with the fact that the Peoples of these lands were massacred, made sick, separated from their foods, medicines, and families SPECIFICALLY so that we can camp and hike in those lands?

Obviously all of this is complicated by settler colonization but, can you build that relationship with your food and all the complexities there? Can you find that sense of connection in your neighborhood, with the plants, animals, rocks, minerals, and humanimals there? Can you shift what it means to connect with land?

Are you consuming or reciprocating?

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And because I personally know what a kick to the gut this information can be, I also want to offer this short text from Buddhist monk Pema Chödrön that has helped me spiritually contextualize my relationship to the “transcending” experiences of being in “nature” and find a more relational (as opposed to consumptive) place from which to engage with land.


“Spiritual awakening is frequently described as a journey to the top of a mountain. We leave our attachments and our worldliness behind and slowly make our way to the top. At the peak we have transcended all pain. The only problem with this metaphor is that we leave all others behind. Their suffering continues, unrelieved by our personal escape.
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"On the journey of the warrior-bodhisattva, the path goes down, not up, as if the mountain pointed toward the earth instead of the sky. Instead of transcending the suffering of all creatures, we move toward turbulence and doubt however we can. We explore the reality and unpredictability of insecurity and pain, and we try not to push it away. If it takes years, if it takes lifetimes, we let it be as it is. At our own pace, without speed or aggression, we move down and down and down. With us move millions of others, our companions in awakening from fear. At the bottom we discover water, the healing water of bodhichitta. Bodhichitta is our heart--our wounded softened heart. Right down there in the thick of things, we discover the love that will not die. This love is bodhichitta. It is gentle and warm; it is clear and sharp; it is open and spacious. The awakened heart of bodhichitta is the basic goodness of all beings."