the beehive collective

Yesterday an important radical art collective The Beehive Collective came to town to share art with us and storytelling.  I’m so happy I was able to get my disabled ass there with Ming’s help.  I couldn’t stay for the whole time.

But it’s the next morning, and I’m still glowing with joy to have met this amazing art and these vibrant people who are working for justice and truth.

The art of the Beehive Collective is busy.  They make huge detailed mural-type pieces that tell stories.  We learned about an art called The True Cost of Coal.  Their work is Creative Commons and free to share, so I can show you.

story

The speaker explained that the art tells a story.  First is how the coal got formed in the ground through ancient plants, then colonial values led to exploitation of the coal and the people there in Appalachia, bosses harmed coal miners through company towns, there was a huge uprising culminating in the the Battle of Blair Mountain, and the coal harmed the air and health of all.  Scientists and activists tried to help the situation, and we can do better in community, using cleaner sources of power, caring for one another, and working toward justice.

The story told in the mural has a left to right progression, and I’m leaving a lot out.  The presenter encouraged us to come close and for each of us to find a detail of the art that excited us, to connect with.  I loved that moment.

There’s a rhyming story that goes along with the True Cost of Coal art, and the presenter spoke the rhyme to us in a slightly louder tone of voice, with some annotation in a more conventional tone of voice.  I loved this performance.  Wish I had bought a copy of the children’s book that the Beehive Collective made to help people comprehend this art.

what I learned

There was a table set up in the back with the Beehive Collective’s art–posters, patches, and little books.  The art is mostly black & white, and very busy.  For me personally it can be off-putting to have that much detail with little context.  I feel overwhelmed.  That’s why it helped to hear the storytelling from a human being standing there speaking with their mouth, to help me enter the art.  Once I felt invited and learned context, it was much more possible to connect to the art and learn from it.

One important thing I learned from the presenter is that the coal was formed in the ground because anaerobic bacteria didn’t exist yet.  Wow!  I love bacteria because I love composting and all forms of soil building.  I especially enjoy thinking about aerobic vs anaerobic bacteria.  (Just now I fell down the rabbit hole trying to find an article about how the coal was formed.  A big article is behind a paywall, but reader, please enjoy the journey if you seek to learn about this.)

I also learned how mountaintop removal is destructive.  “You can’t live on a mountain that doesn’t exist,” the presenter said, which blew my mind.  He explained how if there’s mining but the mountain is still there, people can live and farm on its surface.  He said more than 50 mountains were destroyed by mountain top removal, and I started to cry.

grief

Partly I was crying because I remember one time when we were driving.  Ming pointed out to me some mountaintop removal here where we live in the Pacific Northwest, and I feel ashamed that I asked, “What’s so bad about that?”

It’s ok that we all need to learn, and it’s so much better to care and ask than to look away with apathy.  But I’m sorry it was not intuitive to me that blowing up parts of Parent Earth for capitalism is very harmful.  I’m crying again.

Many emotional topics were discussed last night, including the Trail of Tears where a third of the people died during the immoral, brutal wintertime death march relocation of Cherokee people from their homeland to Oklahoma.  Thank you to the Beehive Collective for bringing up important history.

But feelings seemed low, in the room.  I know we’re constantly receiving messages about destruction and the agony of many oppressed people these days and back through time.  We can’t face it and feel all of that suffering, especially not every day.

group feeling

But hearing about mass harm was hard for me, and I wondered if being a crazy, autistic person made me a designated feeler.  I do believe God put me here on earth to feel.

I wished I could ask the group, “Hey, wait a minute.  We’re learning about overwhelming violence here.  Can we have five minutes to share some collective grief?”  Feelings are part of the truth, and grief is real.

Not sure if expressing emotions together would have derailed the presentation.  Definitely it would have made the event go later.  Not sure if I could have helped build and maintain a strong grief container with a bunch of mostly strangers for a very brief time.  Maybe I am not the one to do that.

But I wish someone would do it.  I wish we had a culture where sharing our pain about terrifying destruction was normal to do together.  Some movement and singing would have helped me, and I’m guessing it might help many others.

content warning: brief mention of self-harm

Some people think handling big emotions is best left to professionals.  But I know from experience that psychiatrists and other medical professionals are the worst people to talk about feelings with.  They often see feelings as the problem, rather than part of what it means to be a human being and an animal.

I mean to say that many people are afraid to stir things up emotions-wise because once people begin to feel, who knows what they might do?  They seem dangerous.  What if someone becomes suicidal or goes on a killing spree because they were invited to feel?

The truth is, it’s not safe to have a bunch of isolated people in their individual homes, anesthetizing themselves with drugs, media, and cheap pizza.  Feelings don’t go away just because we ignore them.  It’s not safe to ignore the emotional response we all have to the suffering of ourselves and others.  Giving people space to express emotions isn’t the problem.  Having a culture where emotions are seen as shameful and dangerous is a problem.

Mass denial of emotions helps environmental destruction happen.  Deep down, nobody wants the destruction of Parent Earth.  Deep down, we all love our planet.  Just some people think money is more important, and I’m sorry they are that out of touch with their love of Life.

important

So many more things I’d like to tell you about the Beehive Collective event last night.  How gender and race played out in the room regarding who spoke, how it feels to be socially different in a social space, the two young children playing in another area of Grower’s Market.  The calamity that ensued when the younger child asked for my banana, and I forgot how the other kid might be hungry and want a banana too.

The older child taught me a song “Police men are bad,” which is sung to the tune of Feliz Navidad.  Please invite me to sing it to you sometime.

Just learning about the Battle of Blair Mountain was valuable.  Ten thousand miners took up arms to revolt against their bosses.  Bombs were dropped from airplanes on the miners’ encampments.  Seems like so long ago: How could people have used airplanes to drop bombs on their own people?  Killing is such a driver of technology, and I’m sorry.

The presenter also mentioned that there’s nothing wrong with travel and exploration.  It’s the exploitation part that makes colonialism and is wrong.  Some months ago Ming and I had an argument about just that.  I was saying that exploration is neutral, and Ming was saying that exploration is necessarily exploitative, since people want to take– it’s going to turn into exploitation.

real

What’s real?  What is human nature?  Maybe as a disabled person who is crazy, I’m not in a position to understand.  Or maybe I’m extra in a position to understand.  Often I misunderstand Ming, my dearest ally and partner.

Are we doomed to destroy Parent Earth?  I don’t think so.  But maybe I’m naive, to believe in love and another way is possible.  The Beehive Collective, they believe another way is possible also.  I’m happy to be an artist like them, and tell the truth as well as I can.