Cob and recycled materials

[Jan Scilipoti]

john-
read this entire message before i realized it was you.  was down on item
2
thinking 'wow, this person this is so right, that WHOLE WORLD is bigger
and badder 
than we even want to know'.  strike at its' heart indeed; how else to
slow the sucking
of it?

had a largish dinner discussion on this very subject wednesday evening.
ben at one
end, skipping taxes and being his lovely fringy self; the rest of us
with jobs and lives,
playing the balance game.

mmmhmmm.  how to be, how to make it be...
jan

> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Otherfish at aol.com [SMTP:Otherfish at aol.com]
> Sent:	Sunday, August 16, 1998 11:35 PM
> To:	coblist at deatech.com
> Subject:	Re: Cob and recycled materials
> 
> Doug Scof's entry re carpet & other potentially toxic materials has
> reminded
> me of a certain (somewhat related) philosophy re cob that I find
> troublesome.
> 
> Specifically that of: low cost as the "ideal" ethic of a "correct" cob
> culture.
> 
> Each of us is in an economic reality - some folks have  less $ (
> either by
> choice or circumstance ) and some folks have more.  These are
> realities of our
> personal lives & we are faced with either living within our economic
> means or
> changing them ( having access to more $).
> 
> I am pleased when I hear of someone creating a low cost cob building
> based (in
> part) on using low cost or no cost recycled materials.  Getting free
> of the
> economic burdens of modern life is a noble thing.
> However it bothers me when this use of recycled, reused, rejected or
> cast off
> materials is touted as somehow freeing us from the "evils" of modern
> industrial  production and thereby making the us more "correct" than
> we might
> otherwise be.
> I  am troubled by this for two reasons:
> 
> 1. It ignors the fact that for these cast off materials to be
> available to us
> they still had to be manufactured by someone.  And if the materials
> are low/no
> cost because they are industrial seconds, that simply means that
> another unit
> of the same industrial product that was not a second was produced to
> take its
> place ( a gain for you, but an additional loss for the planet).   Only
> a
> recycling that reduces pollution , unnecessary transportation or
> wasteful
> original manufacturing has real benefit to the larger world.  I mean,
> recycle
> & reuse as much as you can - just dont hold it up to be more than the
> personal
> bargain that it is (if thats all that it really is).  It's important
> to be
> brutally  honest with ourselves on this - no delusions are needed - we
> have
> enough of those already.
> 
> 2. This bothers me even more - the idea that removing cob from the
> economic
> mainstream is a superior  goal.  Again, if you can get free from
> modern
> economic madness by  all means do so.  Its just that there is a WHOLE
> WORLD
> of people for whom that is not reality.  For cob to be effective in
> the lives
> of most people it (cob) must find a way to fit into the mainstream
> patterns of
> economic life.  To say that cob must be in a non money world as much
> as any
> honest cobber can stand is selling us all short.  We as cobbers need
> to work
> on all fronts.  If we see cob as limited to only a frugal & humble
> being then
> we are marginalizing ourselves and cob into a position that will keep
> us on
> the fringe.  Again - the fringe is fine if thats where you personally
> want to
> be - its just that the fringe is just the fringe.   But if we truly
> want to
> change the beast we must strike at its heart & like it or not - being
> able to
> have an economic impact on the lives of people will do that in a way
> that the
> economic  and cultural margin cannot do.
> 
> please think on this - 
> regards
> john fordice
> THE COB CODE PROJECT
> otherfish at aol.com