A Look Back at the Recent Past
You may have heard about it. You may have seen it. Now you can watch Two Square Miles anytime online--the movie that explores Hudson's past and documents its present in the early years of the 21st century. See Hudson and some familiar faces as they were a decade ago and marvel at how things have changed and how they haven't in ten years' time.
As a lifelong naturalist and an active advocate of Hudson's ecology, I must say that I had a very difficult time "breaking in" to any discussion on these issues when I first arrived in Hudson in 2005, six months after the state's decision against the cement plant.
ReplyDeleteUntil finding a handful of like-minded individuals through trial and error - which took years - it was very clear that my concern for and desire to defend the South Bay wetlands fell under the rubric of the fight against St. Lawrence Cement, which meant I was trodding on proprietary turf. Anyone showing an interest had to begin by kissing rings, which is an arrangement I've always detested.
Ever since then, if you wanted to voice your concern for the wetlands you needed sharp elbows for the other advocates or you needed to pipe down and let the local activists do their job. Perhaps that's true everywhere nowadays, but I still reject it.
From my front-row seat, I believe that a harmful, hidden legacy of the St. Lawrence fight survives in this unspoken social arrangement. It's the main reason area residents come across as being apathetic on local environmental issues; old-timers tell themselves that someone else will pursue their advocacy for them, while new blood is subliminally reminded that they're on someone else's turf, exactly as I was reminded.
Someone should make a follow-up documentary to "2 Square Miles," to show the subsequent breakdown and possibility for sociopathology in communities like ours.
Meanwhile the causeway mining road widens and widens and widens ...
A follow up documentary would be really interesting.
ReplyDeleteI agree, Jennifer!
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