David Mark Brown

Writer. Novelist. Redneck. Granola.

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May 18, 2009 By David Mark Brown Leave a Comment

The Secret Life of Hemp

hemp-leaf-productsDamn you Reefer Madness, William Randolph Hearst, Dupont and racist American government of the 1930’s!  Over 70 years later and we in the U.S. are still suffering the ill effects of banning marijuana and all its associates during a period of economic rebound that encouraged greed, paranoia, racism and lax political oversight. (Sound familiar?)

Industrial hemp was going strong throughout the 1920’s.  It found uses in everything from paint to cosmetics to food.  It is even rumored that the first pair of Levi jeans were made from Hemp in the mid-1800’s.  (The evidence was destroyed in the great San Francisco fire.)  People have long derided prohibition as one of the stupider achievements of American history, blaming it for (among other things) giving rise to organized crime.  Well, if prohibition was stupid you have to lump reefer madness into the same category of dumb. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Energy Sustainability, Sustainable Agriculture, Sustainable Building, Sustainable Innovation

March 2, 2009 By David Mark Brown Leave a Comment

Transition Communities and The Dancing Rabbit

dancing-rabbit-logo1dancing-rabbit-title2

This entry might reveal a little too much about myself, but I just have to give a shout out to this little community in Missouri.  Dancing Rabbit has been around for 10 years now and some might refer to them as a “Transition Community,” but they really are something different.

A Transition Community is, according to Transition Towns Wiki, “a small collection of motivated individuals within a community come together with a shared concern: how can our community respond to the challenges, and opportunities, of Peak Oil and Climate Change?”

I think this idea of transition towns/communities is awesome, and I hope to see it continue to catch on around the U.S. and the world.  But from what I can tell about Dancing Rabbit (through their website) they are something pretty different.  If a transition town is a group of people within a community, then what do you call  a group of people that decide to start their own town?  That is what Dancing Rabbit is trying to do.  Their town is a small one right now at 30 people, but they claim to desire to reach 500 to 1000.  Their covenants include things like not driving a personal vehicle (they share two for the whole community) and not using fossil fuels to heat their homes, etc.

I have been looking for community experiments like this one and am surprised it took me this long to find Dancing Rabbit.  I was so excited to find them I thought there might be others like me out there.  May the rabbit keep dancing.

Filed Under: Energy Sustainability, Simplicity and Conservation, Sustainable Community, Uncategorized

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About Me

David Mark Brown Welcome to the Green Porch! Yep, this is my blog. It's a meeting place for those interested in the art of conversation, story, community and sustainability. Hey, its a big porch. There's room for all of us, so pull up a chair and I'll pour you a drink (adult beverages after 2:00pm, which where I'm from is also known as the watermelon hour).

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