Some say that buying land for preservation/conservation is a good thing. Some say that charging money for ayahuasca is not a bad thing. I think they are wrong - blissfully ignorant of history and contemporary political developments.

The first part of this was previously posted as a reply to an old thread - and two paragraphs has been added below about money.

Buying land - that is acquiring exclusive rights over land - is a particular European idea, which even with the best intentions of preservation, nevertheless, at any rate, both perpetuates the imaginary of exclusive land ownership and of course turns the piece of land into a commodity (that can be then be bought and sold, - so, should the son of a family suddenly decide that the city is cooler, he sell the land to developers).

It can only be understood, at best, as a short term tactic. As a strategy it is self-defeat - and reflects the processes of land enclosures that defined the transition into capitalism in England and the the consequent conquest of the world. Once turned into a commodity, a piece of land becomes a parcel, a thing, the future of which depends entirely on the owner. It leaves it in the trust of the enduring sincerity of individual humans, who are always imperfect and incomplete - that is why we have communities: we are not very good on our own, sort of helpless and untrustworthy in inter-generational terms. Individual ownership of land can also go to the head of people - and people often change when loaded with cash or power.

That is the very core of capitalism and colonialism: rendering land under the control of individuals, outside the reach of the communities to which it used to belong, collectively, the land where the people belonged and the land belonged to all. It feels empowering, but it disempowers community. Breaks it apart.

Once a commodity, land becomes prone to market changes, recession in the (ayahuasca) economy for instance. Anything could happen - and it does: some community leaders, who have been granted title of a piece of land, sell it for extraction or development. It is a smart tactic by the state acting in private interest to "give" people exclusive landowner rights, because then, and only then, can they _legally_ purchase it from them. In the end, they have nothing, but they were treated with legal respect. It was in the moment of claiming the rights that they were cheated, but were fooled to believe it was a victory. Blindfolded. Individual entitlement is a Trojan Horse, it is black magic, the dark side at play, and we all now what happens if you play with those forces.

My father always said about things like these: It is like pissing in your pants when you are really cold. It makes you warm for a little bit, but then you get really cold.

All that said, perhaps it seems like the only possible way to get things done and preserve some land, here and now, and it does, at first, sound like a good thing when a good family can acquire more land, so that they can keep practicing and preserving, but leaves us with the simple question, as with the original enclosures of land, namely: what about all those Kichwa people (and indigenous peoples elsewhere) who cannot afford to buy land? Are we simply creating an indigenous elite of land owners, while the rest will have to move to the city?

Development theory and practice is complex stuff, but one thing can be noted in general: if the core tools and techniques involved are of a Euro-American developmentalism kind, then it is crucial to reflect extra deep and take proper pause to think, consult history books, philosophy arguments and anthropological stories.

When it comes to money and commodity forms - well the situation is slightly similar, but simpler. A good question to ask is this: What is, apart from private property, the biggest, most central problem of Euro-American culture (which, like private property, has been imposed on the rest of the world)? MONEY and the COMMODITY form. What Euro-American culture needs healing from is exactly the single-minded consciousness that the "need" for money generates. If ayahuasca is to heal Euro-American culture - and not just be a plaster on the wound of capitalism (see: colonos.wordpress.com/2008/09...italism/ ), then it must circulate freely, outside the form of commodities. There can be some sort of token exchange of money, if need really be, but ayahuasca presented as a commodity form as organisers around the world do, is a sad development - a new business model - a treatment of symptoms, not of root causes. In the bigger scheme of things, making cash, making a living on ayahuasca - for foreigners - is a selfish, colonial enterprise. Giving it away for free is the road to liberty. Amazonians are under a lot of pressure and cannot do that - that should be "our" contribution to a culture of planetary healing.

When it comes to doing ayahuasca business in the Amazon - not just back home to rich, bored housewives - there is another thing of which most are terribly ignorant: local dynamics. In the moment you support one shaman, you generate envy and jealousy in all the others - and there are MANY. Picking out a few - the "best", "hand-picked" and so on - is a process of elite building, and that is exactly what the colonisers have always done, since the Roman era: divide and conquer. Organising in the Amazon requires an outspoken collective form where the cash profits does not end in the pockets of individuals, chosen by a foreigner. Without collective form that clearly goes across family and community boundary the end result is the same as with private property above: you have pushed people deeper into the world of individual ownership, accumulation and separation from community - in other words: into our world. Meanwhile, their world is gone, preserved in a retreat centre that only foreigners can afford to attend.

That is what private property and money do.