The Destruction of That Which Should Be Left Standing

I saw a machine recently that can only be described as a monster, and it forced me to ask the question, where is our desire for efficiency taking us?

Photo by Simon Wilkes on Unsplash

A lone oak in a field of wheat is an object of stark beauty and magnificence - and thankfully a rather common sight in the fields of the Essex countryside near where I live. Many a time while gazing upon such a tree, I have wondered “why was it left standing?”. Surely the idols of our modern age (efficiency and profit), would prefer that this tree was chopped down to be sacrificed on their alters? It gets in the way of machine work and reduces the yields of the productive land. It is a lodger in the field that does not pay dividends or rent with its presence. So why is it here?

The reason is picturesque - it is the shade that these giants gave to workers (when most work on the farm was done by hand) that saved them from the chop all those years ago¹. In the heat of the noonday sun, farmers and their farmhands would sit in the cool shade of the tree, recounting stories of harvests gone by and cycles of life and death that have played out in the fields, pastures, and barns.

But today shade is no longer required; the tractor or combine roof now fulfils that role. But despite this redundancy, these trees remain standing, even in a day and age where efficiency and profit are all the more worshipped. Why do they still remain? The only reason I can surmise is simply because of their magnificence, and the farmers, who are more in-tune with creation than most of us, keenly perceive this. They have grown to know and love these familiar features in their landscape, and cannot bear to bring them down, no matter how difficult they make the harvest time. It would be almost sacrilegious to chop down such a marvel of creation. Thus, the lofty giants live on to this day.

These farmers, then, rightly value these trees for what they are. This attitude displays much wisdom and rationality, for such farmers have perceived what is of true and lasting value and have acted in accordance. It is an attitude that we can learn much from in our fast-paced efficiency-driven modern societies.

However, it is not just these lone oaks that should cause us to think twice before we swing the axe. The removal of any tree is a significant event. It is in this context that I recently saw something that left me speechless, not with a sense of awe and wonder, but with a sense of fear and dread. For what I saw was a machine (or was it a monster?) which in a matter of seconds chopped, stripped, and dumped tree after tree, all with the movement of one mechanical arm. It is no wonder that this video of the machine in question, is titled "monster machine" for that is exactly what it is - a monster, an instrument of destruction and devastation, fuelled by the desire for raw efficiency.

It is granted that this machine obviously saves the forester an immense amount of time, for what would have taken minutes with a chainsaw, and perhaps a half hour or more with an axe, is reduced to almost an instant. The logs, which are the fruit of the labour, are produced in a matter of seconds for maximum profit. But to achieve this feat, raw, untamed, brute efficiency is required - and herein lies the great danger.

Caught up in the pure efficiency of the process, it is easy to lose sight of just what it is we are doing. For when we fell a tree, we obliterate a habitat and home for an abundance of species, we destroy that which gives stability and rejunivation to the soil, and we remove part of the lungs of the earth that produce the air we breathe. Yes, one could, with justification, argue we are producing logs which we can use to make other beautiful things² - but this does not negate the fact that the tree itself is annihilated, and this is an event loaded with significance and irreversible consequences.