ECOLOGY OF EVERYDAY LIFE
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striving not only to survive at the minimum, but to cultivate ever new creative
ways of relating to the environment is shared by both human and other
species on the planet. The tendency toward not only stasis and stability, but
toward innovation and development, provides the basis for evolution within
both nature and society as well.
However, it is vital to distinguish this social ecological interpretation of
ecological tendencies toward mutualism, differentiation, and development from
the erotic naturalism of Wilhelm Reich. In the early 1900s, Wilhelm Reich,
psychoanalyst and later, physicist, developed an 'erotic’ theory of nature.10
Influenced by Freud, Reich reduced his concept of desir’, or Eros■ to sexual
energy.
Reich called this sexual energy,
orgone,
demonstrating how it
permeated both natural and social worlds. According to Reich, both nature and
society are regulated by the basic properties of orgone energy, namely the
process of tension and release the same process that marks the sexual act.
When this process of tension and release is obstructed, Reich contended, an
impairment of biological functioning occurs within the individual organism.
Accordingly, Reich identified 'orgonic blockages’ as the cause of problems
ranging from impaired cellular functioning and sexual/social neurosis to
cancer. Throughout his career, Reich advocated for creating a society that
would allow for the free flow of orgone energy on both ecological and social
levels.
At first view, Reich’s orgone energy could be seen as similar to the idea
of an eco-erotic. However, there are many differences. First, Reich focused on
the energetic processes of nature without focusing on the developmental
process of nature. Fascinated by processes of movement,
change, and
stimulus-response, Reich was unconcerned with the ways in which such
processes differentiated or became more complex through the evolutionary
process. Reich expressed a far greater interest in exploring the structural and
functional
similarities between
cells,
organisms,
and
humans
than
the
differences. Accordingly, Reich identified moments of desire in nature which
he designated as functionally identical to human desire. For instance, Reich
believed that the cytoplasmic movement of cells was functionally identical with
the emotional movement or responsiveness of humans. In turn, the expansion
and
contraction
of microorganisms were
expressions
of pleasure
and
displeasure that shared functional identity with the emotional correlates in
humans. Again, Reich’s exclusive emphasis on consistency or functional
similarity, rather than differentiated development as well, distinguishes a
Reichian from a Bookchinian view of the relationship between organic and
social phenomena.
While it is meaningful to explore the similarities between an ‘eco-erotic’
and a ‘sodo-erotic’, it is also crudal to appredate that which developmental^