Nothing is simple,
not even simplification.
Thus, throwing away
the mail, I exchange
the complexity of duty
for the simplicity of guilt.
-W.B.
The April NSS News is the annual cave conservation issue. It contains the Minimum-Impact Caving Code, compiled by Jim and Val Werker from a variety of sources. Nothing in this set of guidelines is new to anyone who has been acquainted with caving organizations for very long, and most all of the suggestions have a time for application, but for some reason I found myself unsettled by their tone. Indeed, the official language with which some cavers speak of the underground seems related directly to the way that all people speak of things from which they are distanced. It seems that humans are being actively separated, physically and mentally, from nature. I'm talking, of course, about the idea that human impact is negative impact. This seems to be the stance of "the NSS," and of the Werkers and many other cavers.
As many, many people have stated, the ultimate Minimum-Impact Caving Code would be simple: Stay out of caves. By constructing a sort of compromise, cavers have either revealed a simple selfishness or they have claimed a right; the right to explore. What gives us that right? The right of animals to go underground (and to urinate and to defecate there) is not questioned because caves are their habitats. We cannot make that claim, but we have different rights than those animals. I believe that our natural curiosity and our ability explore and to learn provide a natural authorization to go places that we are in no position to call our habitat. Or in other words, to invite all of Earth (and more!) into our hearts and our thoughts, as Home. And so we can be "at Home" in a place that is not our "home" or "habitat". If then we have claimed the right to explore based on our ability and desire to do so, and we have legitimized that claim by accepting the Earth and its caves as our home, what rights might we have to impact that home? Only the natural rights of any creature. The difference is that, being in a unique position to destroy, we must impose limits on ourselves that animals needn't. But that doesn't mean that we must go too far the opposite way, and try to remove ourselves from the natural give and take of things.
Now, having built for ourselves an artificial habitat, we have been fooled into thinking that it is where we belong, and that we are somehow apart from nature. This is reflected by the way people spend recreational time outside. Nature is treated like a hostile alien place that cannot be tackled with success or with joy except through the implementation of "gear". I walk fairly regularly on a trail established by the state because it leads to a nice place to climb on the rocks and look out over the valley. Meeting people on the trail is fascinating. To see a healthy young couple in the woods no more than a twenty minute walk from their car, and to see that they are carrying a large backpack each, is incomprehensible to me. They have been taught, evidently, that this is what they need. This preoccupation with hardware is alive and well in the world of cavers, though they can be forgiven for being extra cautious. But another form of the same delusion is its opposite, not that we need be meticulously protected from nature, but that it should be wholly insulated from us. This is the idea behind the Minimum-Impact Code. To damn a man for leaving some of his hair and skin or some crumbs from his meal, or even other bodily "wastes", is to claim that he had no business being there in the first place, that he is not a creature at home.
The NSS' conservation site says: Cave resources should be protected by keeping wild caves wild and free from human manipulations and alterations that hamper the free play of natural forces, endanger the cave and karst ecosystems, or diminish the pleasure of future visitors.
If this statement doesn't contradict the Minimum-Impact Code (and itself), it at least allows a clear way around it. We are among the natural forces that should be given the freedom to act. We, even as occasional visitors, are part of the cave and karst ecosystem. To deny this is to deny us entirely our place as humans on the globe.
This doesn't mean that we have a right to be wanton. But it does mean that "minimum impact" may be misplaced priority. If our priority is instead the development of respect for the natural world (not just caves) and for each other, then we will be governed without law. I am certain that many, including the Werkers, recognize this, and view a list of guidelines as an effective shortcut to conservation. That it is. There is nothing bad in the Minimum-Impact Caving Code. But it denies us the welcome that we should feel to follow our honorable inclinations to explore. A set of guidelines that would truly show respect to both the cave and its visitors couldn't be printed on a single page of the News. It would be big. It would require many explanations and qualifications and examples. It's tone would be reflective instead of legislative. It would teach instead of command. It would motivate through honor and celebration instead of imposing guilt and apprehension. Someone with vast experience and plenty of good help should write it. All of the beautiful work of conservation done by the Werkers and many other cavers could be augmented by such an effort. The potential to positively affect behavior and motivation should not be ignored.