Amish Christmas Lights
Read up on the Amish a bit today after getting the Amish Christmas Lights picture/joke by email. Turns out they're very neat in some ways and not what i expected in others. They don't use electricity except what they generate with diesel generators. They'll use modern gasoline driven baling equipment as long as it's pulled through the fields by horses.
The Amish are as goofy as the rest of us. But they do offer an excellant example of a group using and choosing which technology is appropriate and which isn't within a certain framework. Each group of Amish have their own slightly different intrepretations of acceptability. One thing they all agree on though is no TV. That alone gives them cred.
Many environmentalists are predicting a relocalization of economies in the near future driven by huge fuel and transport costs among other things. If they're right those horse drawn carriages the Amish, and some other Mennonites, drive will be a hot item soon. Horse drawn buggies could well be the next big financial bubble, now's the time to get in for sure.
Checked out my neighbors places last night on the way home from the winter solstice celebration. Sure enough our little joint is the only one not decked out in electric lights. Even the Koreans who own the local store have lights up. Sometimes it all seems alien, but i'm a flip-flopper, when the kids were little it was easier getting into stuff like putting up lights, now i'll stick with my birdfeeder and all the little miracles here.
