Oral Presentations - Session 1A: UC 326
Hey Brother, Where's the Bathroom? Forty Years of Rainbow Gatherings and Human Waste Disposal
Presentation Type
Presentation
Faculty Mentor’s Full Name
Michael Mayer
Faculty Mentor’s Department
History
Abstract / Artist's Statement
This project examines the health and environmental disaster that is human waste disposal in much of the world dooming millions to early deaths from easily preventable diseases. Next, Hey Brother digs into the Rainbow Family of Living Light (RFLL) offering background information about key RFLL members and the development of the Rainbow Family history including the annual Rainbow Gathering held by the RFLL on public land and the evolution of their protocols dealing with human waste disposal in a backcountry environment, their on going relationship with local, state, and federal agencies, and, in conclusion, what the RFLL may have to teach a world in desperate need of real relief from the global nightmare that is human waste disposal.
Hey Brother utilizes interviews with RFLL elders as well as other RFLL documents and hip-stories, or oral histories collected by respected RFLL figures, United States Forest Service (USFS) documents gained under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), newspaper accounts, and secondary sources both to further illuminate the RFLL and to lend depth to the account. Besides Rainbow related materials, works by experts such as Joe Jenkins and DR. Sin Van der Ryn lend further understanding to the subject.
Hey Brother is an important work because it presents solutions to the millions of will die every year because of poor sanitation. In poor communities, shantytowns, and refugee camps the world poor suffer and die because it is not safe to relieve themselves. The RFLL have developed successful methodologies for thousands to safely relieve themselves.
Hey Brother, Where's the Bathroom? Forty Years of Rainbow Gatherings and Human Waste Disposal
UC 326
This project examines the health and environmental disaster that is human waste disposal in much of the world dooming millions to early deaths from easily preventable diseases. Next, Hey Brother digs into the Rainbow Family of Living Light (RFLL) offering background information about key RFLL members and the development of the Rainbow Family history including the annual Rainbow Gathering held by the RFLL on public land and the evolution of their protocols dealing with human waste disposal in a backcountry environment, their on going relationship with local, state, and federal agencies, and, in conclusion, what the RFLL may have to teach a world in desperate need of real relief from the global nightmare that is human waste disposal.
Hey Brother utilizes interviews with RFLL elders as well as other RFLL documents and hip-stories, or oral histories collected by respected RFLL figures, United States Forest Service (USFS) documents gained under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), newspaper accounts, and secondary sources both to further illuminate the RFLL and to lend depth to the account. Besides Rainbow related materials, works by experts such as Joe Jenkins and DR. Sin Van der Ryn lend further understanding to the subject.
Hey Brother is an important work because it presents solutions to the millions of will die every year because of poor sanitation. In poor communities, shantytowns, and refugee camps the world poor suffer and die because it is not safe to relieve themselves. The RFLL have developed successful methodologies for thousands to safely relieve themselves.