Photo: Maarten Inghels

Years ago, I found this cobblestone on the street in Brussels with the golden inscription “I USED TO BE A MOUNTAIN.” Like a speech bubble rising from a choked rock. After all these years, I still haven’t been able to find out who made it—there’s no record of it anywhere as a listed artwork. I see it now as a poetic intervention by an anonymous city dweller.

  • Fluffy_Ruffs@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    That’s actually a mildly depressing way to put it. Reduced from a majestic, imposing, mass to something humans tread on without a second thought.

    • athairmor@lemmy.world
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      4 days ago

      Oh, for fucks sake not everything is holy and should remain immutable forever. Not everything humans do to their environment is bad.

      Besides, this is probably granite which would have been under a mountain that got worn away. It was probably buried underground and quarried. No one saw a big impressive mountain and chopped it down.

      • Tlf@feddit.org
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        4 days ago

        Going off, chopping mountains, as one does. On a more serious note, are there examples of this? I only know of humans raising mountains and usually they’re not of the good kind.

        Edit: It appears this is a thing humans are doing. And it looks just as horrific as I feared it might.

          • Trainguyrom@reddthat.com
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            3 days ago

            The worst part is coal is such a terrible fuel there’s no good reason to keep doing it. We’ve already mined most of the accessible coal that can be easily mined, and we have better fuels now that burn cleaner and more easily than coal, and even for the odd one-off usecase where coal is the best option we have modern alternatives that contain no coal and burn similarly.

            Killing coal is one of the easiest wins Humanity could achieve because it’s entirely outmoded but moneyed interests keep it on life support for no reason other than money

        • Jarix@lemmy.world
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          3 days ago

          3 hours after you posted. You have 0 upvotes and they have 22.

          Looks like you are the one who must be fun at parties judging from the numbers

            • Jarix@lemmy.world
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              2 days ago

              You are entitled to your opinion, but I was analysing the numbers. Which at this moment are 29 to -1

              And I explained that so, you can disagree with me all you want. I don’t care because my comment still holds up regardless of what you believe