Spiders & Snails Versus Starmer & Reeves

A distinguished jumping spider (Attulus distinguendus) 

A pair of whirlpool ramshorn snails (Anisus vorticulus)

Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves (Homo politicus) amused by the thought of habitat destruction 

and species extinction in the name of housing development and economic growth

 

 

I. 

 

There are many reasons to despise the present British government and - to echo the immortal words of Bernard Brook Partridge - one would like to see Starmer and his entire cabinet dropped down "a very, very large, exceedingly deep hole", in the belief that the UK would be "vastly improved by their total and utter non-existence" [1].

 

To give but one of these reasons - discussed at length in an article by George Monbiot in The Guardian [2] - the government's new planning bill is tearing down environmental protections to benefit developers, and that is something I vehemently disapprove of. 

 

 

II. 

 

Just to be clear: I am always and forever on the side of bats, newts, snails, and spiders; all creatures that have been blamed by successive governments (not just this one) for getting in the way of urban expansion and economic growth. 

 

Earlier this year, for example, Starmer called for the extermination of an extremely rare species of jumping spider [3] which, according to him, had prevented an entire new town being built in Kent, thereby denying the dream of home ownnership to thousands of families. 

 

This turned out to be a misleading oversimplification of a complex issue [4]: 

 

"What developers were seeking to build on the peninsula was not homes, but a theme park. But Starmer, making it up as he went along, had reduced the issue to spiders v people." [5]

 

Rather than apologise, however, a spokesperson for the prime minister simply repeated that the government was committed to going further and faster with its mad ambition to concrete over what remains of the UK's natural habitat.  

 

And just last week, the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, proudly informed an audience of corporate executives that she had given permission for a large housing development in Sussex that had previously been prevented by "'microscopic snails that you cannot even see'" [6].  

 

What Rachel from accounts doesn't seem to know or care about is the fact that this very rare little creature - known as the whirlpool ramshorn snail (Anisus vorticulus)- is "an indicator of fresh water not affected by sewage pollution" [7], so serves a vital role alerting us as to the state of our rivers and streams.  

 

And what the public have not been told is that a new housing development will lead to excessive water abstraction and that this could not only damage or destroy the highly protected wetlands in which the snails live, but threaten the future wellbeing of people in the south-east of England as groundwater supplies in the region become increasingly polluted and ever-depleted.       

 

 

III. 

Ultimately, as Monbiot says, the new planning and infrastructure bill is a full-scale assault on nature; one that will "enable developers to bulldoze precious wild places" [8] and see irreplaceble ecosystems sold for cash.   

 

And shockingly, "the big nature groups - the RSPB, the National Trust and the Wildlife Trusts - with their combined membership of 7.5 million, are mute. They accepted a series of government amendments in return for agreeing not to campaign against the bill" [9]. 

 

England, my England in 2025 ...  

 

Instead of raising the colours, those who call themselves patriots should be raising bloody hell against this government and protecting this green and pleasant land and the creatures that inhabit it. Rewilding, not flag waving, is what we urgently need to see; fewer people, fewer houses, fewer cars and more birds, beasts and flowers.  

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Bernard Brook-Partridge was a high-profile Tory who served as chairman of the Greater London Council's arts committee (1977-79). He famously described punk rock as "disgusting, degrading, ghastly, sleazy, prurient, voyeuristic and generally nauseating". The words I use here with reference to the current Labour government were originally said with reference to the Sex Pistols, whom he found particularly ojectionable. 

      Click here to watch Brook-Partridge voicing his opinion on camera in The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle (dir. Julien Temple, 1980).

 

[2] George Monbiot, 'Wage war on nature to build new homes: that’s Labour's offer, but it's a con trick', The Guardian (16 Oct 2025): click here.  

 

[3] The distinguished jumping spider (Attulus distinguendus) is one of Britain's rarest spiders, found only in two locations in the south-east of England: Thurrock Marshes in Essex and Swanscombe Marshes in Kent. It is a tiny species, just a few millimeters in size, with excellent vision and leaping ability, which it uses to hunt rather than spin webs. The spider is considered a conservation priority due to its endangered status and the threat posed to its habitat by development.   

 

[4] See the report on the BBC news website by Helen Catt (14 March 20205): click here.  

 

[5] George Monbiot, op. cit.

 

[6] Reeves quoted by Monbiot. 

 

[7]  George Monbiot, op. cit.  

 

[8] Ibid. 

 

[9] Ibid.

 

 

From the Soil Beneath Our Feet to the Iron in Our Soul (Another Open Letter to Heide Hatry)

 The biosphere cannot exist without exchange 

and interaction with the chthonic thanatosphere

 

I. 

 

My friend Heide recently sent me a link to an article by George Monbiot, a writer known for his environmental and political activism, which powerfully argued the case for soil: 

 

"Beneath our feet is an ecosystem so astonishing that it tests the limits of our imagination. It's as diverse as a rainforest or a coral reef. We depend on it for 99% of our food, yet we scarcely know it." [1] 

 

Pretty much, I agree with what he says and share his astonishment for the wonder of soil - that pedolithic mixture of organic matter, minerals, gases, liquids, and organisms that together support life on Earth. It's amazing to realise that even a small handful of soil contains thousands of tiny creatures, millions of bacteria, and a complex network of fungal filaments. 

 

And, as Monbiot writes, "even more arresting than soil's diversity and abundance is the question of what it actually is" - not just a ground-up rock and dead plants as many people think - but a "biological structure built by living creatures to secure their survival". 

 

Expanding on this theme, he writes:

 

"Microbes make cements out of carbon, with which they stick mineral particles together, creating pores and passages through which water, oxygen and nutrients pass. The tiny clumps they build become the blocks the animals in the soil use to construct bigger labyrinths. [...] Bacteria, fungi, plants and soil animals, working unconsciously together, build an immeasurably intricate, endlessly ramifying architecture that [...] organises itself spontaneously into coherent worlds." 

 

Monbiot concludes: 

 

"Soil might not be as beautiful to the eye as a rainforest or a coral reef, but once you begin to understand it, it is as beautiful to the mind. Upon this understanding our survival might hang."

 

And that, dear Heide, is where my problem with Monbiot begins ... 

 

 

II. 

 

For suddenly it becomes clear that, ultimately, the destruction of soil only concerns him because it threatens human existence; the "thin cushion between rock and air" should be valued because it supports mankind and allows Monbiot to continue his comfortable middle-class life in Oxford. 

If Monbiot and his fellow greens were genuinely concerned with the preservation of the soil and really believed that the future is underground, then they would advocate for (voluntary) human extinction [2] - not just new farming techniques. Like Rupert Birkin, they would see that we have become an obstruction and a hindrance to the process of evolution and that only man's self-extinction will allow life to continue unfolding in inhuman splendour.

 

Monbiot should be encouraged to understand that nature is not our home and that if life matters at all, then every life matters equally; human presence or non-presence doesn't determine the blessedness (or indeed the beauty) of anything. 

 

Not that I'm saying life does possess any intrinsic value; as a philosopher, I'm obliged to affirm the essential truth of nihilism, which, of course, is the truth of extinction [3] and the fact that life is epiphenomenal - a rare and unusual way of being dead, as Nietzsche says [4]. 

 

Even so-called ecophilosophy should do more than simply further human conceit and perpetuate a kind of Gaia-loving vitalism. Its duty and, indeed, its destiny is to acknowledge the fact that the Earth has interests that do not coincide exclusively with the life upon it; as Giorgio Agamben reminds us, the biosphere cannot exist without the chthonic thanatosphere [5].

 

Ultimately, soil only goes down so far and even those strange microscopic organisms that live in the rock deep beneath the surface of the Earth, are no longer anywhere to be found. For ultimately, the Earth isn't alive - it's a solid ball of iron and nickel with a radius of about 760 miles and a surface temperature as hot as that of the sun, surrounded by a molten outer core.  

 

Equally amazing - and just as important - is the fact that iron not only constitutes the soul of our planet, but, along with other metals - such as sodium, potassium, magnesium, calcium, and zinc - makes up 2.5% of the human body. 

 

As inorganic biochemists like to joke, man cannot live by SPONCH alone ... 

 

 

Notes

 

[1] George Monbiot, 'The secret world beneath our feet is mind-blowing - and the key to our planet's future', The Guardian (7 May 2022): click here. 

      See also Monbiot's article from several years back, 'We're treating soil like dirt. It's a fatal mistake as our lives depend on it', The Guardian (25 March 2015). Nice to see him recycling old material in this (environmentaly friendly) manner.

 

[2] See the post 'On Voluntary Human Extinction' (12 Oct 2013): click here. 

 

[3] See Ray Brassier, Nihil Unbound: Enlightenment and Extinction, (Palgrave Macmillan, 2007). And see my post on this book (26 Nov 2012): click here.

 

[4] Nietzsche, The Gay Science, Book III, 109. 

[5] See Giorgio Agamben, 'Gaia and Chthonia', in Where Are We Now?, trans. Valeria Dani, (ERIS, 2021), pp. 105-113.