SOME people find the sort of society in which most of us live inadequate, even intolerable, and they do not wish to join us in it.

Most don’t wish us harm, but they try to persuade us that we are mistaken.

In the past, if their persuasion didn’t work they could go to a new area, and try their experiments there.

Today, there is nowhere fresh to go to, so they do the next best thing.

They make use of land that is – or appears to be – wasted.

Many of them wish to be as self-sufficient as possible rather than consume more and more, as we are inclined to do. 

Although trying to stay outside the ‘conventional’ society, they want to show us that they consider

our consumerist, wasteful ethos is a problem and to present us with an alternative.

Unfortunately, many of us find their appearance, their behaviour, and their ethics, off-putting, but we forget that they are trying to tell us about a different attitude of life by example.

It may be hard, and seem wrong, but they see it as worthy, satisfying, and joyous.

Wasn’t the Yorkley Court community doing that, and shouldn’t we thank them for their efforts?

They may seem naive, and their experiments may well fail. But we shouldn’t assume that.

That suggests a closed mind, and an unwillingness to work with them to explore different approaches to life.  

What if they are right? History shows that often they are.

I suspect that some of the things the Yorkley community farmers were trying will prove to be very much what we should turn to: growing food organically, trying alternative foods, being less wasteful, using less energy, tolerating other living things – living more lightly on Earth than we do.

At Yorkley Court a group of brave enthusiasts was trying to do such things.

And they were not shy of telling us about it, of sharing their skills with us, and of working hard to help us benefit from their ideas.

I was not involved much with the community – but enough to be impressed and to be grateful to them.

– Martin Spray, The The Pludds.