Pack up your ethics in an old kit bag?

“In The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien has a wise old tree-creature recall the way the ancient earth-people gained their extraordinary power: 'They always wanted to talk to everything, the old Elves did.' Our greatest hope for survival today is to take a lesson from these elven conversational skills. If we only ever hear and repeat our own story, if we fail to open our ears to new and different voices, the consequences will be both dangerous and extreme. We need a myth to teach us how to listen in a new way to the earth, to each other, to our children, to our dreams. The hero of our new myth could be called, simply, Listener.”
Dan Yashinsky, Suddenly They Heard Footsteps