Opus 2011-242, Green Pieces: Who are we saving the earth for?

I believe that Yellowstone was our first national park.  Teddy Roosevelt was the name associated with that.  Since that time the federal and state governments have been active in setting aside certain locations to preserve them for future generations.  I can see value in that.  I am glad that the Grand Canyon has not become the Exxon Canyon and that the Everglades have not become PETA Park.  I have stood under the giant redwoods.  I have driven through the Bad Lands.  I have no problem with a reasonable effort to preserve beauty and grandeur. 

But now the elitists are trying to shut down our access to these places.  They want to limit the number of people who can pass through. They want to do away with the lodges and recreational facilities.  Groups like the Sierra Club are in favor of making ever larger areas of land off limits to anyone except a select few.  Of course they are in the select few.

The elites are taking over this great country.  Let me give you two examples I have experienced.  The first took place in the Great Smokey Mountains.  Upon entering we saw signs declaring it a U.N. Biosphere.  What?  When we got to the visitors’ center we noticed a sign that declared a “free speech zone.”  What?  At that sign and for a few yards around it we were allowed the freedom of speech.  Beyond that limit it was revoked.  I understand that we get tired of people passing out literature and getting up on soap boxes but since when does the park service have the right to remove our Constitutional right to free speech?  Has our Senate signed a treaty that removes our rights in selected areas that have been turned over to the UN?  If the Smokey Mountains visitor center today, why not your city park tomorrow?

The second example was about ten years ago on the edge of what used to be Everglades National Park.  It is now also a U.N. Biosphere.  After coming back from this foreign country in Florida we stopped at a roadside stand to get a key lime shake.  It was the closest thing to perfect I have every had.  It had so much pucker power I wasn’t sure I would be able to get the straw out of my mouth.  I may never have one again because I was told that the government was expanding the Everglades and forcing people who had been there for years to sell and move.  After driving out the American citizens, do they turn it over to the UN? 

It is wonderful that we are preserving nature.  Some of this work makes sense.  For much of it I wonder, who are they saving it for?  What would be the point of taking the world’s greatest art and locking it up in a vault so no one can see it?  Oh, wait.  That is what art thieves do, isn’t it.  When a child hoards something they can’t use just so noone else can have it we call it immature.  When a government takes away our heritage because they are saving it from us we call it saving the environment. 

I don’t want to cut down the giant Sequoia redwoods.  I don’t want to pave over the Grand Canyon.  I don’t want to drain the Everglades.  I do want them to be available for the most people for the longest time.  Current policy seems to be more anti-human than pro-nature.  If you are an evolutionist then remember that people are part of nature too.  If the redwoods don’t survive then remember it is the survival of the fittest.  If you are a Christian, remember that you are to manage the world as God would have you manage it, not for your own sinful use.  Also remember that it is there to be used.  Enjoying beauty is a use.  Building walls around the forest is sin.  Either extreme says current policy is misdirected.  Change it.

homo unius libri