Environmental groups’ view of the animal world sometimes resembles Disney’s Bambi, with owls and rabbits mingling peacefully and Man lurking as the only predator, aided by his evil servant the hunting dog. A good example is the National Wildlife Federation, which wants to reintroduce wild animals into the suburban and urban enclaves from which development has expelled them by encouraging homeowners to develop “healthy and sustainable wildlife habitats” on their properties. The NWF has even produced a television program—Backyard Habitat, shown on Animal Planet—in which experts advise homeowners in places like Chicago about how to attract animals with plants they can feed on, freshwater, and places of cover like high grasses. The show especially likes to visit families with small children, emphasizing that such habitats can teach kids about wild animals.
But somehow missing from the program is one of Nature’s basic principles: the idea that hunters and the hunted evolve together. My own New Jersey backyard, a rich feeding environment that draws small herbivores with its tasty plants, dense underbrush, and drinking sources, illustrates how a residential habitat gradually becomes a killing field—in our case, one where stray cats battle over hunting turf, predatory birds dive to scoop up breakfast, and my wife and I scramble to clean up carcasses before our daughter sees them. -CityJournal
While I agree in principle with Mr. Malanga’s statement that the environmentalists don’t have an accurate view of nature any longer, I would actually go farther, and say that we as a society no longer have an accurate view of nature. We are separated from nature by plastic, brick, and sheet rock, and react with shocked horror when nature impinges on our world whether we like it or not. Maybe it would be healthier for his kids if he left the carcasses in his backyard, rather than scooping them up so they aren’t seen.
Across the Pond in England, they’ve actually gone to the point of officially declaring environmentalism a religion.
It’s official — putting plastic bottles into the recycling bin or going on a Greenpeace demo is akin to having a religious experience. Tim Nicholson*, who was made redundant by a London property company, claimed that it had discriminated against him on account of his subscription to the theory of man-made global warming and other environmental issues which he said constituted a “˜philosophical’ belief.
In any rational universe, he would be sent away with a flea in his ear for trying it on. But this is not such a world. At an Employment Appeal Tribunal Mr Justice Burton ruled that because of his belief in climate change Nicholson was entitled to the same protection against discrimination as someone with religious convictions. -Melanie Philips
I actually agree; environmentalism is a religion. At least someone is being honest about it. Of course, Al Gore won’t be honest about it any time soon, because he’s making billions off the movement. Who wants to admit that you’re just another religious huckster raking in the bucks?
To say we live in a narcissistic age is simple. To illustrate it, until recently, has been difficult in a way that will actually shock people into seeing what’s going on. Thanks to Mr. Obama, we don’t have to search far for examples with which to shock any longer.
Ask yourself this: what other president of the United States would have spent almost three minutes speaking at the Dept. of Interior before getting around to mentioning the fact that twelve soldiers had been killed, and thirty one wounded in a massacre at Fort Hood in Texas/
This kind of insensitivity is both infuriating and disturbing. Infuriating because reinforces the notion that we have a president whose narcissistic self-involvement borders on pathological. What in the world could have been more important than mentioning an American tragedy prior to the business at hand? Disturbing because it demonstrates a cluelessness one would think was impossible for the Commander-in-Chief of the United States military. -Political Mavens
Who still thinks his posing with 18 caskets of dead soldiers returning form overseas was anything more than a photo op, just more Mr. Obama catering to his own self-image, than about any real respect for the folks in the Military?
Along the same lines, evidence continues to mount that Mr. Obama’s book, Dreams of My Father, was written by Bill Ayers, the celebrated “former” terrorist. But to show the depth to which American society has sunk in accepting these sorts of lies, it turns out the blockbuster Roots was also more fiction than reality, a “just so story for the times,” widely accepted because it told a story people wanted to hear, rather than telling the truth (American Thinker).
Is having a father important to the raising of a child? Not according to popular culture. On the other hand, scientists are finding ever increasing amounts of evidence that fathers are important to children, no matter how hard popular culture tries to make dads look really dumb. The latest research results are observations on the fate of Degu, a small rodent, without fathers (via Albert Mohler’s blog).
And where do dads come from? Well, marriages, of course. Yes, that old fashioned institution the far left is trying to destroy, one household at a time. The Foundry has a piece on current attitudes towards marriage; it turns out the numbers aren’t so rosy as they first look. Yes, there is an upswing in the number of people seeking marriage, but there’s also an upswing in the number of people waiting ever later in life to get married, and a total lack of reality is settling in around our expectations of marriage.
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