ELF discrediting environmentalism

The series of events is telling. Jan. 23: Fire destroyed a home under construction in the Lake Monroe watershed. April 30: Equipment used for the Indiana 46/47 bypass project was sabotaged. June 30: Ten-inch spikes were driven into trees scheduled for logging. Sept. 9: The Republican headquarters in Bloomington was set on fire. Oct. 18: Fuel and hydraulic lines were cut, sand was poured in gas tanks, crankcases and other logging equipment was damaged.\nThe Earth Liberation Front claimed responsibility for each of these acts of vandalism and sabotage, which add up to damages of more than $35 million in the last three years in the South-Central Indiana region. According to an ELF statement, those damages harm "entities profiting off the destruction of the Earth in the United States."\nGroups such as ELF invite people to question the tactics of environmentalists in general, but ELF is hardly representative of the movement as a whole. Several environmental groups in Wisconsin recently wrote a plea to ELF to "Stay out of Wisconsin." They said they are disappointed in ELF's actions and believe groups such as ELF are not effecting change, but merely giving peaceful environmental groups like theirs a bad name. They wrote that "ELF's methods are both morally reprehensible and damaging to the legitimate environmental movement."\nIt is difficult if not impossible to claim $35 million dollars worth of property damage, miscellaneous vandalism and sabotage is an acceptable way to effect change. While some might argue that there are no other ways of getting the environmentalist point across, there is no justification for wreaking $35 million worth of damage via vandalism and arson.\nPatrick Moore, Ph.D., was one of the original founders of Greenpeace. But he left the organization, he wrote in an essay, because it has "taken a sharp turn to the ultra-left, ushering in a mood of extremism and intolerance," evidenced by its 1990 "grassroots revolution against pragmatism and compromise," much like ELF. Moore wrote that he believes these organizations are no longer helping the environmental cause, but hindering it.\nInstead of property damage and sabotage, environmentalists need to collaborate with governments, public and private institutions and corporations. Instead of resorting to covert operations, vandalism, arson and sabotage, groups that truly care about the environment should seek win-win solutions of compromise and gradual change.\nThe bottom line is that groups like ELF, advocating illegal, violent and usually ineffective measures, are giving environmentalists a bad name. To really effect change, groups must use nonviolent activism to work with those in power towards collaboration and compromise.\nStaff Vote: 14-1