Cool the Rhetoric

Extremism doesn't aid environmentalists' cause

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LAST WEEKEND A PANEL of architectural and environmental experts gathered in Doylestown for a symposium on the future of suburbia. The discussion centered on energy consumption and overpopulation and how those two factors might affect life as we in Bucks and Montgomery counties have come to know and, appreciate it

To its credit, the panel reached a consensus that our suburban way of life is sustainable, but only – and this is a big "but only" - if people are willing to make profound changes in the way they use energy.

The recent surge in gasoline prices was a good hook for the discussion. As the cost of petroleum-based energy keeps going up, it would be foolish not to consider the implications and try to map out some strategies for possible shortages in the future.

We say possible because trying to predict the future price and supplies of gasoline is a lot like trying to predict the future of the stock market. We just don't know what tomorrow holds in store for us. Which is why it is just as misleading and disingenuous to predict environmental doom as it is to claim that all is well and there's nothing to worry about

Unfortunately, those behind the so-called "environmental movement" frequently are guilty of resorting to doomsday predictions to try to make their point. They did it in the 1970s when the "hot" topic was the idea of global cooling and the imminent coming of the next ice age Now, just 30 years later, they're fretting about global warming. From time to time, noted scientists issue a collective opinion that mankind's activities are hastening the day when the Earth will be unable to sustain human life. Vice President Al Gore regularly spoke of impending environmental catastrophe.

For all of its good intentions, the weekend forum in Doylestown managed to fuel the hysteria by presenting an excerpt from the film "The End of Suburbia: Oil Depletion and the Collapse of the American Dream." According to our news report, the film "painted a bleak picture of the suburban future, complete With chilling images of food shortages, plummeting land values and economic catastrophes." One of the forum panelists, the director of a renewable energy marketing company, predicted suburbia will become a ghetto unless residents are willing to change their habits.

This and much of what the doomsayers present as fact is nothing but sheer conjecture. It represents an extreme position that hinders rather than helps the advance of environmental awareness. People should care about what impact their lifestyle will have on future generations, and they should be informed of all the "possibilities." But yon can't pr-each to them from the fringe; extremism in any shape or form is a turnoff

Environmentalists could build a much stronger case for their positions by refraining from the "sky is falling" rhetoric. We don't buy the notion .that suburbia is headed for hell in a hand basket, and we don't think too many others buy it, either.

If the experts and non-experts alike who claim a deep, abiding concern for our planet and the way we live want their message to he heard and acted on, they'll have to come in from the edges. There's not much of an audience ant there.