‘Clueless’ on the Environment
Re “Spoiled Americans Here; Big Bad World Out There,” Commentary, May 21: Norah Vincent claims that “stupidity has always been the unfortunate side effect of too much privilege.” While that proposition is doubtful as a general one, in Vincent’s specific case it seems to be accurate. Thus, in all seriousness, she claims that unless a person stops using lightbulbs, computers and paper, he has no right to demand that the government protect the environment. According to Vincent, if you don’t see the obvious logic in this observation you are “utterly clueless.”
Those who believe, more sensibly, that one can fight against environmental degradation and other injustices without renouncing lightbulbs and paper would assign the label “clueless” differently.
Jeffrey B. Valle
Los Angeles
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Vincent’s attack on environmentalists and missile defense foes is typical of what passes for debate in right-wing circles. Do liberals use natural resources? Of course we do. But we try to do so responsibly, and we choose renewable resources when we can. We lobby for sustainable uses of our planet’s resources because anything else is, well, unsustainable.
Vincent attacks missile defense foes because she thinks we don’t want to pay the “costs of protecting freedom.” A trillion-dollar “defense” that pretends to protect against a nonexistent threat while ignoring the many real threats to our freedom can only serve one purpose: to line the pockets of the military-industrial-congressional complex. Follow the money, Ms. Vincent.
Joseph Hopfield
Culver City
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Vincent alleges that Americans such as environmentalists, “teenage anarchists” and those opposed to a missile defense shield are hypocrites so sheltered from the real world that they fight benign, unimportant battles as if they mattered. Her arrogant, self-congratulatory sentiment is narrow-minded and exposes an ignorant bias against individuals whose worldliness far exceeds her own.
While the nation is filled with privileged individuals who sit content in the comforts of their surroundings unaware of the deprivation, horrors and insecurity of the world at large, environmentalists, concerned teenagers and opponents of a missile defense system are a few examples of groups that are not immune to reality but that engage it and try to make our nation and the world a better place.
Dee Anna S. Behle
Dana Point
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Imagine my surprise when I read such an articulate defense of conservative philosophy by Vincent. She highlights the major flaw in the liberal ideology of 2001--hypocrisy. Sure, I am an environmentalist as long as I can drive my sport-utility vehicle and pay 99 cents for gas. Sure, I support freedom of expression as long as I do not have to sacrifice for it.
Unfortunately, The Times more than compensated for the Vincent article by publishing “Preferences for the Rich Grease the Way to College” by William Marshall (Commentary, May 21). How can you publish a piece that argues that preferences for the children of wealthy donors are a major problem without a single piece of evidence? How many people does the University of California system admit per year based on large contributions? This is preposterous--and coming from the former deputy White House counsel to boot!
Roger Nieves
Lawndale