Recreation versus extinction

I have an image in my mind. I’m sitting across the table from an avid mountain biker, and discussing whether bikers would consider foregoing straight-down-the-mountain thrill seeking on a particular peak if it was going to cause the demise of wolverines.  

After all, there are only 318 wolverines remaining in the lower 48. Worse, their reproducing number is probably around 40.  These amazing creatures are on the brink. Surely we can come together to say there is room in Montana for all of us.

Then I remember a public hearing not long ago on that very topic except it was grizzly bear habitat and not wolverines. After a question, one biker said, “The bears have had these mountains for thousands of years and it is our turn now.”  

I want to be clear that I support biking, but just not in critical wilderness. And I can’t help wondering about the origin of this sense of “our turn now” entitlement.  

All my life I have loved Broadway musicals. I have a bazillion favorites, but “South Pacific” is near the top. A particular song, reflecting on racism, comes to mind. Evidently, back in 1949, Rodgers and Hammerstein had to fight to keep it included in the Broadway production.  

“You’ve got to be taught to hate and fear,
You’ve got to be taught from year to year,
It’s got to be drummed in your dear little ear—
You’ve got to be carefully taught!”

If one is so dismissive of the land community and so irreverent of species that are teetering on the edge of extinction, how is such an attitude being taught and where is it being nurtured? Children are not born with it.

It takes only a couple hours of watching evening TV to find one answer. 

Just settling in to relax and catch a little news, one is subjected to mass advertising of automobiles speeding through beautiful streams spraying muddy water every-which-way; trucks pulling every kind of trailer filled with every kind of cargo driving breakneck down a dirt road grinding ruts into fragile landscapes; built-tough vehicles crossing huge rocks, spinning straight up steep hills, and parking on the tops of mesas.  

Oh, yes. Let’s go places. And it appears that Americans are hooked.

Recently, we learned that the mountain goat population of Glacier Park is plummeting right along with the glaciers. We are also learning that appropriate locations for the Winter Olympics are plummeting along with snowfall.  We all weep a tear for the goats, but a minute later we go into high gear figuring out how to make snow and ice, not just for Winter Olympics but for winter enthusiasts everywhere.  

Never mind that this requires yet more water and energy. And just as grim, we now hear proposals to buy and turn ski areas into fancy non-snow recreation areas – with lots of mechanical/industrial opportunities which would enable the invasion of yet more habitat of struggling wildlife species – like mountain goats and wolverines.

If we want to counter this attitude of disregarding the natural world we must be more effective in our teaching its beauty, fragility, and overwhelming importance in our own well-being. It is a matter of paying attention. It is a matter of being carefully taught.

We have a wonderful opportunity in April to celebrate this country’s 55th Earth Day, and learn the latest about ecosystems, the natural earth, opportunities galore that are desperate for our help, and above all, that we are beginning to put our own human species at risk.

We’ve got to be carefully taught and we must strive to carefully teach. As they say, if we can be taught to hate we can be taught to love.

Dorothy Bradley was elected to the Montana Legislature at 23-years-old. She was a successful lawmaker who went on to run for governor as a Democrat in 1992. She is now a retired attorney living in Clyde Park. She served 16 years in the Montana Legislature.