I was flipping through Sierra magazine that my mom gets. I find that magazine extremely frustrating, as many of things in it are misleading. This magazine is probably not purposely misleading, as many environmentalists are deluded to believe in what they are doing. Many environmentalists seem to view the environment as a partisan thing, a contrast of bad or good. They see their policies as environmentally friendly versus their alternatives that are bad the environment. There is no middle-of-the-road for environmentalists. Such people have a heck of an ego, suggesting that one group of people live their lives in a certain way to benefit others that have little stake except for tourist enjoyment. You could argue that this is social engineering to the nth degree.

Maybe the question should be do want to tell the people in the West what to do with their forests? These forests are beautiful and pretty to see, but they aren't in the backyard of many environmentalists. Environmentalists instead suggest that there is a compelling national interest. They view westerners as a minority and dumb hicks who don't know how to manage their land. This is not unlike the Southern view to segregation prior to the 1950s: whites just know better. Liberals generally believe that pluralist standards are inapplicable to the environment, and only should be limited racial and sexual issues. The liberal standard is sexual deviance okay; forest management deviance is destructive. It is interesting how Sierra never seems to consider the issue of culture clash. To them, they are right, and everyone else is wrong. Plurality of values doesn't matter. They're an interest group, and if you disagree, youÕre their enemy and not just their competitor.

The magazine tries to talk about all these great environmentalist things, but they fall into the same trap that all non-environmentalists fall into: it's all about consumption. Flip through the magazine, and you'll find 'environmentally' friendly stuff from left to right, including kitty litter. Who knew kitty litter was an environmental problem, but I guess dumping it in the backwoods is a bad thing. All of these environmentally friendly products won't have a real effect on the environment. The people in Sierra advertise how wonderful mass-transit and how terrible sprawl is, but I'm sure many of their readers have nice suburban homes and sport utility vehicles to drive to work. It must feel good to be a member of the Sierra Club.

Real issues like reforming our societal organization, such as increasing population density and recycling by our biggest corporations are rarely discussed in the magazine. There is a lot about little things like personal responsibility and recycling, but little about the need for tougher laws on environmental crime or finding ways to force large institutions to change their consumption, reuse, and recycling patterns. Maybe in the future liberals will learn that environmental responsibility must first come on the backs of the big polluters: big government and big corporations.

At the end of the day, Sierra is too fake of a magazine. Instead of advocating real political change and citizen advocacy, it is advocating hybrid sport utility vehicles and biodegradable kitty litter. Politics must be more then scientific facts and ideology: it must be about passion. Our environment is so important: we must be constantly critically examining our policies relating to it.