With Friends Like Bobby Kennedy, Jr., Do the Animals and the Environment Really Need Enemies?

Although he likes to gallivant across the country as a self-anointed defender of the environment and animals, Bobby Kennedy, Jr.'s (See photo) recent speech in San Francisco before the disreputable Sierra Club revealed some disturbing incongruities in his thinking.

First of all, when he writes that "... we're not protecting the environment for the sake of the fishes and birds and trees. We're protecting it for our own sake because it's the infrastructure of our communities and because it enriches us," he reveals himself to be nearly as morally and intellectually bankrupt as the polluters and animal-annihilators that he is attacking. To fully comprehend the enormity of his faux pas, Kennedy's views should be contrasted with the breathtakingly beautiful lyrics to "Colors of the Wind" which Stephen Schwartz penned for Disney's Pocahontas:

You think you own whatever land you land on
The earth is just a dead thing you can claim
But I know every rock and tree and creature
Has a life, has a spirit, has a name.

Further along in verse four, Schwartz adds:

Come roll in all the riches all around you
And for once, never wonder what they're worth.

Writers as far back as Aristotle (The History of Animals) and as recent as Darwin have known that animals have souls. The overwhelming preponderance of modern research confirms that animals are not very much different from man. They nurture and educate their young; they have language and reasoning skills; they possess a sense of self-awareness; and, they mourn the deaths of loved ones. It is therefore clear that anyone who treats either the environment or the animals as merely inanimate objects is not only morally incorrect but also committing a grievous intellectual error which is bound to have dire consequences. More importantly, anyone serious about either the animals or the environment must first recognize the intrinsic value of both of them and then be willing to work to secure their protection through the enactment of laws which respect their uniqueness as distinguished from man's exploitative interest in them.

Secondly, Kennedy's effusive praise of free market capitalism as being good for the environment is an outright lie and he knows it to be such. For starters, with American politics being a thoroughly corrupt as it is, there is little chance of anyone taking away the polluters' welfare checks or subsidies as Kennedy calls them. Furthermore, capitalists are only part of the problem. What about their ugly-ass partners in the rape of nature, the insatiable middle class? No one forces consumers to drive gas-guzzling SUVs and pickup trucks or to consume animal flesh. Kennedy, however, does not have the intestinal fortitude to call consumers to account for their greed and destruction of nature. If the hoi polloi had their way there would be an oil derrick on every lawn in America and anyone venturing outside for a noontime stroll would need a respirator and night-vision goggles just to breathe and see through the pollution.

Thirdly, being a Roman Catholic, Kennedy slams the idea of worshiping nature as god in spite of the undeniable fact that neither the Christians' nor the Jews' record on either the environment or animal rights is very positive. In fact, back in 1969 historian Lynn White laid the blame for the destruction of the environment squarely at the feet of the religious establishment (See his seminal work, The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis). From what little information that has survived the Christians' obliteration campaign, the pagans, including in particular Native Americans, seem to have been far more environmentally and animal friendly than any of their conquerors.

Fourthly, despite all of his long-windedness, Kennedy offers absolutely no game plan as to how either the environment or the animals are to be saved. For instance, how is power to be taken back from the polluters? How are the abattoirs to be shut down and the rifles of the trophy hunters silenced? How is consumer greed to be curbed? How can there even be free elections and free speech when the rich and powerful own the election process, nearly all politicians, and all mass media? While he is quick to lambaste Bush and the Republicans, are his fellow Democrats any less opposed to environmentalism and animal rights? Likewise, Kennedy does not hesitate to slam Evangelicals but are the Jews and his beloved Roman Catholics any less bigoted, greedy, and corrupt? He is simply too hypocritical and, above all, too cowardly to hold them accountable for their crimes.

Finally, in accepting the Bill Douglas Award from the Sierra Club, Kennedy has joined forces with an organization which is not only pro-war (Iraq) but pro-hunting as well. It was only last summer that the unscrupulous Sierra Club attempted to strike a deal with the diabolical National Rifle Association (NRA) whereby it would support hunters' rights in exchange for the latter's support of its conservation activities. The big losers in this Faustian bargain would have been, of course, the millions of defenseless animals that the Sierra Club attempted to sell down the river. Hilariously enough, the NRA wisely decided that the Sierra Club was too corrupt even for it to do business with and queered the deal at the last minute. (See, NRA and Outdoor Writers Have Falling Out, Washington Post, 10 July 2004).

The sad truth about both the environmental and animal rights movements is that with the notable exceptions of the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) and the Earth Liberation Front (ELF), most of the groups involved are unwilling to do either the hard thinking or the trench work required in order to save Mother Earth and the animals. Tant pis, they are often corrupt and quick as lightning to sell out.

Photo: Sierra Club