Terrorists strike New Mexico

[tazo]

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,96627,00.html

The ELF or Earth Liberation Front, a pseudo-terrorist group that seeks to eradicate environmental problems by causing more of them, has struck again! This time in at a New Mexico Land Rover dealership, where they spray painted words such as glutton and shamelessly plugged their organization with ELF.

Personally I am getting tired of these people; them and the ALF, a very similarly acting 'organization' which recently released thousands of minks which resulted in local livestock being murdered.

*sigh*

[rainman::|:|]

i see both sides of it. arguably, the ELF and ALF (they are two different things) have done good things in the past... not everything they do has good or better-than-not results, which is probably the result of poor planning. in the case of the times they *do* do good things, it's a question of whether the end justifies the means, and in most cases i agree with the ALF, and some with the ELF. i would champion anyone who spikes logging equipment to protect our invaluable forests from being stolen (we kind of need them to live). but while mink farming is a horrible act of animal cruelty, releasing them into the wild is a rash action.

pnw

[tazo]

What annoys me is that these people like the ALF and the ELF wantonly disregard the fact these things they destroy are people's property, and their means of living. It vexates me to no end to hear that almost all of a dealership's cars are now unsellable because a terrorist group thinks they are damaging the environment. Doesn't burning hundreds of SUVs and using spray paint cause a lot of damage to the environment? I suppose its just another way these "people" consider their actions better than those around them.
Hypocrites. :rolleyes:

[iJon]

yeah all this crap is stupid. the animal thing reminds me of 28 days later when with releasing the monkeys and then london going bye bye.

iJon

[MrMacMan]

tazo -- I haven't talked much in these discussions because in the past the ELF has got blasted, I agree that driving 6 MPG SUV's is going to destroy the environment.

Look even though I disagree with the head Members in how to show people these monsters shouldn't be on the road.

Personally I agree with a slash and run over burning cars.

I am afilliated with the ELF, current there is no Long Island Division. :rolleyes:

That doesn't mean I will not be protesting when a Hummer Dealership opens up near me.

[iJon]

im gonna ask my biology teacher monday how he feels about the whole suv thing. he has a phd and went to west point, he has pretty insightful and his point of view will be interesting. in my years, i have seen more people driving poor ass hoopties who need some serious smog checks than the nice h2's and suburbans. i was driving the suburban to a football game tonight and it reminded me what i used it for. i felt if a civic hybrid could hold 8 people and even more stuff in the back as well as pull huge trailers (which is all stuff that i do) than we wouldnt need suv's anymore.

iJon

[Daveman Deluxe]

Destruction of property won't prove anything. I consider myself an "environmentalist" but find the actions of such groups as the ELF and ALF (at least the highly-publicized ones like this) detestable. It's a waste of energy.

Destruction of property, and therefore, the owner's livelihood, will only make people more resistant to the activists' views.

The best way to create meaningful change is to organize boycotts and to get the ear of politicians. It's hard (our system of government is deliberately conservative) but in the long run it works.

[zimv20]

i don't condone the ELF action. but i don't think it's terrorism. vandalism, yes. but to me, terrorism involves:
1. actions against civilians
2. causing great fright and paranoia among the general population
3. having a political agenda

ELF has #3, but not the first two.

[tazo]

Originally posted by zimv20
i don't condone the ELF action. but i don't think it's terrorism. vandalism, yes. but to me, terrorism involves:
1. actions against civilians
2. causing great fright and paranoia among the general population
3. having a political agenda

ELF has #3, but not the first two.

I vehemently disagree; the ELF has all of those qualities.

That dealership owns those suv's that were burner, so indirectly they involved civilians.

If I owned an SUV or even a dealership I would be pretty scared of these people. I of course loosely use the term 'people' ;)

Irrefragably there is a political agenda driving the ELF and ALF

-tazo

[artificiallife]

Originally posted by MrMacman

Personally I agree with a slash and run over burning cars.


Why? So tire companies have to produce more tires, thereby creating dangerous byproducts and releasing more chemicals into our atmosphere?

Just let it be, you're only making it worse.

[mod. edit - Insults are not allowed.]

[Independence]

Originally posted by artificiallife
Why? So tire companies have to produce more tires, thereby creating dangerous byproducts and releasing more chemicals into our atmosphere?

Just let it be, you're only making it worse.
i wholeheartedly agree.

[mactastic]

Originally posted by artificiallife
Why? So tire companies have to produce more tires, thereby creating dangerous byproducts and releasing more chemicals into our atmosphere?

Just let it be, you're only making it worse.

You are just as bad if you advocate the contunued, unfettered production of gas-guzzelers.

Not that I condone ELF actions, I don't. In fact there is an 11 page thread in the wasteland that I started when the dealership in SD got hit. Before you guys rehash everything we said 2 weeks ago, you might want to review it.

Ashamed to be on the same side as these guys. (http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=35967)

It's in the wasteland because people couldn't keep from calling each other idiots and other such nonsense.

[cubist]

If the SUVs are so bad, politicians should enact a big gas tax increase to pay for improved park maintenance and conservation. Remember what happened to big cars in the 70s/80s? Big gas price increases killed them.

[zimv20]

Originally posted by tazo

That dealership owns those suv's that were burner, so indirectly they involved civilians.


doesn't count. civilians aren't the targets. property is the target.


If I owned an SUV or even a dealership I would be pretty scared of these people.

again, doesn't count. it's not the general population. plus, the owners don't have claim to a reasonable fear about themselves being harmed. only their property and business.

applying your logic, everyone who ever shoplifted, peed on your lawn, or hit someone in a bar is a terrorist.

[Moxiemike]

Originally posted by zimv20
i don't condone the ELF action. but i don't think it's terrorism. vandalism, yes. but to me, terrorism involves:
1. actions against civilians
2. causing great fright and paranoia among the general population
3. having a political agenda

ELF has #3, but not the first two.

I couldn't help but see your qualities for what is terrorism and think "hmmm does that make the US terrorist for our strikes in Iraq? Let's see:

1. action against civilians.

There are reports that more than 20,000 civilians were injured in this latest Iraq war. A maximum of about 7800 deaths. Some good info can be found here:

http://www.iraqbodycount.net/

2. Causing great fright and paranoia amongs the general population.

It seems like the Iraqi people are not happy with America's occupation of their country. They're getting testy, and wondering when the supposed benefits of their liberation will take place.

3. Having a political agenda.

Well, there are many! Removing Saddam. War against "terrorism" which is such an abstract—and it makes me sick that America is fighting abstracts with concrete things such as bombs. The oil situation—Halliburton being given contracts to help "rebuild' Iraq. And a more ethereal concept—Bush piggybacking rabid patriotism in a post 9-11 america to get support and possible gain leverage in the next election because of this war.


As such, is America really any better than Al Qaeda, the IRA, the PLO or the Moussad??

[Sayhey]

terrorism is such a loaded term it, IMHO, shouldn't be used to discribe vandals and idiots. Its indiscriminate use of the word downplays the real threat of folks who are willing to engage in mass murder of innocents. When the fools in ELF start blowing up people I will agree the term is justified.

[pseudobrit]

Hmm 3000+ dead in firey plane crashes vs. spray paint on a few new cars...

Yup, it all sounds like the same terrorism to me...
:rolleyes:

Do you remember the 80's at all?

Oh, no, you were three. Well I do, and I remember the big kids used to love to spray paint stuff all the time. It was like sport for them; a rite of passage.

There's still a ****load of graffiti on the cement pillars underneath the Rte. 30 bridge near where I grew up. I guess you'd call it "ground zero" though, being the site of so much terrorist activity.

Get real.

[Desertrat]

Your time is your only capital. You spend time to do business, to acquire the money to pay your rent and buy food.

And to buy your car, of whatever sort.

Anybody who costs you money, through looting or vandalism, is effectively saying that some part of your life is meaningless to them. It's rarely safe to say that to someone's face, which is why these cowards do their nighttime hit-and-run...

ELF and ALF are nothing more than a bunch of nihilists who have deluded themselves into believing that their version of environmentalism is the Only Way. Arrogant, sleazoid trash is about as close to polite as I can get in describing that ratpack.

A small minority of SUVs get 8 mpg. Most are 20 mpg or more. What's the mpg on a 747? A train? A semi?

How come the only "bad vehicles" are those of private individuals? For over 20 years, now, I've heard some refrain against the personal freedom as to choice of what one drives, or when or where. "Restrain the individual's freedom" seems to be more important than actually looking at other uses of transportation fuel...

'Rat

[groovebuster]

Originally posted by Desertrat
Anybody who costs you money, through looting or vandalism, is effectively saying that some part of your life is meaningless to them.

In their opinion maybe you are doing the same with your way of life to their life quality. By driving a SUV and wasting resources you damage the environment more than necessary which has a direct influence on their life quality in the mid- and long-term. So some part of their lifes is meaningless to others, following your definition.

Those people are highly frustrated, because they don't see any change, it's just getting worse all the time. The industry has no interest in changing things and has a strong Lobby.

So don't be too self-righteous. It really depends on the point of view. They just switched to "pay-back" mode. If that is appropriate is discussable, but I don't like your attitude that these people don't care for other people. Maybe they care way more for other people with their goals than any of those streamlined consumer citizens who fill the pockets of the industry managers and politicians without asking questions or caring about their future in a toxic wasteland without resources...

groovebuster

[mactastic]

Originally posted by groovebuster
In their opinion maybe you are doing the same with your way of life to their life quality. By driving a SUV and wasting resources you damage the environment more than necessary which has a direct influence on their life quality in the mid- and long-term. So some part of their lifes is meaningless to others, following your definition.

Those people are highly frustrated, because they don't see any change, it's just getting worse all the time. The industry has no interest in changing things and has a strong Lobby.

So don't be too self-righteous. It really depends on the point of view. They just switched to "pay-back" mode. If that is appropriate is discussable, but I don't like your attitude that these people don't care for other people. Maybe they care way more for other people with their goals than any of those streamlined consumer citizens who fill the pockets of the industry managers and politicians without asking questions or caring about their future in a toxic wasteland without resources...

groovebuster

Well said. There is indeed more than one point of view to be considered here.

[Desertrat]

"In their opinion maybe you are doing the same with your way of life to their life quality. By driving a SUV and wasting resources you damage the environment more than necessary which has a direct influence on their life quality in the mid- and long-term."

Yeah. Their opinion. They define an SUV as waste. I want to know who gave them these godlike powers to define reality for others?

SUVs are so far down the list of damaging anything that to be a vandal from one's arrogance is just really pathetic.

Use of petroleum products? We'd be better served if we didn't have foreign military pilots in training over here--as a for-instance. Air pollution? There are multitudes of far-worse sources. Like I've said before, all these symbolic efforts strike at personal freedoms.

So I'm not being at all self-righteous. It's this claque of nihilistic twerps that are full of self-righteousness--and they're arrogant in it. They're no different from any religious fundamentalist.

'Rat

[pseudobrit]

Originally posted by Desertrat
Their opinion. They define an SUV as waste. I want to know who gave them these godlike powers to define reality for others?

It's just stuff, dude. It's property, sure, but it's not life.

It's a sick world where the things you own become the things that own you, and that's what you're saying we are; a world where possessions are time and time is life.

I'm sorry, I just don't make the same connections between life and my ****. I've got a different set of values, perhaps less materialistic.

[groovebuster]

Originally posted by Desertrat
Yeah. Their opinion. They define an SUV as waste. I want to know who gave them these godlike powers to define reality for others?
Who gave you the godlike powers to define their reality?

Originally posted by Desertrat
SUVs are so far down the list of damaging anything that to be a vandal from one's arrogance is just really pathetic.
They are a symbol... maybe? ;) Would you prefer that they shut down a whole coal fired power plant?

Originally posted by Desertrat
Use of petroleum products? We'd be better served if we didn't have foreign military pilots in training over here--as a for-instance. Air pollution? There are multitudes of far-worse sources. Like I've said before, all these symbolic efforts strike at personal freedoms.
What you don't seem to get, all the little things sum up. And maybe you should do the math for once. Considering how much fuel a SUV needs compared to a smaller vehicle, just calculate how much gas could havebeen saved during it's life-cycle... It's always little things, you know? And it is the little things that have to change (in the personal environment) first to make people understand

Originally posted by Desertrat
So I'm not being at all self-righteous. It's this claque of nihilistic twerps that are full of self-righteousness--and they're arrogant in it. They're no different from any religious fundamentalist.

Reread your post from the beginning and you'll see that you are exactly what you are accusing those fellows of... You're not less a fundamentlist and nihilistic than they are, you are just standing on the other side of the fence, defining your personal freedom through doing whatever you like to to your environment to keep up your personal comfort...

The only solution possible is to discuss and to find comprimises. You already showed that you are not even able to listen (and you are probably one of many) ... so actually I don't wonder that people who care about their environment start to take more drastic measures.

Please, at least try once to see both sides... it makes things way easier! ;)

groovebuster

[mactastic]

Originally posted by Desertrat
They're no different from any religious fundamentalist.


And there were a lot of people who agreed with the principles Judge Roy Moore advocated, yet condemned his tactics. I think you were among those who said he was doing the right thing, just in the wrong way, if you'll allow me to paraphrase.

I and others feel the same way about the people who did this to the SUVs. I abhor their tactics, but I agree with the principle that they are fighting for. I sure don't recall you using name-calling when those religious "twerps" were having their Jesus love-in on the steps of the Alabama courthouse. Maybe it's because you disagree with this group's philosophy, and you agreed with Moore's?

[Taft]

Originally posted by Desertrat
"In their opinion maybe you are doing the same with your way of life to their life quality. By driving a SUV and wasting resources you damage the environment more than necessary which has a direct influence on their life quality in the mid- and long-term."

Yeah. Their opinion. They define an SUV as waste. I want to know who gave them these godlike powers to define reality for others?

SUVs are so far down the list of damaging anything that to be a vandal from one's arrogance is just really pathetic.

Use of petroleum products? We'd be better served if we didn't have foreign military pilots in training over here--as a for-instance. Air pollution? There are multitudes of far-worse sources. Like I've said before, all these symbolic efforts strike at personal freedoms.

So I'm not being at all self-righteous. It's this claque of nihilistic twerps that are full of self-righteousness--and they're arrogant in it. They're no different from any religious fundamentalist.

'Rat

First, look up nihilism. These people have both a) a belief that certain things in this society are damaging our environment permenantly and b) a want to destroy such things. Maybe if their efforts were to bring down society as a whole via key tactical strikes, I could agree with you.

You can call their methods abhorable, their mentally messed up, whatever. But they aren't nihalists.

As to your assertion that restricting SUV's is simply a thinly veiled attempt at stripping citizens of their civil liberties, I wholeheartedly disagree with you.

Civil liberties (ie. the freedom for a person to act in any way they want) are a very good thing. However, they have their limit: when a person acts in such a way as to harm others or society as a whole, they have overstepped the bounds of civil liberties.

I believe that when a person makes a choice that is detrimental to our environment, they are overstepping the bounds of civil liberties. They are, IMO, harming society. Now, EVERYONE makes some decisions that harm the environment. What I believe our government's responsibility to be is to set the societal standard for what we consider an unlawful harm to our environment.

You could argue that prohibiting the dumping of nuclear waste into a national forest is a infraction on civil liberties. Most people would disagree with you, however, because they see the clearcut harm to society. Many people, myself included, view our society's dependance on oil and other nasty fossil fuels as a harm to our environment and, as a result, a harm to society. An obvious extension to this is opposition to the truly greedy forms of transportation out there. Hence my dislike of SUVs, which are some of the most gas hungry private vehicles on the road.

Your points to other forms of wasteful transportation aren't all that accurate. A truck transporting vegetables from Florida to Michigan isnt' comparable to a single person driving a SUV to work. One is an example of distribution necessity and its cost to the environment is spread across all the producers and distributers of the vegetables as well as the consumers of those goods, the other is an individual making a daily choice where the cost to the environment is put solely on that individual's head.

Similarly in an airplane, there are issues of practicality and dispersement of cost to the environment. Biking, driving, walking, etc. from NY to Cali. are all infeasible for most people in most situations. And lets say the 400 people who can fit on a 747 decided to all drive instead. How efficient would THAT be compared to all of them packed into a single airplane.

Taft

[Desertrat]

Hey, I've been watching the rabid environmentalist groups since before Ingrid Newkirk came from England and started PETA. I go back to David Brower's days with the Sierra Club, before he broke away. I've heard about every argument that's been made, pro and con, on multitudes of enviro-subjects. Logging, dams/reservoirs, air pollution, water pollution...You name it.

Anyhow, if you want to get rid of low gas-mileage vehicles of whatever sort, lobby Congress and get out the vote. That's everybody's right. Vandalism ain't. And the rhetoric of the vandals is indeed nihilistic. They apparently don't think that "normal democratic processes" will get them their way, so they don't care how bad they make things for everybody else. Tear it down! Rebuild a Green World!

Dunno who's gonna feed'em...

Having a house is materialistic? My tools? My dirtwork equipment? My various vehicles? They're "using stuff", not just "possessions". Sure, there are those who do the keep up with the Jones stuff, but they have the freedom to be idjits if they want to. So do you. But if you like housing, clothes, transportation and a few knicknacks around the house, you're as materialistic as I am.

I don't recall much in the way of comments of mine about Judge Moore, other than a great deal of ambivalence about the whole deal. Mostly, I don't see the harm in religious plaques, anywhere. I wouldn't feel threatened by non-Christians' precepts in a court house--even if I noticed them. But ever since I saw 4-star generals all nervous about ICBMs during the Hungarian Crisis in 1957, I haven't felt very threatened by much of anything.

Sheesh! Somewhere well over 200 million passenger vehicles in this country, and idjits foment over a thousand Hummers!

:D, 'Rat

[mactastic]

Originally posted by Desertrat

Sheesh! Somewhere well over 200 million passenger vehicles in this country, and idjits foment over a thousand Hummers!

:D, 'Rat

Hey, there's millions of religious references all over this country, and a few "idjits" were fomenting over a 2.5 ton rock. It takes all kinds.:D

[Taft]

Originally posted by Desertrat
Anyhow, if you want to get rid of low gas-mileage vehicles of whatever sort, lobby Congress and get out the vote. That's everybody's right. Vandalism ain't. And the rhetoric of the vandals is indeed nihilistic. They apparently don't think that "normal democratic processes" will get them their way, so they don't care how bad they make things for everybody else. Tear it down! Rebuild a Green World!

I do agree with you that they are using inappropriate (to say the least) methods.

But they are NOT nihilists. Nihilism is the belief in nothing or the belief that political and societal institutions should be torn down (in the traditional definition, for the sake of nothingness itself, though some definitions I've read have overtones of anarchy in them).

ELF and ALF do have beliefs and, rather than wanting to tear society down, they tactically target specific organizations, businesses and communities who they judge to be damaging the environment. So they have beliefs and don't want to tear down society. Ergo, they aren't nihilists.

Now I've heard some ELF members utter some pretty stupid remarks (surprise, surprise, right?) about taking down capitalism and such. But they are the fringe of the fringe, so to speak. ELF as an organization has a very specific agenda whose ultimate goal is to protect the environment from society, not to take society as we know it down.

The reason I'm harping on the point is that people often find it very convenient to label their extreme opponents nihilists in order to undercut their point. I mean, whose going to listen to a person who believes in nothing?? Nusseeng, Lebowski, NUSSEENG!! ... sorry, couldn't help myself. ;)

And with these clowns, do you really need to use those types of attacks to make your point? I'm pretty sure most people here agree they're a bunch of extremist idiots, even if they do have a somewhat nobel end goal.

Taft

[zimv20]

Originally posted by Desertrat

Anyhow, if you want to get rid of low gas-mileage vehicles of whatever sort, lobby Congress and get out the vote.

i wish it were that easy. seems like grass roots movements are all but impotent against the lobbies. but that's another discussion entirely.

[wwworry]

but that's another discussion entirely.

actually that's the entire discussion. What do you do when a few people with money and power totally close discussion and action about causes one cares about? Surely everyone reading this must care a little bit about this question, why read about politics and post on an internet bullitin board if not to have some effect?

Right now the auto industry, the auto workers unions and right wing know-nothings who see fuel inefficiency as personal freedom oppose CAFE standards. Why is this? It's enough of lobby so that congress will do nothing as soldiers die gaining control of oil. (you said it yourself 'rat, they are gaining control of oil [dieing] so that we might have our personal freedom)

It seems ELF paints themselves as a terrorist organization as a way to indicate how deeply held their beliefs are. Whatever. I think the problem is our new fear and revulsion of "terrorist organizations". Lest we forget our own late 18th century "terrorist" beginnings, the terrorist cells fighting against Hitler and the "terrorist" Nelson Mandela. It's just a word with adaptable meanings. We need not be afraid of the word "terrorist". We need to find a way to deal with people of varying beliefs and of varying strength of belief. Not everyone finds solice in the Mall.

What we need is true debate in congress. Let's get big money out by

requiring tv stations to broadcast campaign issues/debate for free

We own the airways. Why is our political system ****ed up so that tv stations make a lot of money on selling advertising? They should allow us real debate in order to have the privilage of broadcasting.

[frescies]

kinda preachy and self riteous, but true


http://www.stopsuvs.org/

[frescies]

Went to the ELF publication office website and on the list of actions they have this listed:


June 29, 2000. Bloomington, IN, USA
Crooked Creek Road timber sales had tree spiked.


What does that mean?

[Moxiemike]

Originally posted by frescies
Went to the ELF publication office website and on the list of actions they have this listed:


June 29, 2000. Bloomington, IN, USA
Crooked Creek Road timber sales had tree spiked.


What does that mean?

They embed spikes in trees so that when loggers go at them with chainsaws they get a surprise.

Not a very cool thing.... can seriously injure loggers.

[frescies]

I thought it referred to filling a hollowed out part of a tree with gunpowder or something.

[Desertrat]

And if a spiked tree gets to a sawmill, that six- or ten-foot sawblade can break all apart and send pieces of sharp steel all over the place. Several millhands have been seriously injured; I vaguely recall but won't say absolutely that one or two have been killed. (Washington or Oregon, maybeso ten-ish years back.)

There has been a lot of foolishness in our forestry management, whether the Smokey-the-Bear stuff that's led to the really bad fires, or clear-cutting on steep slopes and a lot of other stuff. But "no cutting" is just as stupid. Selective logging increases ecosystem complexity, generally regarded by the biologists as much better than monocultures.

Taft, I'll accept your larger picture, re nihilism. But the few ALF/ELF types I was briefly around in Austin, Texas, sounded quite happy with a torn-down world...

Sorta tied to SUVs: I was watching the Speed Channel, briefly, last night. There was a comment that Ford has some new version of the F150 pickup, that they're gonna introduce with a $200 million ad campaign. I'm guessing that they won't spend as much for their new hybrid that's coming out in Nov/Dec.

Funny about the rise of 4WD pickups and SUVs. I've watched the shift from drag-racing on the street to off-road. In the late '70s lots of city folks were getting into 4WD stuff. In 1984, Toyota created a bobtailed pickup with an enclosed body and called it the "4Runner". Chevy and Ford had been successful with the Blazer and bronco, but they were popular mostly with those who actually needed such an animal. Pickups got ever more popular with the resurgence of C/W music--go figure. All the other car companies got into the act, including Mercede and Porsche!

But always remember that car makers build what sells. They don't build some new toy on hope. They respond to demand. They're no different from a house-builder--the location of a subdivision might be speculative, but the houses are in demand by people looking for a new home.

Weaning the public out of SUVs ("Sport!" ?) is gonna take a lot of effort to create a conservation ethic. Various folks/groups have been trying for a long time, with little success. An oil crisis and gas rationing might indeed make a change.

'Rat

[zimv20]

Originally posted by Desertrat

Weaning the public out of SUVs ("Sport!" ?) is gonna take a lot of effort to create a conservation ethic. Various folks/groups have been trying for a long time, with little success. An oil crisis and gas rationing might indeed make a change.


indeed. i'm in favor of simply rolling back some of the oil industry subsidies so that the market can start reflecting the actual price of a gallon of gas.

that'd increase demand for better mileage vehicles in a hurry.

[mactastic]

Originally posted by Desertrat

But always remember that car makers build what sells. They don't build some new toy on hope. They respond to demand. They're no different from a house-builder--the location of a subdivision might be speculative, but the houses are in demand by people looking for a new home.


And we are now dealing with the results of letting the market decide where houses get built. Sprawl. Higher housing costs. Longer commutes that contribute to more smog. Bland suburban development. Decaying city cores.

The demand is there for a lot of things that society deems off limits for one reason or another. I'm sure there's quite a few people who would like to be able to own military hardwear. We don't let them. It appears the demand never slows for pornography, and not just the nice makin-whoopee kinds, I mean the serious illegal stuff... little kids, forced sex acts, vouyerism. The market is there, but we have decided that decency requires us to be vigilant in keeping it off limits. So when you say the demand is there for SUV's, that doesn't mean that it logically follows that we should allow or encourage them IMHO.

[Desertrat]

mac, I follow your meaning (I think), but it seems a bad analogy. The SUV is a "bad" form of transportation (Better, maybe, to say "inefficient"? Thinking of both fuel and investment cost.). Private transportation is demanded throughout society.

Pornography such as you describe is outlawed because of the revulsion throughout society.

And, like it or not, the demand for "sprawl" housing is increasing at a rapid pace. "Five acres, five miles from town" has become the modern American dream for millions of people. Technology has made that ever more possible, what with wind and solar energy, plus propane. All you need then is a water well...Sure has messed some of my old coyote-hunting country. :(

'Rat

[mactastic]

I though the analogy was apt, since what I was describing were the "bad" forms of pornography. There are some good forms IMHO.