Re: greenyes-d Digest V99 #61
Tanis Skislak (tskisl@yahoo.com)
Wed, 3 Mar 1999 05:19:40 -0800 (PST)
Dear H. If we base this discussion on the premise that all people
should feel guilty for driving a car and that it should be a furtive
act along with eating red meat, smoking cigarettes, etc misses the
point. If we are to get your everyday US citizen to tune in to the
message, we cannot go immediately to an extreme. Very few people want
to embrace having to feel guilty about driving a car. The way our
communities are set up, especially those of us in suburban sprawl, it
makes us shiver and grimace to think about the daily management of our
lives without a car: taking our children to all of their events,
getting to work and back, taking sick children or older parents to the
doctor, buying groceries, running errands, etc. It isn't a matter of
ditching the transport, it's a matter of improving the transport. In
the 1970s, energy conservation wasn't promoted and accepted by showing
people freezing in their homes (the threat of what would happen if
they did not conserve energy); it was sold showing people warm and
cozy, thereby conveying the message that you can do what is right
without sacrificing your comfort by making little changes which have a
big effect in the aggregate. I believe we now call that "Think
Globally, Act Locally". Haranguing people with truth in the extreme
will not win the mainstreamers.
_________________________________________________________
DO YOU YAHOO!?
Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com