At 01:58 PM 4/30/98 -0800, Gar Lipow wrote: >I hold no brief for the Sierra Club, the largest of the corporate environmentalist >groups. But the 40% vote for the anti-immigrant rule is not completely reflective of >their membership. From what I understand there was a massive last minute purchase >of memberships by right wing groups to push for this initiative. (Anyone can join >the Sierra Club.) As David Browder proved, your fundamental point is correct -- >there is massive racism within mainstream environmentalism. I wouldn't fall prey to the idea that all of those who voted for the anti- immigrant rule are conscious, deliberate racists (not that this is what you are claiming) -- even though, of course, it's not the intentions of those who support this policy but the objective consequences of supporting it that really matter. A couple of relatives of mine who basically fit in with the standard Sierra Club profile -- post-60's patrician liberals who are into gamelan music and eco-tourist trips to Nepal -- voted in favor of the anti-immigrant rule, and however much I tried to convince them of the wrongheadedness of this policy and its objectively racist content, from their liberal point of view they were horrified to be associated with racism. John Gulick Ph. D. Candidate Sociology Graduate Program University of California-Santa Cruz (415) 643-8568 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
