Rachel's Democracy & Health News #854  [Printer-friendly version]
May 11, 2006

ENVIRONMENT IS TOP PRIORITY FOR ONLY 2% OF AMERICANS

[Rachel's introduction: At first glance, the numbers may make
"environment" look like a loser as a basis for building a social
movement. But look again.]

By Peter Montague

For Earthday, the New York Times reminded us on April 23 (Section 4,
pg. 14) of something uncomfortable but important: the general public
no longer has "the environment" high on its list of worries or
concerns.

Of course the Times had done its part to lull everyone to sleep about
such things. For example, the Times reported April 23 that "water
pollution and toxic waste" are "both now largely controlled." Oh? And
what of the 4.24 billion pounds of 650 different toxic
chemicals released into the U.S. environment during 2004?

In that same story the Times reported the results of two nationwide
telephone opinion surveys, one by CBS News and one by Gallup. The
results could help us all to realize how isolated and out of touch
with the mainstream many of us have become.

Here are the general public's ranking of "most important problems
facing the United States:"

War in Iraq -- 27%
Economy and jobs -- 13%
Immigration -- 7%
Terrorism -- 6%
Health care -- 5%
President Bush -- 4%
Gas/heating oil crisis -- 4%
Poverty & homelessness -- 4%
Education -- 3%
Moral and family values -- 2%
Environment -- 2%
The military & defense -- 2%
Budget deficit/national debt -- 2%

These numbers add up to only 82% and the Times did not explain the
missing 18%.

At first glance, the numbers may make "environment" look like a loser
as a basis for building a social movement. But look again. If
environmentalists were to form an alliance with people concerned
about jobs (13%) and health (5%) -- that would boost the troops to
20% of the public -- more than enough to pull off a full-scale
revolution (non-violent of course). If you add to that the people
whose top priority is the energy crisis (4%) and poverty (4%) you've
got 28% of the public in your camp -- essentially 1/3 of everyone.
That's about a hundred million people.

So environmentalism isn't dead. It's just lonely and needs more
friends. Let hope this can become a wake-up call to us all. It's time
to climb out of our bunkers, rub our eyes and look around, then set
off to find likely friends and allies, send out ambassadors from our
group (whatever group we're in) to other issue-groups, then forge ways
to work together and support each other. Is there any other way to
build a movement?