Posted on 09/18/2017 4:43:38 PM PDT by Jagermonster
WORKING TOGETHER
To many Americans, conservatism and environmentalism are mutually exclusive ideologies. But to residents of Virginia's Middle Peninsula, the two go hand-in-hand.
MATHEWS, SALUDA, AND URBANNA, VA.—Like his father, his grandfather, and his great-grandfather, J.C. Hudgins has spent his entire life in Mathews, Va., making his living off the Chesapeake Bay.
In the mornings, Captain Hudgins pulls up his crab pots and sells some 10 bushels to the nearby J&W Seafood on Gwynn’s Island. His afternoons are often filled with eco-tours, where he teaches passengers what it takes to be a sustainable crabber or oysterman aboard his boat “Risky Business II,” before settling in for the night with Fox News.
“It’s a living, but you don’t get rich,” says Hudgins, looking out at the water from his dock. “I’ve worked hard all my life, nobody has ever given me anything.”
That’s a sentiment Americans are accustomed to hearing from working-class conservatives. Hudgins’ opinions on environmental policy, however, take a sharp turn from the stance that many liberals associate with people from conservative communities. But to Hudgins and many of his neighbors living on Virginia’s Middle Peninsula, conservatism and conservation go hand-in-hand.
“I’m very frustrated that people think by default that Democrats are pro-environment and Republicans are not,” says Jack White, the chairman of the Board of Supervisors in Mathews County. “Conservation is at the heart of conservative principles. You're operating on the same root word.”
(Excerpt) Read more at csmonitor.com ...
The article seems to conflate conservationists with environmentalists. I don’t buy the premise. Conservation is focused, ie, panthers. Environmentalism wants to control inputs, outputs and anything related thereto.
My father was a stout conservative and conservationist. He grew up fishing, hunting and farming, and pursued all three into his 80’s. There is a big difference between a conservationist and environmentalist. A conservationist believes we are stewards of the earth and need to ensure nature is not destroyed, or we will be deprived of Nature’s bounty. Environmentalists view Nature as something to be worshipped, not used, and view conservationists as complicit with human “users”.
Exactly...habitat destruction is real. Just as EPA wacko over reach is real...
The whole purpose of conservatives is to conserve the liberties of the Constitution.
I remember going out on the Chesapeake Bay on the “Question Mark” in 1956. There was a raw oyster bar on board. I suppose they caught them from the boat.
Well said. I actually work for a national conservation organization and that’s exactly how I see it. Unfortunately it’s an endless battle to keep the leftists at bay.
The article seems to have one major intention - to bow to the “climate change agenda”.
“In the 21st century, the Virginia Chesapeake has experienced sea-level rise of 3 to 5 millimeters per year – a rate that exceeds the global average.”
This is false and not real science. It comes from uncorrected data that includes data taken from instruments that do not account for subsidence on the Chesapeakes shores; which in many places has been substantial. When corrected for the missing subsidence data, the “sea level rise” is negligible.
Thank you. I’m as hard core conservative as you can get, and I’m also an ardent conservationist. I hate environmentalism with a passion. God gave us natural resources to use wisely. Trees are a slow growing crop. Hunting controls animal populations and prevents them from dying or starvation after they eat everything in sight.
Tread lightly and use what God gave us.
Rappahannock & Piankatank rivers bump ..
So I do a lot of corporate events. I’ve noticed (between that and news) that the most effective and useful conservationists tend to be hunters/hunting groups. A real conservative, by nature, believes in proper use of land and maintaining a proper exploit-preserve balance.
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