I've never looked at it as such.
I am a conservationist not a environmentalist, this doesn't mean I am pro-pollution.
I suppose words can mean different things to different people. To me, a conservationist is one who desires to conserve that which we consume. An environmentalist is concerned with ALL of nature, not just that which we eat, drink, or breathe. It is of course well known that the food chain exist, and if we mess up any part of that chain, that which we consume will suffer as well. That is where I don't follow the logic of those who view "environmentalists" as some whacked out tree hugger. Of course there ARE people like that, but to me they are simply whacked out tree huggers...
Many of our fore-fathers were conservationists.
I believe they were that and more...
Simple scientific study, and about 100 divers participate each year. You are given a 1 foot square box of wood which you place over a grid and count how many EM plants are growing in that box. Continue that process over your designated area and report the results when you return back to the surface.
After a few years of doing this, I got fed up! One day, I returned to the surface with a bag filled with those weeds and reported a count of ZERO Eurasian Millfoil plants in my sector.
What the heck are we doing? Documenting how 'evil man' is destroying the evironment, or are we doing something about it?
Since my wife and I enjoyed SCUBA diving in that lake almost every weekend, care to guess what happened to the population of that plant?
Question: What was the important goal?
1) Remove the problem.
2) Document how evil man is?