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Show Will The Real Terrorists Please Stand Up? (Regarding Rick Crawford's letter in the Garfield County News Oct. 18 issue: "Another Kind of Terrorism") Mr. Crawford alleges that "domestic terrorists" are at work in "small areas" like "Escalante, Utah." And he is correct. These terrorists, though hardly rivaling Al Qaeda or Timothy McVeigh, are indeed responsible for a long list of misdeeds, including slashed tires, poisoned pets, "vandalism," sabotage," "pointless "point-less lawsuits," threatening phone calls, broken windows, broken windshields, broken doors, cut phone lines, death threats, and "gross misrepresentation misrepresen-tation or manipulation of facts and evidence," . . Who are these domestic terrorists? ter-rorists? They are the clandestine clandes-tine anti-environmentalist vandals van-dals and thugs of Escalante who have been attacking me, my partner Tori Woodard, and our friend and fellow environmentalist environmen-talist Juniper Allison for the past two-and-one-half years, ever since we committed the unpardonable unpar-donable sin of exercising our free speech rights (see Constitution, First Amendment) and speaking out for our beliefs. It is sad to see that Mr. Crawford, in the midst of his flagwaving support for "civil liberties," thinks that people should be "thrown into prison as an example" for daring to use the courts to get "injunctions"--i.e., for using legal means to oppose what they believe is wrong. Perhaps the judges who issued the unspecified injunctions injunc-tions should also be clapped into irons? One wonders exactly how Mr. Crawford thinks environmentalists environ-mentalists have "undermined. ..civil liberties" by exercising them. One wonders if Mr. Crawford would like reeducation re-education (or even concentration) concentra-tion) camps for his opponents. Indeed, is this were Germany, and the year 1935 instead of (See LETTERS on page 3-A) Letters To The Editor From Page 2-A 2001, one wonders if Mr. Crawford would be sporting a brown shirt, helping to load those with whom he disagrees into cattle cars. Fortunately, we live in a free country, with a Constitution that guarantees the "civil liberties" whose consequences Mr. Crawford so dislikes. Fortunately, there are environmentalists environ-mentalists who refuse to be intimidated by the "domestic terrorists" who live in places like Escalante environmentalists environmental-ists who stand up for freedom and the American way, as well as their environmental beliefs-environmentalists beliefs-environmentalists who show that those "cords of steel" of which Mr. Crawford speaks are still "pulsing today," while local descendants of pioneers skulk in the shadows, making anonymous anony-mous threats and throwing anonymous rocks. I suggest that Mr. Crawford try basing his next letter on some facts, instead of ideology. His notions of science, economics, econom-ics, the Constitution, and environmentalists envi-ronmentalists bear no relation to reality. In order to keep this letter let-ter reasonably short, however, I will confine myself to the last topic: the human reality of the Escalante environmentalists Mr. Crawford would like to see imprisoned. In the last paragraph of his letter, Mr. Crawford alleges that environmentalists "usually do not raise families, work positively posi-tively in a community, have religious reli-gious affiliations, or make good neighbors." What constitutes a "good neighbor" is a matter of opinion--apparently, thuggery and vandalism van-dalism are consistent with Mr. Crawford's notions of neighborly neighbor-ly behavior. The Constitution, which (the last time I noticed) strongly emphasizes the separa tion of church and state, does not require "religious affiliations" affilia-tions" of U.S. citizens or stigmatize stigma-tize those who do not belong to an organized church. In any case, Juniper views herself as having strong religious feelings though not yours, Mr. Crawford. As for working "positively in the community," we view ourselves our-selves as working very positively positive-ly unfortunately, the "community" "com-munity" itself if extremely negative. neg-ative. (Mr. Crawford's letter is a case in point.) Finally, it is usually usu-ally true that the most visible environmentalists those who sit in trees or block roads are not yet "raising families." That is because they are usually quite young almost children, in fact, though very brave ones. Older environmentalists do indeed raise families, albeit their families are "usually" small ones. For instance, Juniper has a grown daughter, and I have a grown son. Mr. Crawford seems not to have heard (and of course did not ask), but my son lived here in Escalante from October '98 to March '99. After six months of life here, he decided he did not like it, and, like virtually virtu-ally all the other 18-year-olds hereabouts, he headed for places with more to offer. So what keeps us here? Tori's health has greatly improved since '98. The rocks are still beautiful fortunately, they are harder to destroy than plants and wildlife. And there is our civic duty as good citizens to stand up to attitudes and actions which, if unopposed, have the potential to destroy the sound heart in our deteriorating body politic. Mr. Crawford, you see us as a threat. Rest assured that is exactly how we you. Dr. Patrick Diehl Escalante |