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  #1  
Old 12-02-2004, 05:29 PM
RipCurl RipCurl is offline
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Presentation about the Sierra Club

So I'm taking this public speaking class right now, and I chose the Sierra Club as a persuasive speech topic. I am speaking against it. I am currently doing research, and I was wondering if anyone had any good resources that I may not be aware of.

I think I am going to base my speech on the Blue Ribbon Coalition, Tread Lightly, and I might even go so far as to include some other organizations such as Ducks Unlimited, etc.

I have visited the websites of these organizations and have books on them, but I figured that this would be a good place to ask about it as you may have resources/experiences that relate to the Sierra Club that I do not.
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Old 12-02-2004, 05:33 PM
Robert J. Yates Robert J. Yates is offline
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Read this.

http://www.sacbee.com/static/archive...t/index02.html
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  #3  
Old 12-02-2004, 07:34 PM
Dan-H Dan-H is offline
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  #4  
Old 12-02-2004, 08:46 PM
mrblaine mrblaine is offline
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Re: Presentation about the Sierra Club

Quote:
Originally posted by RipCurl
So I'm taking this public speaking class right now, and I chose the Sierra Club as a persuasive speech topic. I am speaking against it. I am currently doing research, and I was wondering if anyone had any good resources that I may not be aware of.

I think I am going to base my speech on the Blue Ribbon Coalition, Tread Lightly, and I might even go so far as to include some other organizations such as Ducks Unlimited, etc.

I have visited the websites of these organizations and have books on them, but I figured that this would be a good place to ask about it as you may have resources/experiences that relate to the Sierra Club that I do not.
You bring up a topic that has me currently baffled. I realize that much of what follows will not be viewed correctly by most, but I am hoping for a bit of insight as to correcting the problem. I don't have the answer, I'm not sure anyone does, but until they do, I'm not so sure the Sierra Club is the bunch of bastards everyone thinks they are.

This past Thanksgiving holiday was beautiful, quiet, serene and just outright awesome in giving us the opportunity to enjoy the desert and all of it fresh snow cleansed scenery. That is until the crowds of small OHV's and their considerably inconsiderate pilots arrived.

I ask in all seriousness, is it really necessary to arrive at 11:30 at night, start up your very loud dirt bike and ride around the campsite? And, after that, was it really necessary to arise at 6:30 the next morning to do it again. I'd a figured if you arrived that late, the least you could do is sleep in to at least 7.

Is is really necessary to use my campsite as the playground for perpetuation your bad manners to your children on their miniature bikes and quads?

It is really necessary to start up your unmuffled wannabe desert race truck and run up and down the only flat road out there?

If you build a little circle track through the wash right behind our camp, is it really necessary to ride it continously with 4 quads for 2 hours non-stop?

If we have two vehicles parked close enough together so that a quad won't fit between them, is it really necessary to ride your dirtbike between?

Is it necessary to make so much motorized noise that conversation in my camp is useless?

Starting Wednesday night and continuing until we finally moved our camp to a very remote location, this is exactly what happened.

On more than one occasion after a particularly stupid display of ignorance, be it riding at speed with no helmet or just zipping through the edges of our camp, it occured to me that perhaps the SC had a point in trying to limit that behavior. I know if someone had of identified themselves to me as a SC member, asked for a donation to make the morons go away, I would have gladly dug deep into my pockets for that.

Please don't misinterpret, I truly despise the closure of any OHV area and the reduction of my freedoms and liberties that ensue, but do I really want to fight to enable access and promote the very behavior I had to move away from?

Once again, I am baffled as to why we fight, only to lose in the public's eye by getting tossed into the same trash pile as those who lack respect for others and the land they use.
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  #5  
Old 12-02-2004, 10:11 PM
Stu Olson Stu Olson is offline
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Re: Re: Presentation about the Sierra Club

Quote:
Originally posted by mrblaine
Once again, I am baffled as to why we fight, only to lose in the public's eye by getting tossed into the same trash pile as those who lack respect for others and the land they use.
Why? Because the Sierra Club and others such as the Center for Bio Diversity makes sure that you, and I and every other motorized user (including motorcyles and quads) are always in the same category, called OHV. By doing so, anything you do to limit or restrict the actions of the idiot directly impacts every non-idiot motorized driver....and that is exactly what they want. Unfotunately, resource managemant plans will never be written for two categories of OHV users, the "responsible" and the "idiots".....if they were, we wouldn't have a problem and you and I would be guaranteed unrestricted OHV opportunities for ever. But, they are written to manage "the" motorized vehicle user....and there in lies the problem....our problem.....and the Sierra Club and CBD likes it that way.

So we fight, in spite of the idiots, in order that you and I have some place to drive our Jeeps.....and the idiots get to come along for the free ride at our expense.
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  #6  
Old 12-03-2004, 07:13 AM
mnjeeper mnjeeper is offline
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Re: Re: Re: Presentation about the Sierra Club

Quote:
Originally posted by Stu Olson


So we fight, in spite of the idiots, in order that you and I have some place to drive our Jeeps.....and the idiots get to come along for the free ride at our expense.
And yet, no one has the time, nor the energy to take on our opponents, and the idiots.
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  #7  
Old 12-03-2004, 07:30 AM
Darrell C Darrell C is offline
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Re: Re: Re: Presentation about the Sierra Club

Quote:
Originally posted by Stu Olson
Why? Because the Sierra Club and others such as the Center for Bio Diversity makes sure that you, and I and every other motorized user (including motorcyles and quads) are always in the same category, called OHV. By doing so, anything you do to limit or restrict the actions of the idiot directly impacts every non-idiot motorized driver....and that is exactly what they want. Unfotunately, resource managemant plans will never be written for two categories of OHV users, the "responsible" and the "idiots".....if they were, we wouldn't have a problem and you and I would be guaranteed unrestricted OHV opportunities for ever. But, they are written to manage "the" motorized vehicle user....and there in lies the problem....our problem.....and the Sierra Club and CBD likes it that way.

So we fight, in spite of the idiots, in order that you and I have some place to drive our Jeeps.....and the idiots get to come along for the free ride at our expense.
Well said, Stu.
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  #8  
Old 12-03-2004, 07:37 AM
BlueJeeper BlueJeeper is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by Robert J. Yates
Read this.

http://www.sacbee.com/static/archive...t/index02.html
Boy I didn't have to read very far to find something I really agree with.

Quote:
"We were getting members because we were doing things," Brower said before he died last year. "Our (strength) came from outings and trips -- getting people out..."

Today, there is a new approach -- junk mail and scare tactics.
Combine that with the quotes from Muir and Thoreau before that and you have what is the real problem for us due to the Sierra Club and their other corporate buddies. Anyone who is donating to the Sierra Club now and supporting the things they do today really isn't going out to use public lands, they just want the image that they do, and want to be the hero of that image aka the environmentalist. Muir and Thoreau were visionary conservationists because they actually went out and did the stuff, which is totally unlike todays closeted freaks who would rather crack open their wallet, than throw on a pack and some shoes for a week and go rebuilt a foot trail.

In my mind the real Sierra club legacy, besides getting everyone to abdicate their land, will be that they will totally destroy what they think they are saving. Anyone who has actually been deep in the National Forests in the West knows what a tinderbox it all is. However you can't log out even the dead wood, then next the forest fire access roads are shut down and closed to OHV, the lack of use and maintenance makes them all but impasssable, you know what happens next, all of you are intimately familiar. If the Sierra Club philanthropist today were actually getting out to see this stuff they would be in horror of what their money is doing. But who knows, maybe they don't care, perhaps they're just giving for tax purposes.

As for the rednecks who tear the hell out of the land and establish a wilderness brewery and scream "I have rights!" Its primarily their own fault. However, why should they feel compelled to conserve the land when the Sierra Club and the federal government don't have a policy of conservation either? But everybody in the whole country is at fault for not establishing a culture of conservancy over the years. How do you do that now against corporations like the Sierra Club, well you probably can't since the burden now rests on shoulders and wallet of the few. I think part of the problem is that we don't *create* public lands anymore and when we do they are just there to "look at". No one gets it anymore, but unfortunately I don't think anyone ever will again, you need negative population growth and discovery of new open land that isn't spoken for. If people are going to donate to the Sierra Club then maybe my only option is to give money to Burt Rutan and hope for the best. Although, I just read an article in the past few days that some group of jerks thinks they own everything and wants to establish "conservation" areas on Mars to cut down on the space junk so we don't harm the microbes Might as well stop space exploration period and all stay home and eat a bullet since we might hurt something.
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  #9  
Old 12-03-2004, 08:02 AM
mrblaine mrblaine is offline
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Re: Re: Re: Presentation about the Sierra Club

Quote:
Originally posted by Stu Olson


So we fight, in spite of the idiots, in order that you and I have some place to drive our Jeeps.....and the idiots get to come along for the free ride at our expense.
I don't disagree Stu, I'm just trying to find a way to stomach having your favorite steak tossed down in front of you and it being covered in dog feces. Even if I manage to scrape all the crap off, it's still not very palateable.
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  #10  
Old 12-03-2004, 08:47 AM
John John is offline
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Did anyone ever go and talk to the people in the other camp to get them to stop?
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  #11  
Old 12-03-2004, 09:06 AM
mrblaine mrblaine is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by John
Did anyone ever go and talk to the people in the other camp to get them to stop?
It was pretty evident that was not an option.

The other part of that is if it had turned into a confrontation of any sort other than amiable acquiesence, who was going to guard our camp while we trail rode?


Want a job as camp guard?
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  #12  
Old 12-03-2004, 09:58 AM
TObject TObject is offline
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First, we don't go to the desert to seek confrontations.

Second, any such confrontation would surely escalate into something ugly.

Riding back with a cop or on a stretcher is not something we plan for when going to the desert.
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  #13  
Old 12-03-2004, 10:22 AM
Bruce David Bruce David is offline
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I was over at a friend?s house for dinner Monday night
and while she was preparing dinner, there was a knock at the door.
She asked me to get the door.
I open the door and here stands a lady about 50ish.

Lady."Hi I'm with the Sierra Club"
Me. "I'm a member of the Blue Ribbon collation"
Lady. "Huh?? What is the Blue Ribbon collation?"
Me. "We defend access for motorized recreation and fight closures,
keeping public lands open to the public"

Lady. (with puzzled look on her face) "that?s great"
Me..(now with the puzzled look on my face)"I don't think you understand"
Lady."That?s great, but I'm with the sierra Club and would ??? like to join?????."
Me.." We are on the opposite sides"
Lady.." Huh?"
Me.. "We FIGHT to keep the land OPEN in as opposed to the
Sierra club wanting to close the land"
Bla
Bla
Bla

My point is that these people that are soliciting for the SC are
Stooges and don?t know what they are ?fighting? for, or who
they are ?fighting?. This Lady was CLUE LESS.




On the subject of JV this last weekend, my buddy almost got fired !
Sitting around the campfire and one of his co-campers walks by
and drops a zip-lock bag, filled with gas, on the fire.
Boom...

There?s more to the story, but I?m not going to bore you with the details.
He is OK, minus the hair on the back of his hand and one side of his face.
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Old 12-03-2004, 11:16 AM
Jeff McRae Jeff McRae is offline
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Bear in mind that the last time I camped at Johnson Valley was a long time ago....

What is so drastically different with the JV crowd then say, the high desert, Glamis or Gordon's Well participants?

I've been going out to play as a "participant" for the last 30+ years (and as a spectator for virtually my entire life). I've been in many similar situations in both high and low desert, had the "keep your camp IN your camp" discussion many times - and never felt that it would escalate into something I couldn't handle.
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Old 12-03-2004, 11:20 AM
TObject TObject is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by Jeff McRae
...and never felt that it would escalate into something I couldn't handle.
That's all fine and dandy until you run into a Chai Vang. We won't hear from you after that. You'll be ether dead, or in Chino.
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Old 12-03-2004, 11:41 AM
Jeff McRae Jeff McRae is offline
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I refuse to limit my life and pastimes on the fear of running into a Chai Vang.

Besides, I don't live in Condition White.....
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Old 12-03-2004, 12:01 PM
TObject TObject is offline
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I refuse to believe you are so good at convincing people, that after a short conversation with you they instantly change from most inconsiderate obnoxious assholes into individuals pleasant to be around.

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  #18  
Old 12-03-2004, 12:11 PM
Jeff McRae Jeff McRae is offline
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Fortunate for me indeed then that my ability to do so is not tied to your beliefs
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  #19  
Old 12-03-2004, 12:25 PM
Jeff Weston Jeff Weston is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by Jeff McRae
Bear in mind that the last time I camped at Johnson Valley was a long time ago....

What is so drastically different with the JV crowd then say, the high desert, Glamis or Gordon's Well participants?

I've been going out to play as a "participant" for the last 30+ years (and as a spectator for virtually my entire life). I've been in many similar situations in both high and low desert, had the "keep your camp IN your camp" discussion many times - and never felt that it would escalate into something I couldn't handle.
Jeff,

Trying to talk to these people to stop ripping it up through the campsite would be like trying to bail out a sinking boat with a dixie cup. There were just too many of them to even bother.
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Old 12-03-2004, 12:31 PM
Jeff McRae Jeff McRae is offline
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Hmm, shoot the first and last ones in the group as an example t the rest....wait, that's the POA for Glamis at Thanksgiving

I'm just wondering what's unique to the campsite at JV? Even when I camped "in town" at Glamis over Thanksgiving (where there are more people for the weekend than JV will see in a decade), I've never had a problem. As those of you who've met me can attest - I'm an old gray haired fart - not what I would call "intimidating". Don't even carry a weapon anymore (well, not openly anyway).

Why is this an issue at JV?
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  #21  
Old 12-03-2004, 01:41 PM
Stu Olson Stu Olson is offline
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Presentation about the Sierra Club

Quote:
Originally posted by mrblaine
I don't disagree Stu, I'm just trying to find a way to stomach having your favorite steak tossed down in front of you and it being covered in dog feces. Even if I manage to scrape all the crap off, it's still not very palateable.
I hear you, Blaine. If you find a way, please let me know. I see the same problems over here.

Six years ago, my old Jeepin' buddy took me on a trail ride. The trails were unused enough that grass was growing up between the tire tracks....but I kept going back several times a year, taking along friends and sharing the trail with them. Things being the way they are, I got out of the habit running that trail several years ago. Last night, a local Jeeper stopped by the house to talk mods. He mentioned he led a group of 4x4s on that trail just last weekend (his first time on the trail was years ago when I led a group he was in). He said the area is compeltely tore up.....quads being the main element. Seems that they can't have fun unless they are sliding around the corners and ripping up the hills. I probably won't be going there any time soon. The temptation to roll over a few of them would most likely land me in jail.
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  #22  
Old 12-03-2004, 03:24 PM
Paradiddle Paradiddle is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by Jeff McRae
Why is this an issue at JV?
Jeff,

It's an issue everywhere - nearly everyone is a a$$hole now with no manners and less then no respect for other people.

The problem is somewhat magnified in JV because:
a - we go out there to enjoy ourselves and our group of friends
b - there is 30K+ acres of open space
c - why do the a$$holes always have to park next to us and always have to completly disregard any common courtesy.

I think people feel the laws don't apply to them out there (or anywhere "outdoors") that they can litter, shoot, and blow up whatever they want.

Jeff
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  #23  
Old 12-03-2004, 08:48 PM
speaceman speaceman is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by Paradiddle

c - why do the a$$holes always have to park next to us and always have to completly disregard any common courtesy.


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