July 14, 2000 Missoulian Opinion letter by Loren Rose who writes from Pyramid Mountain Lumber Co. in Seeley Lake: Et tu, tree killer?
Almost 30 percent of the softwood timber harvested in this country is pulpwood. That fiber, plus residual wood chips from sawmills, enables us to enjoy a wide variety of paper products. Every person in this country requires an average of 750 pounds of paper per year. The wood fiber equivalent is 3,125 pounds. A family of four uses one-half of a fully loaded logging truck of pulpwood per year. That is a lot of dead trees!
You can see we are all guilty, some more than others. How many stumps resulted from the Montana Wilderness Society's full page of half-truths in the June 21 Missoulian? Oh, by the way, they are creating more stumps to bring printed propaganda to your front door.
Pat Williams is a professional tree killer, been at it his entire career. Government uses and wastes more paper than most organizations. Universities rank right up there. Pat scores a hat trick by writing for the newspaper as well.
Thomas Power is another real pro. Educators use and require others to use copious quantities of paper. Having books published requires lots of dead trees. Since Mr. Power is a frequent contributor to the newspaper, let's give him a hat trick too!
Now for my grand champion, the Missoulian. The others mentioned all have an agenda. Being a hypocrite and not admitting your guilt is fine, just so you further your cause. Newspapers, on the other hand, report the news and inform the public. Most papers do this for profit. On a recent Sunday, the G and F sections of the Missoulian contained 24 pages. More than 21 pages were classified ads. The A section had 12 pages and nearly seven of these were paid advertisements. Those 36 pages of paper and 28 pages of advertising required more than a logging truck load of trees. It took a couple more loads to print the rest of the Sunday Missoulian.
No one wants to look honestly at their consumption and say they are culpable. Not just guilty of building more houses than they need or a deck, but subscribing to more magazines than they have time to read or not recycling. Guilty of working for an employer that demands forest products.
The Missoulian editorial of June 21 suggested that, "people who now make their wages cutting down trees will see the economic potential in learning how to plant them." The Missoulian and Lee Enterprises owe their employees and readers, an apology. Every morning Missoulian subscribers go to the paper box demanding that trees be cut. Every morning Missoulian employees show up for work demanding more stumps. Every day Lee Enterprises encourages and profits from timber harvest. Are they willing to not publish their paper and teach their employees how to plant trees? Even for one day? Who should the loggers listen to when they wake up, the Missoulian screaming for newsprint or the Missoulian screaming for them to stop cutting and start planting?
I am not against newspapers, universities, teachers, authors or public servants. I am against cowards not owning up to their culpability. We are the most consumptive society on earth. We also have the best laws and regulations governing land use. To lock up productive land and not allow it to be properly managed does not solve the problem, it just exports it. We need to assess 6ur consumption, continue to look at alternative products, increase recycling efforts, examine sustainability of private, state and federal lands and start educating the public. Everyone should know and acknowledge how much blame they shoulder for dead trees before they weigh in on the issue.
CAG Comment
Welcome to the club. The Missoulian, and most other newspapers, print what their editorial staff is pushing at the moment.
CAG has also been an unwilling victim of the editorial policies of this newspaper. On many occasions it has been pointed out to the Missoulian where they can get a different view of the question of introduction/reintroduction of grizzly bears into the Selway Bitterroot Ecosystem [SBE] -- but to no avail. They will not even log onto the website http://www.bitterroot.com/grizzly to see why CAG maintains there is not a quality habitat for grizzly bears in the SBE.
The function of a newspaper, in our estimation, should be to present both sides of an issue clearly and fairly so the public, when called upon to vote on issues such as roadlessness, will have an understanding of the issue.
The internet could deliver the Missoulian at a much cheaper cost to the environment to everyone's home.
Sure would allow the use of a lot of trees for other purposes.
End CAG Comment