The Wilderness Idea

It was supposed to be a day of short, easy paddles and portages. But that is before the winds show up, gale force and pummeling wave after wave against us, determined to lock us down on the island. We pull our three canoes laden with children and camping gear along the edges of the rocky shore to try to find an easier launching point. The teens then take steering positions, as we throw our shoulders into our paddles and dig, over, and over into those icy blasts of heavy, strong-armed water. Any lapse sends the canoe back. One slip of weight, and we’ll tip, losing all our gear, and we’ll have to struggle to stay alive against hypothermia, even in August. We’re tired. We’re cold. And we’re swearing against the powers that push at us, testing us. But we’re alive and we know it. We feel it in our bones and spirit like never at home. And we’re so darned grateful to be here. This is the wilderness. No directions came with this country—the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCA) between Minnesota and Ontario. They could have been so easily lost. In the 1930s and 1940s, Aldo Leopold, Sigurd Olson, and other lovers of the outdoors saw these granite-sheathed lakes for what they were—places of rugged beauty and unspoiled wild communities that once developed could not be recovered. They called a halt to unthinking “progress” for a chance to rest in what was and preserve it for the future. Leopold explained that “Recreation is valuable in proportion to the degree to which it differs from and contrasts with workaday life.” So if Leopold were here, what progress would he note on the wilderness front, where the waves of progress push so hard against the concept? First, he would have admired the persistence of his comrade Howard Zahniser from the Wilderness Society. How “Zahnie” patiently built partnerships over his ten years as secretary of the Society and then persevered for another nine crafting the Wilderness Act. He endured 65 drafts and all the associated lobbying of Congress.

Memo for a Saner World

Bob Brown, the Australian Green?s Party Senator, has been voted the ?World?s most inspiring politician?. His political career has spanned two decades, during which he established both the Wilderness Society and the Australian Bush Heritage Fund. Senator Brown has also won several prestigious environmental awards. His stance on environmental ethics and human rights issues have led to assault, vilification and incarceration, but his voice has not wavered despite pressure from local and international sources.

"The Greens" and "Green Fire"

"The Greens", written by Bob Brown and Peter Singer introduces the Greens to a wide audience. Both authors were Green candidates for the Australian Senate at the time of writing. Bob Brown is one of the founders of the Australian Greens. As director of the Tasmanian Wilderness Society, he led the campaign that saved the Franklin River from impoundment for a hydroelectric scheme, and was a member of the Tasmanian parliament from 1983?93. Brown was voted Australian of the Year in 1993 by The Australian newspaper, and in 1990 won the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize. Peter Singer is Australia's leading public philosopher and the author of award winning and best selling non-fiction Animal Liberation and How are We to Live? At the time of writing he was Professor of Philosophy and Deputy Director of the Centre for Human Bioethics at Monash University, Melbourne.