TWO RED BLINKING LIGHTS ON THE DISTANT HORIZON (or THERE BE LUDDITES AMONGST US) | Commentary by Bill Keshlear
"Long before your Luddite friend was waxing poetic about how blissful it is to not have a smartphone, Luddites were protesting the textile machinery that was slowly replacing them. It was toward the end of 1811, in the vicinity of Nottingham, England, when handicraftsmen formed organized bands and began to riot for the destruction of the new machinery. Their name is of uncertain origin, but it may be connected to a (probably mythical) person named Ned Ludd. According to an unsubstantiated account in George Pellew's Life of Lord Sidmouth (1847), Ned Ludd was a Leicestershire villager of the late 1700s who, in a fit of rage, rushed into a stocking weaver's house and destroyed his equipment; subsequently, his name was proverbially connected with machinery destruction. With the onset of the information age, Luddite gained a broader sense describing anyone who shuns new technology."
– Merriam-Webster Dictionary
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April 3, 2024
The tower would be "disastrous" and a "real blight on the landscape," Neal Clark, wildlands director for SUWA, told The Salt Lake Tribune (The Tribune's report is behind a pay wall.)
"Disastrous?"
We're talking about something that would send out a signal to help ensure you could get life-saving emergency help in the middle of nowhere, among other things.
"The proposed tower will have a positive impact on the economy, security, safety and welfare of San Juan County residents and businesses. Specifically, the proposed project will support and enhance emergency services, schooling, health care services, and remote employment," according to the county's review (beginning on page 49) of the application to build the tower. The county's Planning Commission has recommended approval of the project. Now, it's up to county commissioners to sign off on it.
Davina Smith, a Diné (Navajo) resident of San Juan County running as a Democrat to represent District 69 in the Utah House of Representatives, told the Tribune that “I have no doubt that there are better solutions that do not include having a gigantic tower in the middle of nowhere.”
The Tribune's report did not indicate what those "better solutions" might be.
Smith seemed to suggest that the Bureau of Land Management and Forest Service should be consulted. However, as things stand now, the tower would be built on state land, not federal land. And "because the BLM and USDA Forest Service do not have the ability to restrict or prohibit lighting on non-federal lands, impacts to dark night skies from adjacent communities would occur regardless of the alternative selected." (page 3-280, Draft Resource Management Plan and Environmental Impact Statement.)
A deal between federal land agencies and the state to swap that land, which is managed by the State Lands Trust Administration (SITLA), for possibly more valuable federal land elsewhere in southeast Utah recently fell through – a victim of the seemingly unending feud between Republican lawmakers and federal land-management agencies under the administrations of presidents Joe Biden and Barack Obama. It would've paved the way for the SITLA land to be included in the monument. (The Tribune report is behind a pay wall.)
SUWA and Smith are not alone in expressing their concern over keeping "viewscapes" pristine and so-called light pollution. The federal government is as well. The proposed management plan for Bears Ears lists those as issues among many evaluated to determine possible impact of tower on the environment. In Salt Lake County, criticism of a proposed gondola to carry skiers up Little Cottonwood Canyon as a way to mitigate traffic congestion has focused on aesthetic damage. And "astro-tourism" is the rage in many rural towns whose economies benefit from tourism. People come from all over and pay good money to marvel at something many have never seen: the canopy of Creation. Ka-ching!
For environmental activist and writer Jonathan Thompson, a reliable critic of any and all development of Cedar Mesa (Bears Ears), even at the expense of public safety, the possibility of the tower is one of the "things that gets my goat."
"But is it (telecom tower) really worth it? The site of the proposed tower and its red lights is one of the nation’s few remaining dark sky regions, where light pollution has yet to dim out the stars and the night. Similarly it’s one of the only refuges from the otherwise omnipresent social media, text messages, emails, and ringing phones — a digitally dark area, if you will. The tower will disrupt both."
Here's the not-so-monumental divide: On one side is two blinking lights on a 400 foot tower near a 1,354,849-acre preserve; on the other is enhanced emergency and law-enforcement services; telemedicine support for persons with disabilities and others without access to health care; online education; connections to remote work environments; and a bit of a boost for an impoverished economy by providing visitors with smart phones a chance to search for restaurants, overnight accommodations and sightseeing opportunities using GPS and online maps.
Water or air would not be polluted by the tower. Sacred Native American artifacts would not be damaged (at least any more than they already have been), nor would cultural and paleontological sites and wildlife habitat. Access to camping and climbing spots would not be restricted.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, in a nutshell, is why much of environmental activism nowadays is despised. Uncompromising 21st century Luddites, perched on a seat of economic privilege, would deny even a little bit of technology to those living in Utah's poorest county – technology, by the way, that's taken for granted in virtually every urban area in the world.
POSTSCRIPT: Thompson has made a career out of point-of-view environmental journalism by writing for High Country News and other publications. He recently wrote and Torrey (Utah) House Press published "Sagebrush Empire: How a Remote Utah County Became the Battlefront of American Public Lands." His narrow perspective on conservation – which includes describing San Juan County as plagued with racism, bitterness and twisted politics – should be taken with a grain of salt, according to the late publisher and editor of the Canyon Country Zephyr, Jim Stiles.
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AND COINCIDENTLY ...
This week (April 2-8) is "Dark Sky Week" in Salt Lake City.
"Residents can join @slcgov by helping us raise awareness and support to protect our dark sky resources. Millions of migrating birds who visit our city are impacted by light pollution," said Mayor Erin Mendenhall.
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ALL OF THIS REMINDS ME OF A BIT OF COMMENTARY I WROTE A COUPLE OF YEARS AGO ABOUT 'LIGHT POLLUTION' AND A NEW KIND OF COLONIALISM TAKING HOLD IN PARTS OF THE WEST
Hayden Washington, my grandfather, survived
the aftermath of a world war aboard an armored cruiser anchored just off the
Russian port of Vladivostok, a global pandemic that killed millions, and the
Great Depression. He worked at whatever jobs came along during the oil boom
days of the 1920s in Texas. (Montage: Bill Keshlear)
EXCERPT: "That’s why the truck-stop-diner-anthropologist in me believes appropriation of the Navajo Way by even marginally affluent (white, mostly male) but thoroughly modern Anglo-Americans, Navajo political opportunists rendered untouchable by invoking 'sovereignty' and playing the race card and denigration of working-class culture masked by NIMBYistic environmentalism lie at the core of the rift transforming San Juan County and many other parts of the West. (NIMBY means 'not in my backyard.')
"Take the Bluff (Utah) Arts Festival. Please. (Sorry, I couldn't resist.) A three-day event held in October, the fest has no antecedent. It didn’t evolve organically over a period of years as an expression of pride in the accomplishments of, say, Mormon pioneers, Navajo Way or Cowboy Culture — although those elements are present.
"It reflects a transplanted aesthetic sensibility because, at least in part, many of its current residents are themselves transplants. The festival is a sign of culture change; of what’s preferable to the latest residents.
"A new kind of colonization: | kÉ’lÉ™nʌɪˈzeɪʃ(É™)n | noun [mass noun] the action or process of settling among and establishing control over the indigenous people of an area • the action of appropriating a place or domain for one’s own use.
"Take 'Dark Skies.' The nine-minute Vimeo preceded a panel discussion about “the importance of keeping our skies dark” at what was billed the “Bluff Film Festival” embedded into the arts fest. It was directed and edited by Salt Lake City-based public radio personality Doug Fabrizio and made possible through generous donations from listeners and viewers like you. Thank you.
"Here’s the promotional blurb:
'There’s a price we pay when we illuminate our cities. The light interferes with our sleep cycles and can have real and serious health consequences. There are a few remote places, though, where you can still find true darkness. One of those is Torrey, Utah, where amateur astro-photographer Mark Bailey has an observatory that he calls his ‘portal to the deeper cosmos.’
“ 'Light pollution' is a thang to some folks in environmentally woke (should I say "environmentally awakened") enclaves in Utah such as Bluff, Kanab and Bailey’s Torrey and operators of tourist destinations who see opportunities in so-called astro-tourism.
"Others, less woke, see street lights as a source of personal security.
"My grandpa, Marvin Hayden “Peachy” Washington, or "George" as he was also known to friends, was well into adulthood after spending much of his life until then literally in the dark — illuminated only by lanterns whose wicks were dipped in oil and candles made of petroleum wax — when the Rural Electrification Act of 1936 turned darkness to dawn.
"So roll on, Columbia, roll on ...
"I wonder what Peachy would say about a privileged few colonists of the New West who nowadays want to turn out the lights to open a “portal to the deeper cosmos?” Probably just smile. He was of the old school: If you don't have anything good to say about a person, keep quiet.
"Meanwhile, thousands living on the Navajo reservation a few miles from the film’s screening might prefer to not remain in the dark. 'Among the 55,000 homes located on the 27,000 square mile reservation, about 15,000 do not have electricity,” according to Light Up Navajo. 'They make up 75 percent of all unelectrified households in the United States.' "