Green Voices: Defending Nature and the Environment in American Civic Discourse by Richard D. Besel; Bernard K. Duffy

Author:Richard D. Besel; Bernard K. Duffy
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781438458519
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Published: 2016-09-15T00:00:00+00:00

CONCLUSION

Despite accusations characterizing Carson as “a priestess of nature” and “devotee of a mystical cult,”89 Carson remained steadfast in her search for the scientific truth about the impact of pesticides. She struck a nerve, and a hysterical one at that, among high-ranking government and industry personnel, including former U.S. secretary of agriculture Ezra Taft Benson, who in correspondence to President Dwight D. Eisenhower questioned: “Why [is] a spinster with no children was so concerned about genetics? … [She was] probably a communist.”90 The WNPC and GCA speeches, the two most pivotal and public speeches during her short life, demonstrate Carson elicited what Killingsworth and Palmer labeled anti-environmentalist hysteria from her critics.91 In the WNPC speech Carson stated a number of American scientists feared that “a spirit of lysenkoism” was taking hold of American agriculture. Her reference to the Soviet horticulturist Trofim Lysenko, a promoter of pseudoscience in place of genetics, turned the tables on those who accused her of communist leanings.92

Of Carson’s work, Professor Lisa Sideris wrote: “Human silence was complicit in the more profound silencing of nature that Carson dreaded. Only by breaking the silence—the reticence of government agencies and chemical companies—could humans avert the silencing of nature.”93 Carson saw her public speeches and the book’s controversy as a means to avert the silence about pesticide use and include the public in dialogue. Environmental scientist Jane Lubchenco pointed out Carson’s understanding of dynamic objectivity, that subject and object cannot be separated as science informs how people understand the world, and “personal and political decisions will of course be based on a wide variety of factors, including values, economics, social pressures, politics and more, but those decisions will be better if they are informed by the most current and credible scientific knowledge.”94 Lubchenco’s words reflect Ulman’s characterization of nature writing as an ethical interpretation, one that asks Carson’s listeners to consider the ethos and pathos of the war on nature and come to judgment about the importance of grassroots action to invoke the ideal place of the political jeremiad, where public action is necessary for repentance and reform.

Carson raised moral arguments in her speeches including the “overvaluation or exclusive focus on economic goals and pursuits” and the human “war on nature.”95 Critics of Silent Spring argued the decision to use pesticides was between public health and prices. These arguments were assailed in the media, and Carson spent time in both the WNPC and GCA speeches refuting these criticisms. For example, one article in U.S. News & World Report stated: “Today’s American housewives have the widest choice of fruits and vegetables, and meats and dairy—at prices to fit their budgets.”96 The use of the word “housewives” once again showcased Carson, by contrast, as an unmarried woman. Carson spent little time refuting the claims against her gender in either speech, though clearly her critics were “mostly men, mostly white, and mostly affiliated with some bureaucratic institution.”97 Carson wanted the focus of the Silent Spring debate to be about science, not gender. She chose to refute the criticism and statements that were faulty.

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