As an environmental historian who has worked on fisheries-related issues for more than two decades, I’m not surprised by the popular discourse surrounding the oil gushing uncontrollably in the Gulf of Mexico. It is only the most recent assault in a long, destructive campaign by humans to bend Nature to its will.
The most frequent questions that have arisen from this crisis could have been written in advance out of the rhetoric of the last crisis: "What does this mean for fishermen and their ‘way of life’", "What does this mean for tourism and the dollars tourists bring to the region?", "What does this mean for the political futures of Governor Bobby Jindal, or President Barack Obama?", "What will this mean for the price of shrimp?"
In short, "What does this mean for me?"
continued at Daily Kos....
