Media and Environmental Elitism: Can The Rest Of Us Afford It?

You may or may not have seen the television ad. It goes something like this. A middle-aged father is driving his daughter to school. I’d say the girl is about ten years old or so. Without warning, the stylish little pixie, in the cutest voice you’ve ever heard, puts an amazing request to her dad. The little darling tells her father, it probably would be better for her, if she could be dropped off a couple of blocks from the movie theater.

Now, in the real world, alarm bells would go off like the Fourth of July and New Year’s Eve combined, in the mind of any parent who received such a request. But the little girl quickly diffuses any growing angst in her mildly stunned father when she explains why the early departure would be in her best interest. “All the other parents are driving hybrids,” the little darling exclaims. “It just wouldn’t look like right if we showed up in this big gas-guzzler you are driving me to school in.” Well, she didn’t put it in those exact words, but that’s what was on her mind.

Contrary to the reaction of any normal parent, who probably would have told the girl to get someone else to drive her to school from now on, this daddy calmly and proudly tells the little darling that she is riding in a hybrid. The girl then says something like, “you never told me this” and the father ends the TV ad by saying, “I never thought I had to.”

How would you respond to this ad?

I think analysis of Daniel T. Zanoza, author of the above, is on the money. He wrote:

Suddenly, I understood what much of the environmental movement in America, and the world for that matter, is all about. The movement is designed to speak to the affluent and privileged in our society, playing on the guilt complex that drives much of the liberal philosophy today. Did the creators of the hybrid ad think about the single mother who is happy her car is moving and her tires aren’t too worn out to drive her kids to school safely? The ad was playing on one thing and one thing alone– collective guilt. And everyone who saw the commercial needed to buy this $50,000 vehicle to no longer feel guilty.

However, we shouldn’t be surprised at such snobby elitism coming from the Left. Even though the United States gets most of its oil from Canada and Mexico, we constantly hear about how our nation must be weaned off of foreign oil. This is a reasonable goal that most Americans would agree with. But the modus operandi regarding this change demonstrates how the Left is willing to use any means to reach a goal.

There are some political activists who would like to see gasoline prices go as high as possible. They believe such astronomical costs would help wean the country off of fossil fuels; in this case, gasoline. But these tree huggers are forgetting something, aren’t they? There are millions of people, including the poor and elderly, on fixed incomes, and gasoline prices at such a high rate would greatly impact their quality of life. Money used for items like medicine for them or their children would now have to be spent on gasoline that would take them to the doctor to get the prescriptions they can no longer afford.

Remember, with the Left, the ends justify the means. And though they will claim to be the people who truly care, their actions reflect something completely different.

“The creators of the [above] ad could care less about those who don’t have the 50 grand that would make them environmentally responsible drivers.”

Adding to Zanoza’s analysis, it should be pointed out who those creators are. The creators of the ad was not a single business. They included environmental activist organizations who inspired it, federal government who supported their plans, oil corporations who benefit by skyrocketing price increases, corporate auto manufacturers who profit from new technology, new model, and ads that brow beat American consumers into purchasing their products, and corporate advertisers including both television and print media. Media ads such as this still enter public classrooms, school and public libraries, magazine racks in various health care offices, and privacy of homes. In other words, the creators are the social engineers who define and predetermine our present and future lives. As Zanoza observes, they are the influential elites of the Left who actually do not care about anyone but themselves–their bottom-line, their agendas, and the supposed common goodness of their views.

Zanoza concludes his analysis with this observation: “The ad plays upon envy, pride, and a covetous nature that may lie deep within us all.” Actually, it’s a testament to nature of the views and lives of the Left elites.

Is it any wonder then that compulsive behaviors are now given legal sanction and glorified as an equal right? America is not only a nation of compulsive consumers but a compulsive nation of people whose behavior is manufactured for the benefit of government power and corporate profits.

I can here the founders screaming from their graves saying, “You freaking fools!”

Daniel T. Zanoza’s article was published on the Illinois Family Institute website and it can read in its entirety by going here.