Like others, I spent my Labor Day weekend sprawled on a beach in the Outer Banks: an ever-pristine section of North Carolina that would catch any nature-lover’s eye.
In the middle of the day, a plane flew past the beach with an advertisement banner. Unlike others that advertise specials at local restaurants, this one instead had a message for the president:
“Pres. Obama: Keep oil off this beach #Stopthedrill.”
This was, of course, a reference to President Barack Obama’s five-year proposal to create offshore drilling along the coasts of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia. Released at the start of this year, the plan would open up federal sections of the Atlantic Coast for oil and gas companies to drill and increase production of domestic energy.
For many small businesses that rely on tourism, this proposal brought back harsh memories of the BP Deepwater Horizon spill off the Gulf of Mexico.
In response to this plan, about 140 businesses from North Carolina, with more from other states, wrote a letter to President Obama that called for Obama’s removal of support for offshore drilling off the Atlantic coast.
I applaud the efforts of those against this plan due to their passions for protecting our beautiful North Carolina beaches; however, simply rejecting the plan does nothing to solve the problem at hand.
If the immediate reaction to offshore drilling is to say “no” without deriving another solution, then this becomes yet another case of denying responsibility of a systemic problem. You could even consider it NIMBY-ism.
NIMBY is short for “not in my backyard,” and it pertains primarily to people directly affected by a negative stimulus, such as offshore drilling near their houses, that have the power to speak against it. This type of activism, while well-intended, displaces unfavorable projects on populations that may not have the information or willpower to say “no.” The problem is simply moved out-of-sight elsewhere.
