Problem:
On page 163 of "Desert Solitaire," Edward Abbey declares: "I would like to introduce here an entirely new argument in what has now become a stylized debate: the wilderness should be preserved for political debates We may need it someday not only as a refugee from excessive industrialism but also as a refuge from authoritarian government, from political oppression... What reason have we Americans to think that our own society will necessarily escape the world-wide drift toward the totalitarian organization of men and institutions?" (p. 163). According to Abbey, "... the value of wilderness," thus, is "... as a base for resistance to centralized domination..." (p. 163) When this argument was made, totalitarian organizations were a very real and very immediate threat to the American way of life (this book was originally published not long after WWII and during the height of the Cold War). How has this argument changed in the approximately 45 years since this book was first published? Do you believe this argument is more or less persuasive today than it was in 1968? Need Assignment Help?