Polemic

Edward Abby grew up in Pennsylvania and wrote his own comic books as a kid. He served in the military after WWII and went to the University of New Mexico. He then wrote books about how much he loves the land.

            The general argument made by Edward Abby in his work Polemic: Industrial Tourism and the National Parks is that we should leave nature how it is. More specifically, Abby suggests that we should have parks that no motor vehicles can enter. He writes, “Get out of your motorized vehicle, get on your horse, mule, bicycle or feet, and come on in. Enjoy yourselves. This here park is for people.” (pg. 390) In this passage, Abby is saying that no matter how we decide to travel through a park, it shouldn’t be in a car. In conclusion, it is Abby’s belief that we should leave parks how they originally were and leave the cars out of it.

           
          In my view, Abby is right because we have turned parks into a sit in your car and travel

through it kind of thing were we really should be out experiencing it. For example, I have been to

Yellow Stone three times and I hated it each time because we just drove through it. I don’t think

spending hours in the car looking at miles of trees is a vacation. It was stupid and I’d rather be out

exploring than in the car. Although Abby might object that Yellow Stone is beautiful enough to look

at it from the car, I maintain that there is no where pretty enough to visit three times and not get

out of the car. Therefore, I conclude that we do need to get out of our cars and experience the

parks in their natural state like they were meant to be experienced.