The national parks attracted a record 292.8 million visitors in 2014, but a vast majority were white and aging. The most recent survey ... found that 22 percent of visitors were minorities, though they make up some 37 percent of the population.

Have you ever gone to a national park and noticed that minorities are not represented in the exact proportions to the general population? Well, the New York Times certainly has ! (Can't you imagine a Times reporter getting out of his car in Yosemite, and the first thing he notices is not the breathless beauty around him, but the race of the other people in the parking lot?)

That's a gap of 15%! If there is a racial disparity in any education, job function, or even hobby, racism must be involved, seems to imply the New York Times. (Not including, of course, racial disparity in the reporting staff, editorial staff, or owners of the New York Times.)

A neighbor, Carla DeRise, has been to Mount Rainier and other parks, and is game to go again. She just can’t get any of her friends to come along. They are worried about unfriendly white people, hungry critters and insects, and unforgiving landscapes, said Ms. DeRise, 51, an African-American. So she mainly hikes alone, albeit with some anxiety. “I don’t have a weapon,” she quipped. “Yet.”

You see? Black people don't go to national parks for fear of white people. The liberals' racism in this is doublefold. First, for caricaturing blacks as being fearful of whites (most aren't). And secondly, by perpetuating racial resentment and hatred by writing about one paranoid black woman who feels she needs a weapon to be safe around white people. We know, of course, statistically speaking, that black people are much safer living among white people than other black people.

Jeff Cheatham grew up in southeast Seattle, and still lives in Mount Rainier’s shadow. Yet, he said of Mount Rainier and other national parks, “I’ve never been, and never thought about going.” A 29-year-old African-American writer, Mr. Cheatham said he didn’t even know what a national park was, or what he would be likely to find at one. “As far as I know, it’s a big field of grass,” he said.

Oh, now we have another reason: blacks simply don't know what national parks are! These must be the same blacks for whom voter ID laws would be racist because they have no idea how to get an ID. Liberals are saying that blacks are so dumb, so ignorant, that they don't know what national parks are. And they claim that conservatives are racist!

The author of the article talks about the fears he and black people felt going to national parks:

There was always nervous banter as we cruised through small rural towns on our way to a park. And there were jokes about finding a “Whites Only” sign at the entrance to our destination or the perils of being lynched or attacked while collecting firewood after the sun went down. Our cultural history taught us what to expect.

America cultural history = racist. White people = racist.

In the 2011 park service survey, nonwhites were more than three times as likely as whites to say that the parks provided poor service and were not safe to visit.

So now the park service is racist, too? Who is in charge of the park service? Who runs the executive branch? Wouldn't that be Obama?

How about an alternate explanation: maybe whites aren't racist. Maybe blacks don't fear going to national parks and encountering white people. Maybe blacks simply don't like national parks as much as white people do. Why must all races do everything in the exact same proportion to their numbers in the population? And as long as no one is being excluded from the national parks, why does anyone care?

This is what liberals think about when it comes to black problems: not the huge out-of-wedlock births problem, the failing public schools, blacks killing other blacks, or jobs being gobbled up by illegal aliens. When liberals think about black people's problems, they think about attendance at national parks. And the Confederate flag. And blacks who get shot attacking cops.

This article was produced by NewsMachete.com, the conservative news site.

Thomas Lifson adds: the environmentalist movement is overwhelmingly white. Odd that the NYT focuses on national parks as opposed to the membership of the Sierra Club.