I miss the "save the rainforest" focus on environmentalism in the 90s. I think it was more emotionally compelling for social action.
Yes, I agree with you very strongly, and I would love to know more about how many others are out there, especially professionals in the conservation field, that share this concern. The modern obsession with long-term planet-level climate change threatens, unless we qualify it, to be a terrible thing for short-term habitat conservation. And short-term habitat conservation is everything: extinction is for ever. Human suffering is very sad, and we will do our best to alleviate it, but nevertheless we as a species absolutely must not cause extinction of other species on Earth. That is for eternity and transcends human concerns. Wild animal species have extremely specific habitat/vegetation requirements. I think that a generation is growing up that does not understand this: they think that planetary atmospheric concerns are the be-all-and-end-all of conservation concerns, they think that all trees are the same and all birds smaller than a pigeon are the same; they think that reforestation is a solution regardless of species composition of the replacement trees. They seem to be prepared for their great-grandchildren to live in a future where we have averted large-scale economic hardship and suffering but sadly lost the Earth's remaining rainforests during the 21st century. That is not an acceptable future. But currently, the world's governments and super-governmental organizations are, when it comes to environmental issues, entirely focused on climate change. They are not saving the rainforests.
What's troubling, to me, is that "saving the rainforest" or nature conservancy in general is much more appealing to political conservatives than climate change. In theory, it is much easier to get large companies and nation states to take actions to protect lands than to reduce consumption.
But that's where the philosophy of environmentalism can diverge. Are humans capable of being part of nature? Or are we a cancer on the system? An enormous number of people are very misanthropic these days, on principle.
It's frustrating, also, because consistently-- when people get richer, they care more about preserving nature.
This suggests a natural harmony between economic growth and environtal protection. That idea is very offensive to some; but the evidence is overwhelmingly in favor of optimism.
But, for example, in the southern Amazonian areas of northern Brazil, deforestation is carried out by logging companies and ranch owners, and the ranch and logging company owners mostly come from richer areas of southern Brazil. So local people are poor, and the people from areas with higher GDP are the ones doing the deforesting. At the very least you need to explain why what you said isn't contradicted by obvious examples like that.