Don't blame Walter Ritte.

What, should he have kept his thoughts to himself and just watched as Moloka'i was turned into another Kapalua or Princeville or Makena? Should he have kept his mouth shut while more land was developed and more water secured just so his neighbors could keep their jobs with the company he felt was planning irreparable damage?

That's un-American. That's un-Hawaiian. And that's wrong.

Ritte and other opponents of the La'au Point development did what they felt was right. But how can the owner of Molokai Ranch justify its actions as right?

Blame the owner of Molokai Ranch, GuocoLeisure, for hurting their own workers, for putting an ultimatum on their huge development plans and then playing the "Oh yeah? Well forget you guys!" card. Blame GuocoLeisure for running a business that couldn't support itself as a ranch or hotel without turning into a real estate developer. This multi-million-dollar offshore company isn't taking a hit with this shutdown. The owners won't feel any turbulence.

Molokai Ranch owners ordered the shutdown after plans for a 200-lot luxury home development at La'au Point hit various snags, in part because of the efforts of activists to demand answers to questions like, "Hey, where you folks planning on getting the water for all this, huh?"

Maybe Moloka'i shouldn't be a luxury resort destination. Rich people who want to "get away from it all" seldom want to truly get away from it ALL. They want their amenities and conveniences, things that even a well-stocked Tentalow couldn't offer. Grocery stores and restaurants, shopping districts and hip nighttime events. The developers' word for that is "infrastructure." The real word for that is "urbanization." The reality of selling off hidden Hawai'i to luxury home development is paving over paradise, taming the untamed acres and structuring a caste system of the ones who can afford the land and the ones who have jobs cleaning the mansions.

Kaluako'i hotel has been shuttered for years. The island can't support the visitor industry at that level, the rent-a-room for a few days level. Perhaps it can't, or shouldn't, be expected to take on the Hokuli'a vision of wealthy part-time residents who dabble in the local community.

It is sad and wrong that so many Moloka'i people will be without jobs to support their families. It is also sad and wrong that for so many Moloka'i people, the only way to support their families is by taking jobs with a company that doesn't have the best interests of the island or its people at heart.

Lee Cataluna's column runs Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Reach her at 535-8172 or lcataluna@honoluluadvertiser.com.