March 18, 2013
My website manager informed me that I only generated 42 essays in 2012 – 10 behind my yearly average, and, that I had better step-it-up for this year…so here goes…
An old acquaintance of mine (she\’s not that old) – whom I first met in South Africa sometime in 1973-74 and now lives in Alaska – is in love with elephants and is heaven-bent on rescuing all-of-them. I was actually quite in lust with her as-a-youth – as she was that quintessential South African blonde (think the recently murdered Reeva Steenkamp) – but this memory does not drive me to give my full support to elephant rescue: it’s her energy and the energy of her departed mother (who was heaven-bent on rescuing whales).
I call her Pennyloper, and I promised her that I would lend an essay to the elephant-saving cause if she would watch “Water for Elephants” (which she hasn’t seen yet). Pat Derby’s recent death (you know the lady who couldn’t imagine living in a world without elephants); Ginny Wood’s recent death (you know the famous Alaskan environmentalist); and, the newly signed Leonardo Di-Caprio to elephant rescue — have caused me to deliver on-my-end. May Pennyloper deliver on hers (though the film does lose its elephant focus towards the end). Still, “Water for Elephants” does address the plight of circus creatures.
If elephant slaughter stopped, then I would not continuously receive these sickening and heart-rending articles from Pennyloper depicting ignorants killing these majestic creatures for their ivory. It was actually in South Africa that I saw my first film of an elephant culling (you know, when someone decides the elephants have overpopulated an area and the herd has to be thinned). The mothers (I don’t know about the bull) are killed and the babies taken. It was through this film that I first realized the humanity of these creatures…
The-manner-in-which the mothers are executed stays with you forever…first the herd is rounded up by helicopters, and then the mothers are shot in the knees so they become immobilized. From there it’s a brain shot and that’s it…Oh, except for the screaming babies forced to endure the horror.
This type of crazy, horrific shit perpetrated on Nature, reminds me of the U.S. Navy testing nukes in the oceans – with no care for the sea life that beaches itself to die…and now, a vision of dolphin slaughter in remote, isolated bays floods my mind with bloody water.
What is right with humans?! I ask the question this way because everything we do with regards to living with Nature is so, so wrong! Don’t kill a rhino — use Viagra for Chrissakes — you little-dicked Napoleon! Don’t carve a tusk for the piano – use plastic, or wood! Let’s hope there is some elephant god out there that exacts retribution through elephant karma: we know that they don\’t forget!
Hell! I even bought an air pistol with biodegradable pellets so that I wouldn’t kill the squirrel raiders of my garden (but I do silently rejoice when I see that one-of-the-little-bandits has been mowed down by a car!)! And my down-the-street neighbor has told me to dispense with trying to poison my gophers – she has recommended the thumper and/or flooding (which is way too an expensive proposition here in Woodland Hills!).
You know Pennyloper – I believe I have written this article before – sometime over the past five years; but the last time, I didn’t hope-and-pray (as I do now) that you will strive to protect these incredible beings till your dying day. Because really, what kind of a world would it be without elephants? And now that you have informed me that the star of \”Water for Elephants\” wasn\’t even treated well on the set — I release you from your end of the bargain!