Sarah Palin kills wolves
My nine-year-old son and I just finished reading Jack London's White Fang together, so I'm particularly vulnerable to stories about wolves, and this ad is especially grisly If you want to help Defenders of Wildlife air it in markets where it might help, there's a donation link included.
By the way, Robert Haaland has put together a nice set of links on Palin's record here.
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Comments (5)
This video clip in ad against Sarah Palin is an oversimplification of a complex issue which could leave an informed person for or against the hunt depending on context which does not appear in the video clip.
There are areas of Alaska where the wolf population has gotten to high for the local available game to sustain them. The wolves end up decimated dying from starvation and resulting disease.
It might be possible given enough resources to fly in and tranquilize the wolves and relocate them to a less densely part of the Alaska wilderness. It might even be possible to house them for the winter. This requires a lot of money and at some point Alaska might do that.
Naturally there are also hunters who want to hunt wolves and they might be influencing more culling than neccessary. The sides of the argument are not adequately covered by the video clip.
It is nice to see people still reading Jack London you might read up on the life story of the author and what real life friends inspired his best known novels keeping in mind my last name. It is not coincidental.
Posted by Richard Bond | September 15, 2008 07:06 PM
I still don't understand why people need to shoot them from planes, though -- especially if they have to land anyway to cut off the wolves' legs? It seems a little unfair.
Posted by Marke B. | September 15, 2008 08:35 PM
Congratulations to your son for reading London's White Fang at the age of nine. I didn't get around to it until I was 16. White Fang was the first book I ever read from start to finish, and I loved Jack London's stories about the wilderness from then on. He helped shape my views on wolves as beautiful animals functioning as nature intended rather than the snarling, evil beast humans portray them as. Unfortunately, wolves and other defenseless targets of predatory humans don't have high-powered rifles to level the playing field. My advice to people who claim they hunt for food, run down to Safeway and shoot a can of Spam.
Posted by Robert | September 16, 2008 10:00 AM
My nephew, who loves guns, would be happy to shoot a can of SPAM at Safeway. But what his dad (properly) tells him is: Anything you kill, you eat. Pop a squirrel? You're having it for dinner.
Personally, I'm not into hunting at all, but I'm a meat-eater, and under no illusions, and I don't get terribly offended by people who hunt, say, deer and then eat the venison, or hunt wild pigs and roast them.
But nobody hunts wolves to eat them. I hear all this stuff about culling the herds, but (again, read Jack London) wolves have been struggling to survive in the arctic for thousands of years. The real reason people shoot them from planes is for sport, and it's a sick sport.
Humans have killed wolves for generations because they fear them (and because the wolves are predators and eat livestock). This is another example of human cruelty.
Posted by tim redmond | September 16, 2008 12:31 PM
So what's wrong with the wolves dying of starvation in the wild and their remains serving as nourishment for future prey?
Is the impulse for humans to dominate over nature so strong or is it the big bucks to be made from trophy hunts that seals the deal?
-marc
Posted by marc | September 18, 2008 04:02 PM