sorry, elephants
I read Bryan Christy's essay "Ivory Worship" featured in the National Geographic's October 2012 issue.
Christy describes a world where people of different religions help one another to kill elephants for making offerings to Gods. Humans are a species who kill other species for non-basic needs. We kill crocodiles for their skin, roosters for their feathers, and tigers for fur. Humans are very creative about decorating our appearances with other animals' appearances. Ivory is a different kind. It is blessed by our imagination, and elephants are just carriers of ivory. Carriers don't matter. What matters is the profit behind humans' desire of owning a piece of something that represents one's ability to do everything and anything. Yes, simply because we can wear shoes made of crocodile skin, extend hair with rooster feathers, cover a piece of floor with tiger fur, or decorate a God-worshiping house with sophisticatedly carved ivory. Or simply decorate a house. Oh, why not?
Why do people love pandas and hate the idea of killing them for fur or meat? Because they are cute. Why don't people eat dogs? Because they are "humans' best friend." Why don't Muslims eat pork? Why don't Jews eat shellfish? Humans adopt an arbiuary system that determines other animals' fate. Pandas are lucky. Elephants aren't. Humans are their Gods.
The ivory problem is extremely difficult to solve, as Christy nicely summarizes in last quarter of his essay. Any problem involving human greed is not easy to solve. Like the oil problem in Western Africa, the girl-trafficking problem in India, the drug problem in Mexico, or the dophine problem in Japan. Just to name a few. The thing is these problems are global. The market is international. As to ivory, it is not just human greed but also labeled with holy purposes which justify human greed.
Long time ago, I read an article about saving a specific kind of boars in the US. Their number was endangered. The solution was to increase its economical value by promoting its meat. Because the meat had the red-meat texture like beef and had a mouthwatering aroma when grilled, people actually loved having it. As the sales went up, farmers raised more of the boars and saved the species. I read this article in a local magazine, so I can't be sure about the facts and other factors overlooked by the author. However, it may be a solution for many other animals. Historically, humans select who get to live and who get to die. We select fruit, vegetables, and grain. We make modern horses possible. We make dogs. We shall be able to keep elephants alive. If ivory is so valueable, we can't use up its resources. We have to care its carriers. Carriers do matter. One cannot catch the entire ocean of fish in one season and expect to have another good season next year. Big buyers (people in China, Phillipines, and Thailand, as mentioned in Christy's report) have to help Africans save elephants and make ivory trades much more transparent. Banning it is certainly not a solution. People love doing things illegal.
If humans in most parts of the worlds practice routines discriminating half of their population, i.e., women, for milleniums, how can one expect that humans will respect other species anytime soon? We cannot save a species by "respecting" their existence or treating them with "humane" acts. Only too few people lead their lives with educated principles. Too many others earn their livings by taking advantages of anyone. Take the advantage of human greed. Set regulative rules that benefit the elephant hunters, the buyers, the traders, as well as the elephants. Then we may see less crual killings and stablizing the number of the elephant population.
Sorry, elephants.
