Sustainability, is doing something for the purpose of survival. For example, Native Americans live off the land by hunting animals only when needed and use every part of the animal. The meat for food, fat for candles, fur for clothing and blankets and bones for tools or weapons.
Fun, is for enjoyment, amusement, or lighthearted pleasure. As the photo shows below, and I'm sure many of us have experienced, going to a concert. See your favorite band or singer in person to gain a couple hours of enjoyment for the eyes and ears.
Survival and enjoyment aren't usually said in the same sentence or on the same topic, but I've come here to explain how two very different words can describe the same action to two different people.
The action I'm referring to is, trophy hunting. Trophy hunting is hunting for the piece of the animal that is kept to represent the success of a hunt. Notice the photo below is of a dead grizzly bear's bones, who's missing it's head and front paws.
Unlike the Native Americans, this bear's hunter left the animal's body [majority]to decay in the wild. This action effects not only the animal directly, but it's family, the species, the community, the environment surrounding it, and even more so, the people.
Community members such as Julius Strauss, have had to close their businesses and move to a different location due to trophy hunters. Hunters not only effect the people living in the community but visiting members as well. Those who simply want to enjoy nature and travel a long way to do so, only to see hunting and effects that corpses of animals, like the one seen above, have on the environment
When being confronted about the reasons behind trophy hunting, hunters answered, "...if the law permits it, I should be aloud to do it." Some Americans even go over seas to places like Africa to pay for rare trophy hunting such as lions or elephants, paying any where between $25,000 to $100,000. In America, trophy hunting can be as cheap as $80, on the other hand, the wild life touring business brings in over 10x that amount annually.
Unlike Africa, in North America we have acts like the Yellow Stone Park National Protection Act that protects endangered species like the grizzly bears since 1975. In Yellow Stone National Park alone they've gotten the population up to 700, with the aid of the protection act. Despite our efforts the population has decreased from 50,000 to about 18,000 in North America. Animals, however, based on a set of requirements can be voted on and off the list over time. Considering that the population are decreasing down so far, how could we let them be unprotected? Wouldn't that send them right back into being an endangered species? Hunting would only increase without protection
Reasons for their concern include
- Food source decline
- Isolated bear population (territory/space)
- Reproduction time line (slow)
- State Hunting regulations (cheap/easy to obtain)
- Climate change
Popular voices against the hunt and delisting of grizzlies include the following.
Join the petitioning community to defend the grizzlies.
Learn more at http://www.trophyfilm.com/
Act today!!
