They are trying to take my wolves away. Our wolves. The wolves I've spent three years tracking, thinking about, respecting and learning from. The wolves who have stunned us into silence so many times through what they choose to reveal to us when we truly take the time to listen, be patient and observe.
When I first heard, I was shocked. Angry. And then I thought some more, and I was filled with an incredible sadness. Because this has been happening for so long. We've been moving this way since the beginning of human existence, and we've been moving this way so quickly in recent years. And I can always feel for the environment in the abstract and object to its degradation, its subjugation, by and for human arrogance. But this has a face on it. I know these wolves--seven or eight of them, at least. I've seen them in action, studied their footprints for hours, heard them howling in the dead of night over a frost-covered meadow and seen what their teeth can do to another animal. And I have such a deep respect for them because of everything they've allowed me to experience.
I understand a rancher, a farmer, who objects to the wolves because they eat livestock. I understand thinking they should be killed if they're caught in the act. And while I don't agree--I'm a bigger fan of the Defenders of Wildlife's efforts to compensate farmers for damage wolves do to their property--I can understand their motivations, their reasoning.
This, to me, makes no sense. A desire to kill wolves for no reason, just because they're there. The government, by delisting the wolves, is making an incredible assumption. They're asserting that humans have an unconditional right to kill other species so long as their actual existence as a whole is not threatened. Think about that. Every regulation in place that says when you can and can't hunt animals, and which ones you can hunt, is there only to preserve the species as a whole. It lacks any concern for an individual animal's welfare or right to exist. An animal only has a right to exist if there are so few of its species left that its death would threaten survival as a whole. And this fundamental assumption, about the human right to control nature, is not being questioned by either side. The groups planning to start a lawsuit for violation of the Endangered Species Act are debating about the number of wolves that would constitute a sustainable population, not whether we have a right to kill a population even if it's self-sustaining. Just think about that for a minute. Where did we get this idea from? Why does it run through society almost unquestioned?
The governor of Idaho has said that when the delisting is official, one month from now, he plans to allow open season on wolves in Idaho. And he's said that he will be the first to pick up a gun to go shoot them. He wants, he's said, a complete end to all the wolves in Idaho.
Close your eyes. Picture a world in which anyone who wants, who has a gun, can walk into a forest and shoot a wolf on sight, just for existing. Look into that wolf's eyes, the eyes of the pack as one of their own falls in a pool of blood. Look at the hunter, watching. And the wolves, staring back, trying to understand. Look at the dead wolf, which will lie there until its body is reclaimed by the earth, since the hunter has no use for it.
This vision of our earth is enough to make me lose most of my faith in humanity. What keeps me from doing that is the people in these states, the very same ranchers and farmers. In spite of the losses some of them have incurred because of the wolves, an overwhelming number of them are opposed to these new policies. And we can stand with them, united. Think back again. Picture that world. If it's not what you want, then do something about it.
