Soapbox

       I had a weird dream last night. I hate when I remember them.

       A group of us were discussing a documentary film we wanted to make about several species of endangered animals, but funds were short. There was argument about whether it wouldn’t be best to use the money for other projects. Should we instead spend it to lobby to get more land set aside for animal preserves? Others argued that through the film we could educate people about the beauty and value of these creatures and they might be receptive to donating more money. But which animal species would we choose to feature?

     Finally a guy who'd been leaning against the wall, listening spoke up.

    “Make the damn film” he said. “Only not just about two or three species. Go ahead and use every penny we can beg, borrow or steal, and make a film about all the threatened species out there. Every one we can get on camera.”

    The room erupted in chaos. That would  be an incredible undertaking! It would use all our time and all our funds and we’d be forced to abandon all the other preservation projects we had in the works.

 

     “You don’t get it” the man said, shaking his head. “This isn’t about education any more. This isn’t about advocating for protection of a species. It’s too late for any of  that. This is about… creating a memorial. A beautiful, technicolor tombstone for what we've lost- or rather, thrown away”.

    Everyone listened in stunned silence.

    “It’s too late for education" he said.  "People don’t want to learn. The human race is far too busy arguing over Dancing with the Stars and freaking out about the terror mosque to care about the eradication of species that have been on earth for millions of years.
     Who cares about the whales and the sea turtles and the whooping cranes, as long as they aren’t ingredients in chicken nuggets? People are offended at the idea that they should alter their lifestyles in any small way for some animal that doesn't even have its own Reality show. If these animals really mattered, they would at least have an iphone ap.

   " And even if they listened, too many have convinced themselves that their God gave the earth to mankind, so if we want to engage in wholesale destruction of the life that covers it, why not? 
    How can you possibly hope to educate people about conservation when many of them still don’t believe that the earth revolves around the sun? Don't accept that the planet is warming or that life changes over time? Who believe that the planet and all its inhabitants were created 6000 years ago- zap!- 144 hours from start to finish, and then God took ‘Sunday off to have a beer and watch football.  
   And asking them to sacrifice something they want but don’t in any way need in order to serve a greater good- well that’s socialism. They’d rather be dead. Which is good, I guess, because they will be.

    You would think, if you really believed that tiger balls or narwhal horn had some magic powers,  that you would want to protect the species, and thereby preserve the supply of this elixir. But  no. I want mine now, as much as I can get, and if that means there’s none left for the future, who the fuck cares?  What use is an acre of rainforest to a guy whose Wii is broken?

   

     "There's no point in trying to set aside land where animals can live in peace- first of all because people don't want peace- they want stuff!  What good will the land do the animals when the planet warms and all their water dries up? Or the next war starts dropping bombs, or the pollution from strip mining and heavy metals from manufacturing and the smog from a billion cars poisons their air and soil? Or when we simply use up all the resources out here and go looking for more? 

 

    "These animals are extinct already- they just don't know it yet. They've gone the way of the Do-Do and the Passenger pigeon: it's just too easy to kill them. When they're gone, we'll find something else to kill, or to love into extinction, like whales and Chilean sea bass.

    So make the damn film. Make a dozen of 'em. Cram in every weird, gorgeous, miraculous creatures that we'll soon never see again.  Film the orangs and humpbacks and rhinos and cheetahs, monarchs and Mexican wolves and snail darters and condors in their last gasps of beauty. Call it "A Funeral Story: Death by Greed".  And maybe, when they're all gone, people will care about them at last, as a curiosity, the way they find dinosaurs so interesting now. And maybe we'll make enough money from it to go out and get good and drunk."

 

    Nobody said anything: nobody knew what to say. The guy shrugged, not pleased that no one could summon an argument against him.
      "We should probably add one more species to the list" he said, and stuck a small photograph of himself on the wall as he walked to the door.
 

    

 

    …And then I woke up and my back hurt and my tongue was stuck to the roof of my mouth and the dogs were pacing, restless to go out.. I thought about all the things I had read or watched the evening before that might have led my mind to conjure this vision. And I knew it was gonna be just another lovely day in paradise.