Animals in the News: Herds of Bad Judgment

by Stephanie Feldstein · 2009-11-27 09:30:00 UTC
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Animal advocates have been blogging all week about the two-day Gadhimai Festival in Nepal (Nov. 24-25), a ritual sacrifice of tens of thousands of animals, including buffalo, pigs, goats, chickens, and pigeons. The sheer scale of this event drew attention from around the world -- people traveled to Nepal from all over India, where the ceremony had been banned. In the chaos of hundreds of thousands of pilgrims and animals, three infants died due to extreme cold.

Over in Australia, where 6,000 wild camels have overrun a town. The camels usually stay away from civilization, but took over the town in the midst of regional drought conditions, trying to get water from any source, including air conditioners. The government's solution? Spend tens of thousands of dollars to use helicopters to drive the camels back into the desert where they'll all be killed and left to rot.

The government has also set aside 19 million Australian dollars to address the wild camel population. Now, it makes sense that something needs to be done. Domestic camels aren't always known for their charm and the introduction of 6,000 large animals to any town would cause serious problems. But it seems like there would be a more cost effective means of control, like the fencing proposed by Animals Australia. Not only would this be more humane to the animals, but couldn't it also free up funds to help the humans? I mean, if camels, the icon of desert survival, are panicking about the water shortage, I'm guessing the human population needs some relief, too.

What were they thinking? I don't know if people were blinded by the scale of the animal populations they were dealing with in both of these situations, but it seems like they've lost sight of compassion for every species, including our own.

Photo credit: photos8.com

Stephanie Feldstein is a Change.org Editor who has been part of the animal welfare and rescue community for over a decade, and most recently worked for an environmental organization.
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