Photo: John and Karen Hollingsworth/USFWS – Creative Commons License
One way to illustrate what’s at stake in removing protections from gray wolves, is to quote the people who’ve effectively been given legal license to kill them. I will not link out to their websites or Facebook fan pages (some of which have thousands of fans — one has more than 18,000), but I can assure you this rhetoric is frequently accompanied by gruesome imagery of dead wolves. I’ve posted just a smattering of their words, from a much larger supply, at the end of this post. [Crudeness warning.]
Wolves were delisted in the Northern Rockies (by Congressional budget rider) in 2011. Now, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposes further removing gray wolves from the ESA in the lower 48 states, undermining decades of recovery and leaving the fate of wolves in the hands of states, where politics and powerful financial constituencies have considerable influence.
We cannot let gray wolves lose their federal protections. As The Center for Biological Diversity and other conservation groups wrote in their letter to Interior Secretary Jewell:
“Collectively, we represent many of the scientists responsible for the research referenced in the draft rule. Based on a careful review of the rule, we do not believe that the rule reflects the conclusions of our work or the best available science concerning the recovery of wolves, or is in accordance with the fundamental purpose of the Endangered Species Act to conserve endangered species and the ecosystems upon which they depend.”
The Predator Defense website has a rational counterpoint to the anti-wolf rhetoric: Wolf Myths and Facts. Among the figures they cite: 1,703 wolves have been slaughtered in Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Minnesota and Wisconsin since the 2011 delisting.
An easy way to show your support for wolf protection and conservation is to use the template at the NRDC website to send a message to Secretary Jewell.
Added from Larry’s comment below (thanks, Larry): And there is an essential, critical step to take — using the 90-day public comment period to let U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service know that this is simply not an acceptable proposal or conservation measure. To be effective and heard, use reason-based commentary (Predator Defense is a good resource) and avoid strictly emotional arguments. Link to the USFWS proposal and public comment information
Random anti-wolf sentiments:
“What’s the difference between a dead wolf and a septic tank? I don’t have a septic tank buried in my back yard.”
- “I may have both in mine.”
- “Put some in the flower bed. Makes the wife’s tulips grow better.”
“Good day on the trap line!” (with photo showing two trappers and seven dead wolves)
- “Smoke a pack a day!! Great work guys!! SAVE THE ELK!!”
- “Every dead wolf laying there saved 22 elk each … per year!”
“I fired nine shots at the five running wolves and killed four. I got the alfa male and female. My dad weighed the alfa male on his calf scale and it is 110 pounds. The alfa male is the grey on the far left and the alfa female is the black on the far right. I was using a .270 win and 130 grain Barnes Triple Shocks. I just bought that Ziess rapid Z 800 from 209×50. That is an awesome scope.”
- “Great shooting killing the worthless vermin wolves.”
“I haven’t posted a wolf all tangled up in a while. Here’s a pretty one.” (with photo of wolf strangled in trap/snare)
- “This picture really bothers me. That animal would look so much better if his best friend was hanging beside it. Lmao.”
“Breaking News – National Wolf Delisting Rule Announced.”
- “I can just hear them bawling & having candlelight vigils over the damn things dying. Wolf tags 20/box. I love it.”
- “The worthless cry babies in the wolf cult are going to have to get a real job now instead of crying over wolves. To all the worthless deadbeats in the wolf cult GROW UP AND DEAL WITH IT CHILDREN!!!!!!!!! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA”‘
(photo of a guy holding a dead wolf around the neck)
- “What does wolf taste like anyway? Bald Eagle. LOL.”
“With a majority of Wolf Hunt advocates on the Wisconsin Wolf Hunt Council, the state is poised to increase the limit to 275 this fall.”
- “Mmmmmmm peppercorn teryaki wolf jerky!!”
- Wolf season? Isn’t it 24-7? It is when I see them!!!”
- Yep. 250 is a good possession limit. I’m bout half way there.”
- “Enjoy the slaughter as you will be the last generation to carry on this way.”
“Yellowstone wolf research? Nasty wolf humpers ….”
“If you are in search of a Trophy Wolf Pelt, then hunting wolves during the winter months through March will produce better results. Our Idaho wolf is easier to track in the snow, has had time to grow larger, and will have prime winter pelts.” (from a guide service)
“Who’s ready for this Fall’s wolf season? What will be your plan of attack if your get drawn? If I get drawn this year I was originally going to use my bow, but I think I’m going to use my muzzleloader this year since I haven’t used it yet for anything else. Might as well have it’s first blood be from a wolf.”
- “Heading to Montana for 10 days for them …3 a piece $50.00 for nonresident …”
- “.270 short mag. send em rollin.”
“You call the shots: Would you shoot, or would you pass in hopes of getting a better chance later on? Note that you only have the archery or firearms that are listed below!
Animal: Wolf – Method: Compound Bow – Distance: 45 Yards – Wind: 15 mph left to right
- “Fucker would be dead!”
- “SHOOT! Wound em! Lol the only thing you’re out is an arrow n a broadhead.”
- “Shoot this one then go find my next one shoot as many as you can.”
- “Shoot! Just connect! Anywhere helps! Wound maim but hopefully kill! Don’t tag it! Just find another one! Repeat! This is not about hunting! It’s about conservation of the rest of North Americas wildlife! We are under seige and normal rules and ethic do not apply!”
- “45 yards… right through the eye.”
- “Smoke that meat stealer.”
(photo of a hunter with dead wolf hanging alongside two dead deer)
- “Hang em high.”
- “That’s awesome! Hell of a trophy!”
- “Great pic an congrats. they need to make wolf season like coyote season. Get rid of them all.”
- “Mmmm wolf tastes like soy burger . Maybe u will like it u tree huggin pricks.”
- “Do u tree huggers have ur own page so we can rip on everything u do . Go drink ur tea and stick ur thumb up ur ass u worthless pieces of shit.”
- “Way to go the trees should be full of those rodents they are worthless and need to be wiped out.”
- “Where I live(Outing) the deer population dropped a ridiculous amount in the oaks where we’ve hunted for years and years. Sitting outside on our deck at night when the pack gets a kill the woods lights up fucking every which way, eeriest sound you’ll ever hear. That being said it doesn’t really matter if there is a wolf season or not, they’ll just continue to trip on logs and not get up. So you naturalist hippy douchebag citiots that come up here once a year for the weekend just need to shut your shithole. Whether it be for fun, for sport, or overpopulation, they need to be pushed out of here.”
- “This is the best picture i have seen in a long time in no way is this appalling its beautiful wolves are vermin like stray dogs kill them all. Any wolf hunter is welcome at my place all u other people stay where u belong in some city with your heads up your asses.”
“It turned out that he was the only one I’d caught, and he was one of the pack’s young sub-males. Still, it was a wolf, and although I’ve been in my fair share of exciting woods experiences, there is nothing like seeing that you’ve actually caught a wolf. It didn’t work out like I’d hoped, but wolves are like that. They often will do what you least expect them to, and getting just one to step on a 3-inch pan in the middle of miles of wilderness is an accomplishment for any trapper. I still have a couple of months to try my wits against the rest of the pack, which is now smarter, but that’s what really makes wolf trapping fun.”
- ” … AK has no set time limit on checking traps. I believe this is mostly due to logistics. for most trappers it would be impossible to check their sets every day due to their remoteness and the money and time it takes to check them. The vast majority are very responsible, and check as often as is reasonable, which for me is usually once or twice a week. thanks for the question.”
“On a most recent float hunt I was on I got lucky (The good Lord was smiling down on me I believe) and managed to come across a pack of wolves while I was looking for a moose. I managed to take down three of them. I can’t say that they were helping eachother, but after the largest of the pack ran off, the others were confused and amid the confusion they didn’t really know which way to run. I think they were looking for their leader and the leader already took off. The wolves were all young. I would say about 85 lbs a piece. After I shot one they began scattering but they were unable to determine where the shots were coming from because I was above them and with their leader out of the picture they were more vulnerable.” (with photo of three dead wolves piled across each other)
- “congrats on that wolf kill, wackem and stackem!”
“That’s how it was done in the old days. ‘Roping Gray Wolf’ … ‘Round Up in Wyoming.’ (with archival photo of men on horseback choking a wolf by rope)
- “Saves ammo.”
There is only one solution now to stop the slaughter. Send comments to USFWS during the 90 day comment period. Instructions here: https://www.fws.gov/home/feature/2013/pdf/Gray_Wolf_Comment_Period_Bulletin.pdf
Or go directly to the comment site: https://www.regulations.gov/#!docketDetail;D=FWS-HQ-ES-2013-0073
Spread the word anyway you can to turn the tide.
I cannot think of anything to say about the comments of the haters in your post Ingrid. I really can’t.
Thanks, Larry. I edited to add your link to the text of the post — much appreciated!
btw, I wanted anyone who landed on this post to understand how wolves are perceived by some of those who legally hold the animals’ welfare in their hands.
Wow. Obviously there’s a lot of hunters who can’t find elk anymore, now that elk have to be more careful. Real hunters have respect for other real hunters.
John, what you hear and see in relation to wolves and wolf ‘management,’ illustrates just how much vitriol there is for this species among certain groups. There’s the negative mythology and fear, the long-term, entrenched dislike for gray wolves, especially among those who didn’t want them reintroduced to their historic range, there’s the bottom line for ranchers (even though wolf predation numbers are tiny relative to livestock mortality from other factors — less than two tenths of a percent (.2%) according to Predator Defense). And then there’s the competitive angle — humans who resent coexistence with ecological apex predators. It’s a potent and lethal mix for wolves who, in my view, need ongoing federal protection based on the science of their recovery.
Ingrid, these heathens just want to kill. Something. ANYTHING. Wolves are just the new/old exotic. Nothing new.
I really don’t think they even believe themselves when they spew the same old rhetoric about the balances of nature.
To many elk, to little elk…blah blah.
It is just the same ignorance again. Although this time it is ..what was that Bushism..”fool me once, shame on you .fool me again..er… derrrrr… well…..” This time we got all caught up in the wild west coming back complete with wolves and millions of bison and Sitting Bull XXII… Didn’t anyone watch Jurassic Park? Better reference needed.
We have been had!
The wildlife departments are full of self-serving hunters who get careers and paychecks from our monies, taxpayers.
To think anything others is total bullshit. Like the Elwha dam removal. Hundreds of millions of dollars to open up a river with strains of fish that are gone and a new indian hatchery no one knew about (ha!) to screw up this big masterplan. There are plenty of rivers on the peninsula with clean and unobstructed flows that have zero runs already.
The only answer to recovery, in my opinion, is unpublicized reintroduction to large closed areas to humans.
Until then, the only joy for me in these release-site turned killing grounds for heathens is when a few of them goes a check’n them trap lines and freezes to death or when they shoot each other in the heat of the kill………
*too *too, my apologies
I apologize for my blanket statements, probably a few good folks in the wildlife departments but they are drowned out by special interest groups in the end anyway…. a.k.a ducks unlimited, cabelas, ted nuggent… the vocal ones with the bucks.
Saving the wolves is, ofcourse, a noble a valiant idea, but it has to be thought out better. Bald eagles were saved because chemicals were changed or banned, bullets were not the issue in there decline. Wolves were exterminated by humans directly-not by farmers using bad chemicals to grow food to feed the country. Wolves put fear in some people and no one is more afraid of the woods than hunters. Plain and simple. I have talked enough of them to know that they “would never go in the mountains without their gun” for fear of all the blood thirsty creatures they need to kill to make it home safely to watch “Sasquatch Hunters”…..
Messing with nature-and especially after the fact, is tricky.
The Olympic Moutains HAD their own wolves, has native bear and cougar but to my understanding in recent times, no fatal attack has occurred by bear or cat, only by a mountain goat that was introduced to the range that is non-native and eats native indigenous plants.
Again, glad the wolves are trying and good people are behind them. Hope is good.
John, no apologies necessary. The types of comments I posted here — a fraction of what I’ve seen across wolf hunting groups and boards — incite that type of reaction. I hesitated a long time before posting because the commentary is so vile. It defies every tenet of intelligence, compassion, and reasoned response. But I want people to realize that when it comes to wolf conservation, the hate ideology for these animals is so imbued in the culture, it is utterly unreasonable, unfair, unscientific and cruel to sell hunting tags and trapping licenses to these very entities — under the auspices of a conservation and preservation measure. It defies logic. I feel the same way about open season on coyotes, given the torture inflicted on those animals by the same types of mentalities. In the case of wolves, I’ve read some wolf hunting advocates argue that we’ve far outstripped the original conservation goal (hundreds of wolves) and that’s, frankly, where they’d like to see the numbers. They have no interest in restoring wolves to their original range in any significant way.
The comments that I read form the wolf haters and hunters made me do some further reading on this behavioural pattern and I ended up linking all of this to René Girard, a French historian, literary critic, and philosopher of social science. He claims there’ s a ‘mimetic desire’ amongst humans which is responsible for violent behaviours, particularly the “scapegoat mechanism”. He claims that among humans there is an object of desire, which he calls the ‘mimetic desire’. which means humans begin to emulate one another as to what they believe their “common” desire is.
“We borrow our desires from others. Far from being autonomous, our desire for a certain object is always provoked by the desire of another person — the model — for this same object. This means that the relationship between the subject and the object is not direct: there is always a triangular relationship of subject, model, and object. Through the object, one is drawn to the model, whom Girard calls the mediator: it is in fact the model who is sought…”
So for me there is a “hunter’s culture”; hunters emulate one another because even though the objects are livestock or elk, they are really following their role models through the culture of an “ideal”. What hunters are really doing is emulating one another. The object of desire is soon forgotten (in this case the elk or livestock among others), so that humans become engaged in similar patterns of behaviour which they have learned to emulate as a cultural norm. “Mimetic rivalry” follows, which is the struggle for the possession of the objects (elk, deer, livestock, wild animals). And then he goes into the “scapegoat mechanism”, which is what I think has happened with the wolf:
“In Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World (1978), Girard develops the implications of this discovery. The victimary process is the missing link between the animal world and the human world, the principle that explains the humanization of primates. It allows us to understand the need for sacrificial victims, which in turn explains the hunt which is primitively ritual, and the domestication of animals as a fortuitous result of the acclimatization of a reserve of victims, or agriculture. It shows that at the beginning of all culture is archaic religion, which Durkheim had sensed[citation needed]. The elaboration of the rites and taboos by proto-human or human groups would take infinitely varied forms while obeying a rigorous practical sense that we can detect: the prevention of the return of the mimetic crisis. So we can find in archaic religion the origin of all political or cultural institutions.”
This quote about ‘the origin of language’ really impressed me:
“One great characteristic of man is what they [the authors of the modern theory of evolution] call neoteny, the fact that the human infant is born premature, with an open skull, no hair and a total inability to fend for himself. To keep it alive, therefore, there must be some form of cultural protection, because in the world of mammals, such infants would not survive, they would be destroyed. Therefore there is a reason to believe that in the later stages of human evolution, culture and nature are in constant interaction. The first stages of this interaction must occur prior to language, but they must include forms of sacrifice and prohibition that create a space of non-violence around the mother and the children which make it possible to reach still higher stages of human development. You can postulate as many such stages as are needed. Thus, you can have a transition between ethology and anthropology which removes, I think, all philosophical postulates. The discontinuities would never be of such a nature as to demand some kind of sudden intellectual illumination.”
All these quotes are from Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/René_Girard#Mimetic_desire
Maria, that’s an incredibly detailed look at behavior that’s perplexing to many of us. I wonder what the correlation is between individual awareness and mimetic desire. That is, are people who’ve examined their motivations, plumbed the depths, so to speak, still susceptible to these patterns? Or, is it a case where the illumination of consciousness necessarily pulls a person away from behavior that (as described here) appears almost autonomic in nature? Rhetorical question unless, of course, there is an answer. 🙂
I’m just beginning to discover Girard. Girard states that scapegoating occurs at an unconscious level. I’ve been reading essays questioning at which point collective behaviors take over and whether there are indeed moments of introspection before the acts occur at all. This is the link to an article from “Religion Peace Conflict Journal” where both Girard and William E. Connolly’s views about violence are analyzed:
https://www.religionconflictpeace.org/volume-4-issue-1-fall-2010/engaging-girard
William E. Connolly is a political theorist known for his work on democracy and pluralism, agonistic democracy and secularism. Both Girard and Connolly are still alive. Girard links violence and scapegoating to the tenets of archaic religion which are still prevalent today; whereas Connolly believes political engagement that avoids the scapegoat mechanism is still possible and attainable (agonistic democracy).
I can’t add anything significant here that hasn’t already been eloquently and bluntly noted except to respond to “Smoke that meat stealer” by reminding myself and others that it is they who are the life stealers. And as your post is properly labeled The Haters. 🙁
Yes, that comment about the meat stealer … it does tie in with what Maria was saying about scapegoating or projection. Isn’t it always true that the hypocrisy is lost on people who demonize the other for their own transgressions or actions? I can’t remember if I’ve mentioned this previously, but a few years ago, there was a story about a hunter who approached a deer he’d shot, thinking the buck was dead. The buck was not — and he rose up and attacked the hunter. The man described the incident as “15 seconds of hell” — and the story ran without a hint of irony expressed for that comment. 15 seconds? This can even be construed as “hell” by someone who engages a sport that often requires hours of waiting as an animal dies of her wounds? But it’s different because they’re ‘just animals,’ right?
“He who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men. We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals.”
Immanuel Kant
I believe that what René Girard says about the ‘scapegoating mechanism’ has helped me understand the nature of such violent actions from hunters, and their using wolves as innocent scapegoats. Precisely the ‘scapegoating mechanism’ ends with the slaughter of an innocent victim, and has perpetuated itself through the mimetic desire and rivalry that constitutes a hunter’s culture, practice and behavior.
I feel ill reading the wolf haters comments.
No hearts, imagine being raised by a pack of them.
That’s another sad commentary on the entire problem. These heartless and irrational views are passed down to the hater’s children who continue their prejudice unless they become educated.