environmental ethics

What the Public Doesn’t Know About Killing Endangered Species


It’s The 4th-Biggest Illegal Industry In The World, And In 11 Years, It Will Destroy Itself

There is a terrible epidemic in the killing and trade of endangered species worldwide for profit. While the extinction of any species is one of the worst acts humankind can inflict on a helpless animal, there are aspects to this needless killing which have even more far-reaching consequences that some say could endanger humans themselves. The video below will explain, in very graphic detail how ivory trade could ultimately destroy the human race.

One elephant is killed every 15 minutes and 96 elephants are killed each day.
The ivory trade is not only illegal, it is also a huge-profit enterprise for organized crime and for radical groups who use money from their killing spree to finance terrorist activities around the globe.
Each time you buy an “innocently produced” ivory trinket or souvenir, please recognize you are taking part, indirectly, in the needless killing of the majestic elephant and are furthering organized crime and terrorist activities.

Please view the video below (if you can make it through the gruesome images) and consider what, if anything, you can do or are willing to do to stop this senseless destruction of an important animal species and to, equally importantly, stop the spread of terrorism associated with these senseless acts of cruelty.

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What the Public Doesn’t Know About Killing Endangered Species


It’s The 4th-Biggest Illegal Industry In The World, And In 11 Years, It Will Destroy Itself

There is a terrible epidemic in the killing and trade of endangered species worldwide for profit. While the extinction of any species is one of the worst acts humankind can inflict on a helpless animal, there are aspects to this needless killing which have even more far-reaching consequences that some say could endanger humans themselves. The video below will explain, in very graphic detail how ivory trade could ultimately destroy the human race.

One elephant is killed every 15 minutes and 96 elephants are killed each day.
The ivory trade is not only illegal, it is also a huge-profit enterprise for organized crime and for radical groups who use money from their killing spree to finance terrorist activities around the globe.
Each time you buy an “innocently produced” ivory trinket or souvenir, please recognize you are taking part, indirectly, in the needless killing of the majestic elephant and are furthering organized crime and terrorist activities.

Please view the video below (if you can make it through the gruesome images) and consider what, if anything, you can do or are willing to do to stop this senseless destruction of an important animal species and to, equally importantly, stop the spread of terrorism associated with these senseless acts of cruelty.

.

 

Native Americans concerned with the effects of fracking on the water table on their sovereign lands


Mountaintop-mining (a form of surface coal mining where the tops of Appalachian mountains are removed to expose valuable coal reserves) and “fracking” (a form of accessing oil and gas reserves that many claim to be destroying water quality and causing subsidence and small earthquakes), are both forms of extracting natural resources for energy production. Both processes involve highly charged support or opposition by the coal/gas & oil industry (and their service industries), on one side, and environmental groups (and their supporters) on the other.

Pro-Mountaintop Mining Coal Miners

Leveling Appalachia

 

As an environmental attorney working in Appalachia, I have had the misfortune of working on both mountaintop mining issues and oil & gas fracking issues. Unlike other highly charged issues on which I have worked during my career, there is virtually no opportunity for any compromise on either side of these issues, turning political policy decisions on the subjects into metaphorical IEDs, ready to explode and alienate a large segment of voters, regardless of which side benefits from a given policy.

Fracking Policy–Supporters & Opponents are Polar Opposite

Anti-Fracking Process Description

 

Although I have worked with Native American tribal liaisons regarding ancestral artifacts and human remains, I have never worked with them on issues related to natural resource extraction/exploitation–though I did discuss the issue hypothetically in a graduate level Environmental Ethics course I taught as an adjunct professor. As expected, the students in the course were divided in their strongly held beliefs on both sides of the issue of whether natural resources should be allowed to be removed by private industry from Native American lands, with obvious environmental effects, if the action would result in cheaper electric bills. 

Native American view of land as sacred

 

The Nation of Change article linked below shows one Native American tribe’s views toward the practice of “fracking” and the effects this process will have on their traditional lands.

 Native Americans Launch ‘Love Water Not Oil’ Ride to Protest Fracking Pipeline

Anishinaabe Native American Activist Poster

Anishinaabe Native American Dance Troupe

 

I would be interested in receiving feedback on readers’ particular views on these two natural resource extraction methods.