Elites Destroy Endangered Species on Purpose?

Tiger decline is 'sign of world's failure' ... Governments need to crack down on illegal tiger trading if the big cats are to be saved, the UN has warned. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) meeting in Doha, Qatar heard that tiger numbers are continuing to fall. Organised crime rings are playing an increasing part in illegal trading of tiger parts, CITES says, as they are with bears, rhinos and elephants. Interpol is working with CITES to track and curb the international trade. Last year, World Bank chief Robert Zoellick said the global black market in wildlife products was worth about $10bn per year, making wildlife the third most valuable illicit commodity after drugs and weapons. Despite attempts to protect tigers, numbers have approximately halved over the last decade, with fewer than 3,200 remaining in the wild. – BBC

Dominant Social Theme: A crisis ... and government has to solve it!

Free-Market Analysis: The modest paradigm that animates these pages is that a power elite uses fear-based promotions to frighten people into accepting globalist solutions – answers that would not otherwise be considered.

No one, for instance, gets up one morning and thinks to himself that he ought to create an international body of nation-states attended by governments around the world and dedicated to world peace and eradicating human misery.

Someone did, however – or various someones – and thus we are saddled today with the incomparably corrupt United Nations. This august body has done more, in our view, to retard world peace and create conditions of poverty and misery than could have been imagined during its inception.

Does this sound harsh? In fact, all elitist institutions do approximately the opposite of what they are said to do. Monopoly central banks are inflation engines. NATO "peacekeeping" missions often end up creating and prosecuting wars. The Western "free press" is actually a rigorously controlled one.

The power elite that hopes to run the world builds global government piece by piece using facilities that have the most innocent sounding names and the most admirable briefs. Yet as the Internet – and what we call the Internet Reformation – has shown us clearly is that these organizations often accomplish more harm than good.

The question then becomes whether the harm is intentional or merely the product of well-meaning do-goodism. At one time we might have answered that question by proposing well-meaning incompetence. But no more.

At the very top of the elite hierarchy, the old men who are intent on creating world government know exactly what they are doing – at least that's our position now. Increasingly, it's obvious they seek chaos, for out of chaos they hope to create order ... a New World Order.

Occasionally we find a dominant social theme that shows this perversity in an emphatic way. The meme of endangered species is a really strong example of our argument, or so we think.

Like many others we get upset about losing animal species, especially species like tigers, which are beautiful beasts (so long as they are not trying to eat you).

But as we can see from the article excerpted above, the battle to save tigers (and rhinoceroses, etc.) is being lost. They are being killed faster than they are being replaced. What can be done about it?

Well ... one thing we could do is PRIVATIZE conservation efforts. A few months ago at an objectivist website (not that we are overly partial to objectivism) an interesting article appeared on conservatism and on endangered species in particular. Here's an excerpt:

The Free Market Way to Save Endangered Species ... According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) database, about 1 in 5 mammals are threatened with extinction. Rates of the threat vary depending upon the group, but it does show a problem.

As human population increases, the demand placed upon local area increases, especially in developing countries in Africa and Asia. Government attempts at stopping poachers has not been very effective, and laws that aim to "protect" threatened species often come at the cost of property rights and human care. Therefore a new focus should be made to use the free-market to save endangered species. ...

When a person has the ability to use his land as he sees fit, and knows that the government will protect his rights, he is more inclined to use his land efficiently as he seeks to derive his subsistence from it. It is here that environmentalists should then focus their efforts. First the area of the threatened species should be mapped in conjunction to which landowners own the area. What follows next can vary depending upon the circumstances.

Any species could be easily protected if a contract was made with the landowners to provide a set sum of money each year for allowing parts of their property to remain as habitat. If the species is a charismatic mega fauna, such as a tiger, panda, seal, or some predatory bird, can be used as a tourist draw that would enable the landowners to derive a source of revenue through the leasing of his land and tourist attraction revenues.

Now if the animal or plant is commonly used as a source of food and delicacy, or in medicine, a few solutions are still present. Depending upon the demand for the product, the owners of land could be paid to withhold their product from the market indefinitely or temporarily.

If it is only temporary, focus must be given to establishing a steady population that can be kept on the land and used as needed. This approach would be best with a great multitude of owners, each forwarding a sum towards the business, and allowing a large part of their land to serve as habitat, and a minority part being for residence and business activity.

Plants would be easier to protect than animals, as plants do not require many specifics in their environment. Any plant that is used for local medicine or consumption can be converted into a crop, whether it lives in the wild (but managed) or in a greenhouse (a better choice if electricity is available), with will bring in income for the landowners and will encourage improvements upon their land.

The solutions to endangered species via the free-market are endless, this short post just covered a few. The key though is creativity. There is nothing wrong with improving society as a whole by lowering government corruption and allowing people to use their land without fear of criminals.

There are a lot of sensible points in this article excerpt but we would go further. One needn't incentivize landowners to conserve: The market itself will do that. People would surely rather make a business of harvesting endangered species than sneaking around somewhere and risking long prison sentences or even being shot.

Accordingly, were land OWNED, said landowners would doubtless receive numerous attractive offers to harvest endangered species. It would be in the landowner's best interest to maintain these species so that he could receive top dollar for them – maybe once they died.

Land ownership (versus public ownership) is the key to so many problems, including "immigration." Anyway, the point is that the elites have moved in exactly the opposite direction. They've created vast public parks patrolled by an understaffed policing entity.

Instead of making use of the private sector, and creating a virtual army of motivated individuals who would be incentivized by the private market to look out for their lands and their beasts, the elites have created massive incompetent bureaucracies that will inevitably guarantee the extinction of these great animals.

Bastards. They know what they are doing. Every time an important species is lost, the cry goes up for more global government and more failed "public policies." The article we started with, above, provides the following quote:

"If we use tiger numbers as a performance indicator, then we must admit that we have failed miserably and that we are continuing to fail," said CITES secretary-general Willem Wijnstekers. "Although the tiger has been prized throughout history, and is a symbol of incredible importance in many cultures and religions, it is now literally on the verge of extinction."

And what is the solution suggested?

CITES enforcement officials said government agencies including police and customs needed to step up efforts to combat the illegal trade ... A resolution before the fortnight-long CITES meeting calls for greater co-operation between regional enforcement authorities to cut down the tiger product trade, and to ensure that breeding operations are "consistent with the conservation of wild populations".

There is something very evil about constantly proposing solutions to issues of import that are evidently and obviously only going to make the problem worse.

In the 21st century Austrian economics and free-market thinking has made great strides. But in our view, the elites have redoubled their efforts to demonize private markets and the solutions they offer to a variety of human dilemmas.

These dynastic families that want to rule the world would apparently rather wipe out numerous rare beasts if it furthers their promotional propaganda of globalist solutions. It really is evil. And, of course, it is even more evil (if there are gradations of evil) when applied to human populations. And it does.

Conclusion: One begins to see they will stop at nothing, and sacrifice ... all.