Chinese fake lion

[Ian Rubie]

You have got to laugh at the Chinese, they are even doing fake lions now

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-23714896

 

[SimonD]

Shame they don't do fake rhinos, too - the horns are giving them fake orgasms anyway. Now extinct in DRC and Cameroon with Kenya and Southern Africa under extreme pressure.

 

[froggy Steve]

Shame they don't do fake rhinos, too - the horns are giving them fake orgasms anyway. Now extinct in DRC and Cameroon with Kenya and Southern Africa under extreme pressure.

Agreed, visit http://www.stoprhinopoaching.com/
over 530 Rhino's this year
Steve

 

[Philip A]

The ONLY way to stop rhino poaching is to A) legalize the trade so that demand can be met legally (there are enough rhinos reproducing to sustainably meet a part of the demand), and B) to get the Chinese Government involved in the rhino conservation, by pushing for rhino farming both in Africa and China, and controlling the buyers at their end.

There IS a demand for rhino horns, no matter the motives, and if that demand is not met prices skyrocket and, guess what... the higher the prices, the higher the crimes will go to meet the demand.

Unfortunately, global conservation is mostly run by feely-touchy people with a Mission, and very little understanding of the reality on ground.

The Chinese are very pragmatic, and only care about bottom line things, like: what do I have to gain or to lose?

So, make it a sustainable business in which they gain. Find the way to get them involved. Anything else is wishful thinking.

 

[froggy Steve]

Rhino horn actually grows back if not cut too short. There are vast (ish) stock piles of it and Elephant tusks. I guess farming the Rhino for horn might work? Something needs to be done as there wont be any left by the time I get to do our African trip!
Steve

 

[yogi]

The ONLY way to stop rhino poaching is to A) legalize the trade so that demand can be met legally (there are enough rhinos reproducing to sustainably meet a part of the demand), and B) to get the Chinese Government involved in the rhino conservation, by pushing for rhino farming both in Africa and China, and controlling the buyers at their end.

There IS a demand for rhino horns, no matter the motives, and if that demand is not met prices skyrocket and, guess what... the higher the prices, the higher the crimes will go to meet the demand.

Unfortunately, global conservation is mostly run by feely-touchy people with a Mission, and very little understanding of the reality on ground.

The Chinese are very pragmatic, and only care about bottom line things, like: what do I have to gain or to lose?

So, make it a sustainable business in which they gain. Find the way to get them involved. Anything else is wishful thinking.

My God, that is the most sane thing I have read in a long time!! Pity the loony brigade would try to never let that happen, and probably succeed.

 

[Dan W]

Or maybe someone should tell them that collecting rhino horn for medicinal purposes is simply goddamn stupid?

 

[yogi]

Or maybe someone should tell them that collecting rhino horn for medicinal purposes is simply goddamn stupid?

Maybe they should tell us that worshiping a statue of a man with nails through his feet and wrists is just bloody sick and twisted??

One thing the 'global village' and other such tat hasn't quite managed yet is to totally destroy peoples different cultural beliefs, I'm pretty sure there is a large ethnic group that considers your sunday roast beef just as obscene........

 

[Dan W]

They can call worshipping a guy with nails through his feet and hands stupid all they like and I'd be forced to agree with them.
Cultures and religions should not automatically earn respect, if that were the case then female circumcision should respected. But it shouldn't be, because it is also, utterly stupid.
As is consuming animal parts for their completely fictional mystical properties. I don't care about their culture, it's stupid.

 

[yogi]

They can call worshipping a guy with nails through his feet and hands stupid all they like and I'd be forced to agree with them.
Cultures and religions should not automatically earn respect, if that were the case then female circumcision should respected. But it shouldn't be, because it is also, utterly stupid.
As is consuming animal parts for their completely fictional mystical properties. I don't care about their culture, it's stupid.

Well our culture isn't any better. Cultures/religions don't need your respect, female circumcision is to OUR minds barbaric and drinking powdered rhino horn equally so. However differences should be RESPECTED, if people wish to live a certain way let them, that is the problem with all these 'rights' groups. I don't care what people do, so long as it doesn't affect me or mine directly.

If you look at OUR Americanised culture of WANT/GREED/WANT/WASTE/DESTROY and the damage it has done to the world and all the people in it, just look out your window.....

Yes you can partially blame the Chinese for the Rhino trade, but the potential (and very unlikely) extinction of the rhino is nothing compared to the destruction of western Europe since the war and the rapid rate of deforestation/industrialisation of farming taking place in the Balkans and Eastern Europe to help the marching tide of capitalism and greed. Look a bit closer to home if you want to blame 'culture' for environmental transgressions.

And just for the record, I don't advocate female circumcision in any way, but it is not my place or yours to tell other people(s) how to live their lives. Its that bloody do-gooding attitude that has half the world in the mess its in today (Iraq, Central Africa, Afganistan, Syria, .....)

 

[Dan W]

I'm not arguing that our culture is any better than anyone elses (I mean some of us voluntarily read the Daily Mail which is surely a sign of a degenerating social mental health) and I very aware of our transgressions. But as an example, if someone from Mongolia pointed out that British fishermen might be hunting Atlantic Cod to the point that CITES listed it as being threatened with extinction just because it tasted quite nice with chips, then I would agree that continuing to catch them would be a fairly idiotic thing to do, I wouldn't cry about how they were attacking British cultural beliefs.

Although I would just like to thank you though for informing me of the current problem with deforestation and industrialisation of Eastern Europe and I have just spent the last hour reading about the proposed logging business starting up in Transylvania to decimate the Romanian Old Forests. It is something that more people should be informed about.

I believe greed is a human trait and not a uniquely western or capitalist phenomenom.

Also I firmly believe that culture or religion is absolutely no defence against something which is harmful or derogatory to others and it is this point that we probably disagree on.

But back to the issue of the rhino trade and my original point about its stupidity. As far as we can tell rhino horn has absolutely no positive medicinal properties, in some cases huge doses of it has been proven to slightly lower a fever in rats but you would need a helluva lot of it for any effect in humans. It is possibly also useful for detecting alkaline poisons in liquids. So unless you're a very wealthy rat with the flu or a paranoid 16th century monarch it will infer no benefit to you. Not to mention it is only recently being prescribed as an aphrodisiac whereas traditionally it was only used for illnesses.
Therefore it's pointless. If it's pointless then it fits the definition of a stupid act, which then proves my original statement true.

Also worth mentioning I am not calling all Chinese people stupid, I'm sure many of them are against the practice, and it is not unique to China. Vietnam is an example of a country with a huge demand for rhino horn.

As for eradicating the practice I'm not sure there's any right way to go about it. I think education in all countries that practice traditional Chinese medicine with a view to explaining what does and does not work would be a positive step (hint: most of it doesn't work).
As Philip A and froggy steve have said the other possibility would be farming rhino for it, and whilst on the surface at least this seems like an ideal solution as not only do you supply demand but you also preserve the species, underneath there is a host of problems that could possibly go wrong.
As a quick example farming them could lead to their extinction in the wild; you farm them for the horn, the horn has the potential to become plentiful, lowering the prices. So instead speculators store the horn to limit supply and push up the prices. Now you have a huge market who believes rhino horn is legal and wants more. Poaching returns with a vengeance, wild rhinos go extinct, speculators begin to release stored horns for a massive return.
Although it sounds far fectched, it has already happened with elephants.

 

[Shayne]

In my mind its called evolution , millions of species are extinct already and millions more will follow . It is a foregone conclusion that the king of beasts will eventually face extinction as well because human beings cannot dominate nature forever .