I was driving in a jeep through the Indian Safari here in Jaipur, listening to our guide talking about the effects of poaching. He told me that over the past ten years, there have been over 200 tiger poachings inside the National Park that we are in. Since these events, Ranthambore National Park has taken measures towards stopping the killing of these sacred beasts. However, poaching remains a large issue. Not only here in the park, but everyday all across the world, endangered animals are being killed by humans, for us. No matter the cautions that lie against poaching, poaching remains a major problem. Why? What can we do to end poaching?
Back in the US, poaching is seen only as a criminal offense. It is never looked at as good thing. We have trouble understanding why anyone would kill a precious animal for their own benefit. Why would anyone do this? The only way we can answer this question is by placing ourselves in the poachers shoes.
During my travels in India, I have seen more poverty than ever before in my life. People with families of 6 struggling to make 1 rupee a day. Starving children. All these people's lives would change if they could make even just 90 rupees a day (a buck and a half).
Imagine you are one of the 33% of Indians that fall below the poverty line. There are three people in your family, and the total family earnings are two bucks a day. Then, one day, a man comes to you and tells you that you could make a lot more money than you currently are-if you come work for him. Sure, you have to kill an elephant on Monday and then a tiger on Thursday and then a rhino on Wednesday. But now, you are earning 100 times as much money as you were before you started poaching. You are a king! Your family doesn't have to fetch for food or shelter or clothing.
It is a natural human instinct to put your loved ones before anything else in the world. If I went up to you and said your brother's life or all the elephants in the world dead, you would probably choose the elephants death over your brothers-no question in your mind. This is because at the time-in light of the chance of loosing a loved one-killing all the elephants doesn't seem like an issue. In the realistic scenario that I gave you above, the poacher is killing one elephant a month while saving his family. You would do the same, right? Suddenly poachers seem more human.
Please don't get me wrong. No matter how many times I thought about this scenario I still could not bring myself to fully justifying with the poachers. I could see why they were killing the animals. But I couldn't see why they chose killing animals over any other opportunity.
That was when I realized that these people don't have choices. That is why they are poaching. This where the park comes back into play. The way we stop poaching is not by increasing the fines and penalties of the offense because people will be willing to risk their own life to save their loved one's. The way we prevent poaching is by giving these people options. The reason why there is less poaching in America then India is because people in Americans have options. You already told me that if you had a choice between losing a brother or killing all the elephants you would choose killing elephants.
If you got out of this essay what I was hoping, in the past ten minutes you saw that poaching is good but that poaching is sometimes necessary for those who have no options. The way we prevent options is allowing people to have options. I do not know what all those options are. That is for you to figure out. You-the future-have the capacity to save animals. You-the future-can save animals by granting people options, not fines.
Do I wish we could have those 200 tigers back? Yes. Do I see why we lost these tigers? Yes. Will I strive in my life to present options to people other than killing animals? Yes.
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