Elephants (real ones, not Repugs) going nuts and attacking humans

[JohnyCanuck]

And I can't really blame them. This is really, really disturbing how we're screwing up the world around us in so many ways and apparently beyond redemption.

The elephants are going mad
Nov. 19, 2006. 10:15 AM
CHARLES SIEBERT
SPECIAL TO THE STAR

SNIP

These were not isolated incidents. All across Africa, India and parts of Southeast Asia, from within and around whatever patches and corridors of their natural habitat remain, elephants have been striking out, destroying villages and crops, attacking and killing human beings.

SNIP

For a number of biologists and ethologists, the attacks have become so abnormal in both number and kind that they can no longer be attributed entirely to the customary factors. Typically, elephant researchers have attributed aggression to the high levels of testosterone in newly matured male elephants or the competition for land and resources between elephants and humans.

But in "Elephant Breakdown," a 2005 essay in the journal Nature, Gay Bradshaw, a psychologist at the environmental sciences program at Oregon State University, and several colleagues argued that today's elephant populations are suffering from a form of chronic stress, a kind of species-wide trauma.

Decades of poaching and culling and habitat loss, they say, have so disrupted the intricate web of familial and societal relations by which young elephants have traditionally been raised in the wild that what we are witnessing is nothing less than a precipitous collapse of elephant culture.

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1163890209824&call_pageid=968332188492&col=968793972154&t=TS_Home

[bahrbearian]

1. So what else does Gaia have in store for us?

[pretzel4gore]

2. meanwhile, 30 percent of the richest

most powerful demographic on earth votes for a man like junyer, would applaud his mass murders, his insane pandering to greedy boors(!)

[HCE SuiGeneris]

3. Well worth the read... thanks for posting this. Our stewardship

leaves much to be desired. :cry:

[OneBlueSky]

4. when presented with the marvelous diversity of the planet, humankind . . .

could have stood in wonder and perhaps created a new mythology honoring all creatures of the universe . . .

instead we took inventory . . .

[Rex]

5. So the elephants finally decided we are pond scum and an enemy.

Here comes Lucifer's Hammer.

[1monster]

6. I remember reading an online article, several years ago, about

a group of wild elephants who had been captured and put into a temporary enclosure for whatever reason.

Late that night, a group of elephants, apparently from the same extended family, came to the enclosure and figured out how to open the pin locked gate and released all of he captured elephants.

The elepants are such remarkable animals. I'm sure they are just as if not more so intelligent as humans.

I've often thought that if elephants had the ability to make mankind understand their language, and produced lawyers, that they should sue the republican party for unauthorized use of their image as their logo...

That said, I have been reading more and more about elephants striking back at villages, people, and crops.

And I can't blame them. I think they have declared war on human kind.

[htuttle]

10. Of COURSE elephants are more intelligent than humans

Ever seen one working a job they hate 50 hours a week? Nope.

[alfredo]

7. Elephant Breakdown PDF Full article

Clicking the link will download the article or load it onto your browser.


http://www.elephants.com/pdf/PTSD.pdf

[JohnyCanuck]

8. Thanks for the link n/t

[alfredo]

11. thank google.

[malaise]

15. Thanks for this

How sad. We humans are so evil and destructive. In 2002 I read about a young elephant cub injured by a train in India. I saved that amazing story.

ANGRY ELEPHANTS BLOCK RAIL TRACK
DEHRA DUN: An elephant cub was injured when it was hit by a train near Motichur railway station at Rajaji Park here on Friday following which herds of angry elephants brought the movement of trains to a grinding halt on Saturday, official sources said. Herds of angry elephants blocked the Hardwar-Dehra Dun railway track following the accident, Rajaji Park Director Sunil Pandey said. Meanwhile, the injured cub was shifted to Dholkhand area of the park for treatment, Mr Pandey said.

[alfredo]

17. I'm starting to think that elephants are smarter than us.

[shadowknows69]

9. Doctor Rat

<http://amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw/002-5980130-2937604?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=doctor+rat>

[Liberty Belle]

12. In humans, heavy metal poisoning can cause aggressive outbursts.

I can't help but wonder if pollution and contamination of our planet from things like depleted uranium released into our atmosphere from the Iraq War couldn't be responsible for this.

[mcscajun]

13. "The Star" is over a month behind on this story.

Charles Siebert's story was published on 10/08/06 in the NY Times.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=edit&forum=103&topic_id=239254&mesg_id=239254

[Ms. Clio]

14. this makes me unbearably sad

it's as if some tipping point has been reached for the planet, and we are just plunging towards massive die-offs, including many human populations.

[smirkymonkey]

16. That is the cutest dog picture I have ever seen!

Is that your dog? What a sweetie!

I agree with your post, however - how long until society breaks down and human beings turn into murderous animals? In some places, it's already happened.

[Ms. Clio]

18. thank you! She's the most recent addition to the family, yes

I can't remember now, exactly, although I could swear I followed the link from here originally, but I thought I read a article that argued that the fate of the great mammals, such as the elephant, had distinct implications for humans, as well.

The water wars will be starting soon -- in some places, have already begun.

[SemperEadem]

19. they're getting sick and tired

of seeing their mothers shot dead, having their land stolen from them, being kidnapped and dropped in another region of the country--and they remember that all of these atrocities to them have been at the hands of humans, no other creatures, as they've got no known enemy except for man and his guns.