No, said Aziraphale, it's ineffable.

He was particularly proud of his books of prophecy.
First editions, usually.
And every one was signed.
He’d got Robert Nixon, (A sixteenth-century half-wit, not related to any U.S. president.) and Martha the Gypsy, and Ignatius Sybilla, and Old Ottwell Binns. Nostradamus had signed, “To myne olde friend Azerafel, with Beste wishes”; Mother Shipton had spilled drink on his copy; and in a climate-controlled cabinet in one corner was the original scroll in the shaky handwriting of St. John the Divine of Patmos, whose “Revelation” had been the all-time best seller. Aziraphale had found him a nice chap, if a bit too fond of odd mushrooms.
What the collection did not have was a copy of The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, and Aziraphale walked into the room holding it as a keen philatelist might hold a Mauritius Blue that had just turned up on a postcard from his aunt.

- Good Omens by Terry Pratchet & Neil Gaiman

scutellatebooted asked:

Hi Will. I saw your post about the rhino poacher's death and, while I definitely understand the gut reaction, I wanted to remind you that a majority of poachers are just people trying to support their families and poaching is the most lucrative source of income for many places in Asia and Africa. I work in conservation and see lots of people demonizing poachers, and it's tragic what they do to wildlife, but unless we address the root reasons for poaching (economic insecurity) we can't stop it.

wilwheaton answered:

Can’t we do both?

scutellatebooted

I mean you do you, and if you can find a way to condemn the act while fixing the problem, even better. But it makes me uncomfortable seeing (usually) white people, especially in my field, get satisfaction out of the death of an impoverished person of color, because I’ve seen it tie into some racist mindsets, e.g. “these Asian people have such backwards ideas about medicine. They deserve to be punished/killed for breaking the law.” I don’t expect you to change your mind, but I wanted to give you something to think about since you’re very proactive in the social justice spheres of the States - I feel there are parallels between what’s happening here with racial and economic divides on our country’s level, and what things look like on the global scale. I’m just not articulate enough to do it justice I’m afraid.

zookeeperproblems

This is something I care a lot about, and often find it hard to articulate. Because the mind set of “how do we fight poaching without talking about executing, maiming, and poisoning human beings” is something so far out of my realm of understanding that it’s difficult to bridge the gap.

In the animal conservation world, poaching outside of the western world has been deemed a crime that should be punishable by death. The death could be to the perpetrators (execution), the consumers (poisoning), or both. It’s sad to see that the way conservationists talk about poaching has created a cultural norm where killing hundreds of thousands of people as a solution to a complex issue involving thousands of years of culture, economic insecurity, and organized crime is a totally acceptable and sometimes encouraged. The worst comments on poaching within the US is usually that the perpetrators deserve to be banned from hunting for life - while the comments on a similar article on poaching in Asia or Africa will include calls for ‘slow, painful deaths’ in sickening detail. It’s become a socially acceptable way for people to discuss fantasies of torturing people of color. The aspect of animal harm is seen as the ‘excuse’, which it shouldn’t be in the first place, and the truth is animals across the globe are being wiped out by human greed, but a majority of that isn’t related to poaching - it’s related to habitat conversion and pollution.

Poaching is often seen as a threat to animals that is easy to understand and place blame on, influencing charismatic megafauna that everyone agrees on protecting. Poaching is also related to an actual crime, while the most harmful actions towards animals - producing plastic, releasing pollution, destroying habitat - is perfectly legal, despite being absolutely devastating to humans and animals alike. So the focus turns to poaching, and the vitriol surrounding it is much more extreme than any outrage towards the other threats.

In this case, the poacher was not harmed by humans, but was killed by animals in the environment. While some may see this as perfectly fine to celebrate, it still perpetuates death as a celebrated solution to wildlife crime. The dehumanization of those who commit wildlife crimes like poaching encourages this baffling and horrifying idea that ‘simply’ ending the lives of anyone involved in mass killings will ‘fix’ this problem. Please stop celebrating and encouraging deaths like these, no matter who or what has perpetuated them.

Extrajudicial mass execution is not the answer to wildlife crime. All of us in the conservation world need to work on researching and supporting legal and diplomatic solutions to wildlife crime.

See, that’s what the app is perfect for.