Contraception, South Africa and....Elephants?

[Michael_Forrest]

The following is a letter I sent to Ann Coulter some time ago in response to an article she had written. I thought the story of elephants in Kruger National Park, South Africa, deserved to get a little more attention, too. It’s an interesting story.

LETTER:

Dear Miss Coulter,
I enjoyed your article on Harriet Miers (Who Was the 2nd Choice?). However, I was a bit confused and disappointed by your reference to the legal ban on contraception as “silly”. You explained the legal connection between Roe and Griswold quite well. And I believe the connection is equally clear in the moral sphere that the acceptance of contraception led naturally to abortion as well (and to euthanasia and homosexuality, I might add). They all emanate from the same philosophical train of thought.

How is making illegal that which fundamentally undermines the family unit “silly”? Certainly the law may simply reflect our values, but it is also a teacher, true? For most people, what is legal is moral. When contraception became legal, it spread like wild fire. And what is one of the top reasons cited for our 50% divorce rate? Infidelity. Is it reasonable to suppose that contraception played a rather direct role in encouraging men and women to cheat, knowing that the “evidence” won’t show up 9 months later (among other things)? I think so. And what is the back-up for failed contraception (real-world rates that are between 10-25%)? Abortion, of course (never mind the fact that “the pill” itself is abortifacient). “Hey, we had sex with NO intention of having a baby!”…so when the ‘mistake’ happens, what is the answer? Abortion. Contraception as an aid to lower abortion rates? No, I think the evidence strongly suggests just the opposite.

If you ever get a chance, it is worth doing some research into the case of contraception and elephants in Kruger National Park, South Africa. It’s an embarrassing little event that didn’t get much press aside from Rush Limbaugh. And even Rush never seemed to understand the implications fully. He merely used it to slap silly liberals for thinking they could solve every environmental problem.

So what happened? They used contraception (the elephant equivalent of “the pill”) to “control” elephant populations that were considered too high but had to stop the experiment abruptly because of the disastrous effects upon elephant society (and humans in the area!) including: 1) starving baby elephants because the mothers abandoned them in search of mates and because of #2, 2) Out of control male elephants that were obsessed with perpetually sexually available females (males that were also more dangerous to humans as a result, by the way).

Sound similar to human society?

However, fortunately, the elephants in this case had objective observers available to pull the plug when it was obvious that the experiment was a disaster. Humans are not so lucky. We are both the subject and the scientist. I suspect if we could communicate with the male elephants especially, they might have said, “Hey, wait a minute! What are you doing? We LOVE this stuff!” Just as their human counterparts do while society continues to disintegrate.

I believe you erred on this one.

Best,
Michael Forrest

P.S. Guess who wrote this:
“The abandonment of the reproductive function is the common feature of all perversions. We actually describe a sexual activity as perverse if it has given up the aim of reproduction and pursues the attainment of pleasure as an aim independent of it.”

Psychiatrist Sigmund Freud

Even sexually obsessed Sigmund got this one right……

 

[jwashu]

While I detest Ann Coulter and her hate filled speech, that’s a very good note. As someone who was almost a shrink, Sigmund got more correct that most people realize… he just had the wrong “reason”… it’s not all about sex

Joe

 

[Michael_Forrest]

Some background support:

Kruger National Park, South Africa

While the first two articles dealt partially with a certain success of “immuno” contraception (as opposed to the hormonal contraception, which humans use), the information is nonetheless useful in the human comparison.
It seems also there is a problem of the “orphaned” babies who end up being very destructive adults.
pest.cabweb.org/Journals/BNI/Bni21-4/GenNews1.htm

Hormonal contraception using steroid sex hormones to disrupt the oestrus cycle is not species-specific and is also difficult to deliver to a wild population. In some species, at least, there may be undesirable behavioural side-effects to such treatment, as has been demonstrated in African elephants.
scienceinafrica.co.za/2004/september/elephant.htm

Previous attempts at elephant contraception using drugs based on steroidal and sex hormones had led to bull elephants severely harassing females, which made them separate from their herds and even their calves.……the experts agreed that more information is needed on the long term effects of contraception, especially in such social animals.
zoo.upe.ac.za/teru/Elephants/Elephant%20management%20in%20Addo.pdf

Two methods of contraception, that of hormonal implants….and the immunocontraception approach…have been tested…Although the evidence is not conclusive, both methods appear to show a reduction in fertilization with the former method (hormonal contraception) suggested to produce abberant behavior….
etv.co.za/~kanthanp/Perspex/19970426.html

Rumour has it that there can be found within the offices of the Kruger National Park a sign which reads Getting things done around here is like mating elephants …
IN this country, prior to British rule, men were men, women were women, and sheep were scared. People from the San to the Nguni respected animals, and ate them. The ancestors of today’s Afrikaners also respected animals, and shot them.

Then came the Brits, and with them came their bunny-hugging fascination with wildlife, and their preoccupation with sex – or rather, no sex.

These norms collided head on this week when an attempt to control elephant populations in the Kruger Park using contraceptive hormones didn’t quite turn out as expected.
The contraceptive part worked. Would-be Mama Elephants no longer fell pregnant. But they were also left permanently in heat. The wonders of modern medicine had turned homemakers into houris.

And the normally placid pachyderms were suddenly plunging through the park in an orgiastic frenzy. Family values were summarily abandoned. Hugh Hefner had annexed Disneyland.

And the rulers of the park said, this will not do!

“At one stage there were eight bulls around one cow,” said park veterinarian Douw Grobler. “This is unacceptable…” This is why, he said, the contraceptive program would be terminated.

Now this is all a bit much. An elephant’s job is to procreate. Deprived of their employment, they had merely done what (according to our Health Minister) the rest of us do – turned to recreational sex.

So what’s wrong with that? Strikes me that the potential here for attracting tourism is tremendous.

Let me put this in perspective. US film producers Spotted Dog this week announced a R300million production in this country next year called Mambo – a feel-good Hollywood bunny-hugger which has been codenamed “Free Willy with Tusks”.
At the Kruger Park today, most of the bull elephants immediately meet that job description. Cash-strapped conservationists can capitalise on the inevitable movie merchandising. “Come see the real thing, then buy your miniature Willy.” (Maybe that’s an oxymoron.)

But back to the British. The sudden lapse in Victorian values among our wildlife has clearly left them unsettled.

A British Broadcasting Corporation documentary is to be filmed in Uganda later this year, and requires elephants. Unlike us, Uganda does not have many elephants as they have generally been poached – (I don’t know, maybe they use very large kettles?) – and/or eaten.

The Brits have made it clear that they don’t want our elephants. Instead, about six of the beasts will be flown from from St Petersburg zoo to the Ugandan capital, Kampala.
The cargo manager of the airline chartered to transport the animals could not say why the BBC had decided to send elephants from Russia to Africa. (The elephants will be transported in containers on an Antonov AN-124 jet in September.)

To me, it’s perfectly obvious. Russian elephants staggering about in an alcohol-induced state of bewilderment more closely fit the “No sex please, we’re British” mindset than do our own horny tuskers.

And what’s accuracy in journalism when weighed against the need to keep a nation wrapped in blissful ignorance? As a large Afrikaner of my acquaintance is fond of saying, it’s enough to make a jackal puke.

globalpost.com/dispatch/south-africa/090225/planned-parenthood-elephants

Other ways to control the elephant population include moving elephants to less-crowded areas, such as Mozambique, expanding the size of the parks and contraception. The current form of contraception used on elephants is similar to that used by humans, in which the female’s hormone levels are altered. But that method disrupts the social hierarchy of the female herds and results in erratic behavior.

In its announcement, the South African government said that elephant contraception’s “long term social, physiological and emotional impacts on elephants are not fully understood, and current contraception methods are highly invasive and should therefore be used with caution.”