9/22/15

Savage



I wrote the following this past weekend after my drawing was finished. I have been reading about animal poaching and smuggling, about the killing of thousands of elephants and rhinoceros. I kept asking myself how I can help preserve and protect wild animals from man’s evil ways.  I told my friend that I was reluctant to share it because it painted an awful picture of  humanity. Yesterday I read about Chinese poachers and smugglers apprehended in the Philippines. The ship processed thousands of pangolin (aneaters) for their meat and scales. Some of the anteaters were bare-skinned, their scales totally plucked from their bodies while they are still alive. China is the primary destination of illegal ivory trade from poached elephants and also the world’s largest consumer of rhino horns which they ignorantly believe to cure ailments such as cancer. Rhino horns like pangolin scales are made of keratin, the same material as human fingernails. Now with China’s population, do you think they can just make a fashion statement of growing their nails longer and chewing them?  


Wild And Savage


Wild creature!

You are unsophisticated.

You are not human.

Humans are not wild.

Humans are sophisticated.

You, on the other hand, are an animal.

You are beneath humans

Who are intelligent, they can think,

Who are compassionate, they care.

Who have conscience, therefore, virtuous.

Humans speak.

Can you say pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis?

No you cannot.

Humans have language, syntax, semantics, phonics.

Humans have numbers

From zero to infinity.

Humans have a past, a present and a future

A yesterday, today and tomorrow.

Humans have calendars.

Humans have metaphors

Similes and sarcasm.

You, on the other hand, merely grunt

Screech

Scream.

Humans are politically correct.

They make up words to stand for other words
Like “illegal alien” is undocumented
Or "Murderer”  is  'accused of unlawfully ceasing the life of another'
Like “terrorist”
Is called a “freedom fighter”
Because some humans find “terrorist” offensive

Explain that to the father of a son killed by a terrorist bomb that his son was killed by a Freedom fighter.
The president calls an act of terror in Fort Hood
 A “workplace injury”.
Explain that to the relatives of the soldiers killed by
That Islamist terrorist.
Oh I forgot, Islamists is to be avoided and I forgot that
Under this president no Americans die of terrorism.
Humans lie.
Humans are social beings

They have friends

They even have machines that multiply their friends

With a click of a button, hundreds, thousands,

And they don’t even have to get up from their chair.

How many friends do you have? A tribe? A herd? A cackle?

Humans invent religions

Where they worship their gods

In temples, chapels, cathedrals and mosques

Because humans love their gods

They kill other humans

Or enslave them.

To appease their gods they offer

Animals for sacrifices

Or carve their horns or tusks into idols.

Or hang the animal's foot to their key chains for luck.

Humans create vaccines to cure diseases.

They invent drugs

That make them happy whenever they want to be happy.

Humans can make genes mutate

And clone creatures.

Humans are intelligent.

They have philosophy, psychology,

Logic and mathematics.

They have books

And books about books.

Humans have virtue.

They have rights.

They have governments.

Humans can lead other humans

Or rule them like

Tyrants and dictators, kings and emperors.

They make promises and tell lies

So others humans empower them

And allow their freedoms and liberties to be curtailed

In exchange for security and protection.

Unfortunately

Human are easily fooled.

But they are capable

Of building cities, skyscrapers, towers and underground shelters.

It was humans that harnessed energy, invented the printing press, processed fossil fuel, invented hydroelectric dams, discovered vaccines, invented cars, planes, submarines, cures for diseases.

Humans built the pyramids, the Eiffel tower, The Statue of Liberty, the twin towers of the World Trade Center...

They are capable

Of inventing and building giant machines

That fly like birds they call airplanes

And transport hundreds from city to city

Over oceans and mountains.

Once they flew the planes into

Skyscrapers with thousands of people, 

Like the twin towers

And they exploded just like bombs.

Sometimes they just drop the bombs from

The flying machines from chemicals they invented

That can wipe out cities in a second

Like Hiroshima and Nagasaki
Humans wage war to keep the peace.
Humans maim hundreds of innocent people with a blast.

Because they have a statement to make.

You would think it's evil 

But freedom fighters have lawyers defend their rights.

Can you understand that?

Yes, humans can do all of those.

They can wipe out entire species of animals for their horns

Or scales made of keratin

Believing it is medicine.

Because they choose to be ignorant

Or superstitious and selfish and they have money

And can afford to pay for the last animal of its kind

To cure their ailments

Unfortunately it won’t make a fool into a wise man.

Humans kill thousands of your kind for your  ivory tusks

To turn into combs and other trinkets like chopsticks and hair clips.

You cannot do anything.

You are at the mercy of humans

Because you are wild.

You are not sophisticated. 

Ah, it's nothing against you.

Humans kill their own too.

Because you have no thumbs.

You cannot invent tools,

Nor weapons.

Humans invent tools like curettes

And blades and suctions

That they can insert inside the female human

To cut up little babies inside the womb and suck their parts.

Every twenty seconds.

Humans can decide who gets to live

And who gets to die.

They decide what is life

And what is not.

They invent weapons like guns

And one day while a little girl or boy
Or a man or woman

Goes walking down the street

Someone shoots her or him in the head.

It happens everyday, somewhere.

Humans can change, reshape or get rid

Of their reproductive organs.

Can you do that?

No you can't.

You are wild.

You are not human.

Humans can think.

Humans are compassionate.

They heal, love, care, protect, cure, teach, raise families, give to charity.

Humans are creative.

They think, invent, write, paint, sculpt, draw, carve.

Humans can be doctors, drug dealers, actors, professors, rapists, dictators. popes, imams, monks, nurses, teachers, thieves, emperor, dictator, mothers, felons, fathers, social workers, pedophiles, businessman, maid, engineer, policeman, veterinarians, fireman, pilots, soldiers, psychologists, students, novelists, manager, entrepreneur, architects, sculptors, programmers, tax collectors, terrorists, community organizer, tyrant, president, painter, illustrator...

Yes, humans can be anything

They want or dream to be.

Humans are sophisticated, 

Complicated.

Not savages

Simple,

And wild like you.



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