The Good and Bad about WildFact - Need your suggestions

[peter]

Appreciated, Bronco.


OUR POLICY ON VERSUS DEBATES

In order to understand our policy, I decided for a few words on the past. Most of us are former members of Animal Versus Animal (Yuku). I was a mod at that forum. AVA had plenty of versus debates. Although most of them produced good information, it also is a fact it was a warzone. Most of my time was invested in keeping those involved in all kinds of battles in check. It had little effect, as the climate kept deteriorating. In the end, the forum was hacked and that was the end of it.  

When I was all but done with 'forums', Sanjay proposed to give this one a try. One of the first decisions we took was to refrain from versus debates for the reason stated. We decided for data and good information and the result is almost 2 million views in a few years only. This means there is a market for a forum like this one. Most other forums started after the collapse of AVA failed. I'm not sure, but the number of versus debates could have been a reason.

My take on debates is expressed in post 52 of the animal trainers thread (captive animals section). The bottom line is I like debates, as they often result in exchange of knowledge. Most unfortunately, it also is a fact some debates nearly always result in failures. Lion versus tiger is the most prominent of them. The main reason is this debate always attracts many posters unable or unwilling to interact.  

In order to offer good posters a chance to give it another try, I started the animal trainer thread. It immediately resulted in animosity and a ban. We don't want it, our members don't want it and our readers also are not that interested. It's telling that the thread on captive animals started by Tigerluver attracts much more views.

If you think it should be possible to discuss lions, tigers and interaction in a way that would prevent animosity, you can revive the animal trainer thread. I'll do the moderation, but I admit I'm not that interested. Well before I joined forums, I interviewed trainers, keepers, vets, directors of training facilities and many others who saw interaction between captive predators. Apart from that, I read books written by trainers and saw quite a bit myself. The bottom line is the outcome of an all-out fight between big cats of similar size and age is close to unpredictable. This is the reason the old rulers kept organising fights for centuries.

One of the things that stuck in the period I talked to trainers and performers was they agreed on individuality as a decisive factor in a fight. In their opinion, there's no such thing as species-related ability. Furthermore, every fight is unpredictable. At forums, posters guided by preference often invest a lot of time in proving them wrong, but it is not easy to take them very seriously. The reason is they saw nothing, whereas some trainers and performers saw a lot.


CLIMATE CHANGE, THE PLIGHT OF BIG CATS AND THE FUNCTION OF FORUMS

Today is the day of humans. There are over 7 billion and all of them want a chance to live a decent life. They need ever more room and the result is wild places are disappearing everywhere. Big predators can be considered as mirrors: if they are on their way out in a region, we know it is going downhill rapidly. In many parts of southeast Asia, forests are all but empty. If we don't act now, the point of no return will be reached real soon. Same for things ignored by many, like climate change. This year, again, was the year of new records everywhere.

Change often starts at the bottom. A forum about the natural world can be considered as just another way to make a few bucks, but one could also consider it an attempt to affect the outlook of those interested. As the natural world is changing ever faster, chances are more people will get interested in the world they once considered safe. To them, the question is what next. At that stage, books or documentaries come into play. A forum about the natural world also can have an effect, meaby even more so. The reason is it is updated every moment of the day by people living in different parts of the world. People interested in the natural world, with access to sources unknown to others.

A forum offering spectacular stories about bouts between dangerous animals wouldn't be much different from other agencies offering information intended to draw a crowd. A forum offering insight into an unknown world, however, would be different. Insight, we think, is what the world needs. It's our contribution to addressing a problem hardly recognized as one.

It may seem a bit dramatic, but those hit by storms, floods and landslides might have another opinion. In New York, they're still repairing the damage caused by a storm that raged some years ago. New Orleans nearly was completely destroyed. In northeastern Russia, heat waves resulted in less permafrost. Bodies of prehistoric animals who succumbed to diseases dangerous for all have been found. 

As long as we're able to do something, the damage can be contained. But what will happen if we're no longer able to repair all damage caused by rising temperatures? And who will decide which region is to receive help? Also remember life and death is a very interesting market for big firms. Healthy societies have a kind of balance between private and public, but the days of 'We, the People' are long gone. Most of us can understand why big firms want to have a say, but the situation today is very close to overdoing it. This is one of the reasons ever more people lose their interest in politics.  

The first thing we need to do, right away, is to protect our home. This planet is our home and it's a very nice one. We largely lost the ability to communicate with it, but those who live in the emerald forest, the deep blue sea and the skies have not. They can tell us what needs to be told, but they're struggling nearly everywhere. Our first task, therefore, is to protect them. To protect them is to protect ourselves.

The next step is to listen to them, to study them and to accumulate and understand knowledge. Knowledge about the planet and its capacity. Than we need to act on it, meaning we need to develop a long-term policy directed at survival. This also means scientists and those in the know should decide, not politicians and CEO's. We could do with a few shamans as well, as they, like Dersu the trapper, were convinced every living creature had a soul. Furthermore, they thought everything was connected. Research strongly suggests they could have been right, but we don't have to time to wait for definite answers.  

Back to square one then? In a way, this could be the case. It is about the essentials. WildFact contributes in that we focus on some of them. As large predators can be considered as landmarks and mirrors, they in particular feature in our forum. Not to fight, but to talk. Reply