printThe following is from my new WND column, “Picnic Time For Teddy Bears”:
“A man from my neck of the woods was mauled by a bear. A politician, to be more accurate. John Chelminiak, who is alive but disfigured for life, is a Bellevue City Councilman. Bellevue is a wealthy suburb of Seattle. When he was attacked, the councilman was at his ‘vacation cabin’ at Lake Wenatchee, in central Washington.
Chelminiak described the sounds of his cranium cracking as the black bear chomped down on it. Bears eat their prey alive. At least Chelminiak spared us the familiar, ‘No one knows why she attacked.’ ‘Bears rarely attack human beings.’ Or, ‘Before taking ‘measures’ against him, the bear community had issued fair warning about the Timothy Treadwell nuisance factor.’
Before he was gobbled up by an Alaskan brown bear, Treadwell had been pursuing a career as a bear whisperer. He had Hollywood ambitions too. Treadwell spent 13 seasons in the Alaskan Katmai National Park. There he whiled the days away filming himself crawling around with grizzlies. His bleach-blond locks were always carefully coiffed for the camera, or covered with a bandana. The brown bears seemed indifferent to Treadwell’s cooing and clucking routine.
Unbeknown to Timothy, who was usually able to read the minds of bears, one, not-so little teddy had made a mental note to himself: ‘if the porridge pickings are slim, come winter, come back for Goldie Locks.’ And that’s precisely what Ursus Arctos Horribilis did. For good measure, the bear consumed Timothy’s girlfriend, who had come to the park to break-up with bear boy.” …
The complete column, now on WND.COM, is “Picnic Time For Teddy Bears.”
Read my libertarian manifesto, Broad Sides: One Woman’s Clash With A Corrupt Society.
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It’s worth noting the greatest of your kings, David, slew bears and lions without a second thought and complete impunity.
“Fill the earth and SUBDUE it,” says the Big One Upstairs. A pox on the Sierra Club, PETA and their brainless fellow travelers.
Well said, Ilana. It’s about time that men in this country cowboy up and act like men for a change. Your column illustrates one great example of that. Keep up the good work.
Hello Ilana,
The first article I read on this unfortunate attack stated that the bear had been around the area for awhile raiding trash cans. There could have been some effort in getting the bear out of the area – but the bottom line is that John Chelminiak’s neighbors are more to blame for his attack than agencies, or the bear – due to their careless trash management that lured a bear to a residential area in the first place. The easy answer is to suggest removing all wildlife that displays “unwanted” behavior that we dont like. The real answer is for people to take responsibility and remove human foods, mainly trash and birdfeeders, that attract potentially dangerous bears to our homes. But, that requires people to change their behavior and no one, especially ones that dont like being told what to do, wants to hear that.
“You don’t tolerate any risk from wild animals.’
That’s one view. Here’s another.
“When all the dangerous cliffs are fenced off, all the trees that might fall on people are cut down, all of the insects that bite have been poisoned, and all of the grizzlies are dead because they are occasionally dangerous, the wilderness will not be made safe. Rather, the safety will have destroyed the wilderness.”
– R. Yorke Edwards
As someone who hunts, fishes, and regularly hikes in Tennessee’s Cherokee National Forest, I choose the latter sentiment. I have seen dozens of bears in the wild. It is always the highlight of any backcountry trip to see one.
The most dangerous aspect of any hike in bear country, by far, is the ride to the trailhead in your car. I will continue to hike in bear country. If this blog post keeps all the bear scared weenies at home, under their bed where it’s safe, it will serve some useful purpose. Thanks for that.
A person may be fascinated with bears, and that’s OK. But don’t try to make one your prom date. Bears don’t like to share. If you look like you are approaching something that they consider food they will take you apart. Mama bears are hyper sensitive about their cubs. If you even look like you are approaching a cub you will likely have a tango lesson from the mama. Last of all, bears sometimes have bad days. Like humans the older they get, especially the crochety old males, the shorter their fuses become. It shouldn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that you need to stay away from bears whenever you can.
A comment on one of the thoughts from your WND article. “After decades of cultural and legal emasculation, our queered men folk no longer have the urge or license to protect home and hearth.” This is the brutal truth. Not only do most people dispute this premise they don’t even recognize the problem.
Biblical is right:
“Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? And not one of them shall fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not therefore: better are you than many sparrows.”
– Matthew 10:29-31
Just finished reading ‘Woman the hunter’ last night. I appreciate the referral you gave the book a long time ago. Her non-judgmental attitude was good to see. If I see a snake in the woods, I leave it alone; however, I have two acres, mostly in grass on the edge of town. Snakes are frequent visitors. Every snake I see on my property gets checked. Non-poisonous, you’re welcome to dine on mice and insects, poisonous (none so far) will die a quick death. My family and neighbors are too important to me to think otherwise.
Ilana,
You are my new hero. Your prose and the ideology behind the prose brought a tear to my eye and renewed my optimism that there may well be pockets of reasonableness and sanity left on this planet. Continue to go get ’em girl !
Mike
Colonel USMC (retired)
[Welcome to Barely A Blog; I hope to hear more from you, even when you disagree with this writer.—IM]
Living in an area where we have bears and cougars for neighbors have taught me to respect their nature, but never trust them, and trash has nothing to do with it. Cougars take pets; bears smell the food you’re cooking. It’s what they do. It’s literally impossible to not have them bother you. The only solution is to ignore them where possible and kill them when you can’t. It’s not rocket science and doesn’t mean that bears, trees, birds, and love itself, will vanish from the earth. I find that quote by Edwards to be vacuous at best and sinister in its implications at worst. It’s entirely possible to have some middle ground, without being “told what to do.” I don’t live here to destroy “nature”. On the other hand I’d move to San Francisco and regularly step in human feces if I wanted to be completely uncivilized. Shooting a marauder encourages the rest to avoid human contact for a while. Not shooting them insures ever increasing encounters. However, you decide for yourself and don’t bother me with your personal decisions.
After they Mirandize the bears, I hope they force those bears to take sensitivity training as well.
While I appreciate the opinion — you need to think about what causes this “bear behavior”. First and foremost, the main cause human-bear conflict is encroachment. Humans need to take the blame for destroying habitats and animal food sources. Most bear experts acknowledge that organized feeding programs directed by trained professionals reduces these kinds of conflicts. Second, there are measures on can take to prevent animals from being attracted to settlements — special garbage cans, keeping them in garages, putting away bird feeders especially when they increase foraging behavior to fatten up for hibernation, etc. In many cases, humans are initially responsible by inciting nuisance behavior because many think it is pretty cool to have a bear in a back yard for a few days while they eat garbage and other “junk” they are usually fed but afterward tire of the instrusion. Waste smells and it has the same odors and like many animals bears will scavenge and will be drawn to these odors. Also, what they scavenge from human settlements from garbage (and loaded with pathogens) or are voluntarily fed — can contribute to low-level inflammation (ie palm oil cooking fat) which is also nutrient depleting. The normal black bear diet is bugs, berries and other tree “fruits” like nuts and we destroy the habitats that provide this and consequently have to find other food sources like garbage. Next, we need to consider the impact of pollution and greenhouse gases which also disperse contaminants that blankets food sources and can make them sick and contribute to nuisance behaviors. Air pollution attracts animals and depending on what toxins are in the pollution may even change their behavior. Climate change has also influenced the availability of food sources like the whitebark pine for grizzlies in Yellowstone and is one of the main staples of their diet. In some areas 80% of the trees have been destroyed and this has been attributed to the effects of climate change on the bug that is destroying them. People can refute the existence of global warming but industrial pollutions are mostly responsible for the rise in greenhouse gases that can influence biology in ways that contribute to these kinds of changes in organims. As far as smaller settlements are concerned in more remote areas a major problem is lack of infrastructure and funding for better technology to handle the amount and proper disposal of waste which attracts the animals. When it comes right down to it, humans really are the problem but too selfish in many cases to take the necessary steps to do anything about it.
Overpopulation is also to blame. There are more wild animal attacks on humans because we are building into their habitat, at least in overcrowded states like California.
If we did not have mass immigration, we would not have to keep building into bear and cougar natural habitat, or keep draining their only water sources to support ever increasing numbers of Third Worlders (most of whom couldn’t give a rat’s ass about “animal rights”).