#11. The Red Wolf
If you live in the Southeastern United States, chances are you have never seen one of these magnificent creatures. The Red Wolf used to be a common predator in the Southeast with a triangular range that stretched from Texas to Florida to New York. That was before private property owners destroyed their ecosystem and exterminated the hated “varmint.” There are only about 200 Red Wolves left in North America. Most of these welfare bums are slumming on public property maintained by your taxpayer dollars.
#12. The Carolina Parakeet
If you’re anything like me, when you think of ‘parrots’ the tropics usually come to mind. Most White Southerners are unaware that an indigenous species, the Carolina Parakeet, used to be found in the forests of the Eastern United States from the Ohio Valley to the Gulf of Mexico.
Unfortunately, the Carolina Parakeet suffered the same fate as the Passenger Pigeon. Their habitat was destroyed by careless White settlers who cut down forests to make room for new farmland. They were also shot en masse as “varmints” by private property owners and their colorful feathers were highly in demand as decorations in ladies’ hats. Although the CP flourished in capitivity, the ‘free market’ couldn’t find any commercial incentive to preserve the species and it went extinct in the early twentieth century.
#13. The Cougar
White Southerners love to swap stories and rumors about “Mountain Lions” prowling about their hunting land. As I child, I distinctly remember being spirited away one afternoon to see some of their alleged tracks on my own property. The ubiquitous Cougar once roamed most of the Western Hemisphere from Alaska to Chile.
Cougars are rarely seen in the Eastern United States these days. East of the Mississippi, “Mountain Lions” were extirpated virtually everywhere outside of Florida by private property owners as another hated “varmint” thought to be more trouble than they are worth. The Cougar was able to survive into modern times due largely to having such an extensive range. Less widespread species haven’t shared their luck.
#14. The Heath Hen
In Colonial America, the heath hen was an extremely common and popular animal. It could often be found on the dinner plate of of poor Americans. Some have speculated that it was heath hens (and not wild turkeys) that were consumed on the first Thanksgiving. Now all but forgotten, the heath hen was driven to extinction by market hunters and private property owners who decimated the species over the course of the nineteenth century. The ‘free market’ apparently couldn’t find an incentive to preserve this animal for posterity either.
#15. The Bighorn Sheep
By now you should be starting to get the picture. There used to be millions of Bighorn Sheep in the American West. By 1900, the market hunters had reduced their population to a few thousand. The species has made a dramatic comeback on the wildlife refuges established by the federal government. Libertarian ideologues insist that ‘government’ can’t do anything the ‘private sphere’ can’t do better, but any number of successful examples in wildlife management show otherwise.
And don’t forget this: all these godforsaken creatures were killed by the millions by white people. Also, you might want to include the Beothuk in your list, as it develops, who could be considered wildlife.
Stronza, you might have added the key word here: ENGLISH speaking white people, who did these ‘deeds’. Besides the wildlife and the American Indians, they did indeed do a genocidal number on the Beothuks of Newfoundland, who, ironically, may have been of Solutrean origin.
When I was younger, I studied biology and zoology. My favourite subject was herpetology, the study of reptiles and amphibians. Through my studies, travels, and talks with herpetologists at universities on the East coast, I was told that the absence of the Eastern Box Turtle (Terrapene carolina carolina) over vast regions in upstate New York is due to their having been genocided by the Iroquois Indians, who used the turtles for meat, decorations, burial objects, and ceremonial rattles. Today, the Asian appetite for turtle meat is driving many turtle species to extinction in Asia. Fortunately, they survive thanks to American and European herpetological researchers and hobbyists.
Alex does take a respite from barking at elderly widows who rely on government assistance to make one salient point, which is that the Lew Rockwell/paleolibertarian types having been “carrying our water” for us and that we should acknowledge their (unintentional) assistance. This revolution will manifest first as an implicitly racial revolt against taxation and inflation and second (presuming we embrace our moment) as an explicitly racial reawakening of the Anglo-American people.
As such, I think it’s prudent to be bedfellows with paleolibertarians until our movement can stand on its own. We’re all against being taxed by this government. We’re all against this Federal Reserve. We’re all against this government becoming more powerful. But this is for situational, not ideological reasons. We’re all Situational Libertarians(tm). But we should keep some penicillin at our bedside to assure that we don’t catch something from ideological libertarians (like wanton disregard for nature).
The problem isn’t the White race. Whites have done more than anyone else over the past century to preserve threatened and endangered species. It was a naive and misguided ideology.
A classic documentary about a nature lover: