Of Monkeys and Polar Bears

What do the monkeys in India and the Alaskan Polar bear have in common? More than you might think. They are both well-loved animals looking for a new place to live.
Recently an Alaskan Polar Bear wondered into a Native Village looking for food. There is no debate that this happened simply because the Bear is quickly losing its habitat--the polar sea ice. It needs to look for food on land now, and obviously the Village dumpsters are a good choice.

The monkeys in India have a similar dilemma. As the Indian economy grows, the human population can afford to build houses in former wilderness habitat. With the sprawl, the monkeys lose their natural home. So the logical course of events has been for them to become city-dwelling monkeys. Living among and harassing their new human neighbors.

Unfortunately for the Alaskan polar bear, he was shot and killed, simply because he came too close. The Indian monkeys are painstakingly relocated, to ever dwindling habitats, only to return to their city families.

It seems to me that people have a hard time understanding these connections. As we continue to cheer our economic development, we keep ignoring its byproducts. Be it the loss of sea ice due to warming or the loss of forests for our animals as we expand our homes. It is simply impossible to sustain suburban lifestyles for every inhabitant on earth. The animals need to go somewhere. Some folks may like a world filled only with shopping malls, but that world is not for me.