LETTER: Don't take animals' suffering for granted

John Muir, the renowned 19-century naturalist, once came across a dead bear while hiking in the Yosemite wilderness. He stopped and tried to imagine what this beautiful creature’s life had been like. Did the bear rejoice when it felt the sun and wind on its back? That night, in a reflective mood, Muir wrote in his journal, “God’s charity is broad enough for bears.”

I think that Muir’s journal entry challenges us to expand our circle of love to include all of Creation. But I don’t think he meant the kind of love that Warren Illi had in mind when he wrote in his Flathead Outdoors column (May 5, 2016) that “...trappers love wildlife...”

Mr. Illi, after recounting some personal anecdotes to dismiss and minimize nonhuman animal suffering, writes, “A recent letter to the editor by the anti-trapping crowd was full of misinformation.” The only example of this “misinformation” that Mr. Illi supplies is, “That writer said that for every wild animal trapped, two non-target wild animals are caught.” However, once again he uses personal anecdotal narratives and shallow descriptors like “nonsense” to make his point rather than documentation.

I don’t personally know the author of the letter Mr. Illi was referring to, but it only took me a few minutes to verify her comment. Dick Randall, a former federal trapper, testified before Congress, “My trapping records show that for each target animal I trapped, about two unwanted individuals were caught. Because of trap injuries, these non-target animals had to be destroyed. (D. Randall. “Hearings before the Ninety-Fourth Congress to Discourage the Use of Painful Devices in the Trapping of Animals and Birds.” Washington, D.C. U.S. Govt. Printing Office) Also, from a study by Novak, “Non-target animals comprised 76 percent of all animals captured in leghold traps...” (M. Novak. “The foot-snare and leg-hold traps: a comparison.” Proceeding of the Worldwide Furbearer Conference [1981] 3: 1671-1685)

Mr. Illi’s arguments that animals do not feel pain (See also Illi’s column “Pain largely a matter of mind for animals,” Sept. 1, 2005, Daily Inter Lake) are remnants from an outdated and disproven Cartesian world view.

In his definitive book on suffering, “The Spectrum of Pain” Richard Sarjeant writes, “Every particle of factual evidence supports the contention that the higher mammalian vertebrates experience pain sensations at least as acute as ours. To say they feel less because they are lower animals is an absurdity.”

There is no way around it. Animals suffer. And trapping is inherently painful.

John Muir was a deeply spiritual man. But whether we are Christians, Buddhists, Muslims, or of no faith, his words should call us to compassion: “God’s charity is broad enough for bears.” Is ours?

—Bob Muth Sr., Kalispell