elephant world

the essay i read on the elephants almost made me sick. when they talked about having a group consensus on hanging an elephant who lashed out against her trainers i almost threw up. learning about elephants and how they have censors in their feet which can detect "messages" from other elephants from up to four miles away made me love them more. also, re-reading about the elephant family dynamic and how they mourn over other elephants', especially those in their families, deaths, linked them more to humans than other animals. the way they bury their dead and mourn over the bodies also connects them on a very emotional level to the world. i really like elephants, and reading about the depression raging through the elephant world made me really sad. the way they have been lashing out against the villiagers didn't make me feel as bad for the people as it did for the elephants. knowing that something is wrong with the entire elephant population worries me for the future, which could be potentially elephant-less. we don't seem to care about animals and their welfare in the wild as much as we should. we are such an egocentric species that we only worry about our own kind, and we don't worry about the world around us as much as we should. the essay made me really sad about the mistreatment of circus animals and the way we treat them when they lash out against us, as they have a right to do. we underestimate the intelligence of animals because they aren't like us. i take the elephants' side on this matter.