The Garden of Life (a speech advocating for the megafauna)

Mankind has a checkered past. The history of the world is that wherever homosapiens set foot, the megafauna have disappeared, the large wild beasts of the field, forest, and jungle. North America is no exception. When mankind arrived 16,000 years ago, there were wooly mammoths. When mankind arrived, there were giant ground sloths that were 10 feet tall and weighed 2 to 3 tons. When mankind arrived, there were saber toothed tigers that weighed up to 620 pounds. When mankind arrived, within the span of several thousand years they were all extinct, all gone, wiped from the face of the Earth. One step was taken from the garden to the desert. The megafauna of the past are the myths of today. Without action, the megafauna of today, the elephants, the rhinoceroses, the lions, the hippopotami, the giraffes, the tigers will become the myths of the future.

The megafauna are swept up in the harsh wide winds of extinction. They blow through the garden of this planet leaving the trees withered, leaving the plant life desiccated. The soil is arid dirt where rich peat once lay. Each extinction is another step taken from the garden to the desert. What used to be a vast garden with hundred foot tall trees and meandering brooks, and verdant glooms, laid bare, denuded of its leaves. The remaining megafauna are only a shadow of what once roamed this planet. Footprints in the sand are the only reminder of what once was. 70% of megafauna species are in decline, fatally swept up in the arid winds of extinction. Just since the founding of the United States, nine megafauna species have gone extinct. Wild animals make up only about 4% of the mammals on this planet. Humans are at a loss for company in the desert of their own making.

From human hands sprang the winds of death. The desiccating winds of poachers lay waste to the garden. The withering gusts of agriculture depleted the soils and destroyed habitats. The venomous gale of toxic chemicals poison the land and the animals of the garden. Humans are poised to cause a sixth mass extinction event, an endless desert with no shelter from a blistering heat, no oasis to drink from. We will lose beauty. We will lose drama. We will lose inspiration. We will lose a necessary link in the food chain and the natural order. Mankind will become super predators with no chance at reform. A caretaker who killed everyone in his charge and will arrive empty handed before his maker on judgment day. We will stand alone in our desert, our desert of nothingness. Mankind is gobbling up the Earth’s habitat at an alarming pace. It took only twelve years for the population of this planet to go from 7 billion to 8 billion people. When we have destroyed our habitat, our own demise is inevitable. The Malthusian crunch is coming. Yesterday, today, and tomorrow we damage the Earth, but eventually she will right herself. It may take 500 million years. It may take a billion years – a blink of an eye in the lifetime of this planet – but the garden will be restored. The only difference is, we will not be there. To paraphrase Malcolm from Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park, it is the height of arrogance in man to think he can destroy the planet. The only thing he can destroy or save is himself.

The megafauna cannot stand up for themselves. The endangered animals cannot speak. Alas, I stand here in their stead. The biodiversity on this planet is being compromised, threatened, and I am a solemn voice in the midst of the unheard wails of torture sounded from the dead megafauna, and those on the brink of death. They are wails of pain. They are wails of outrage. They are wails of change. They are wails of hope. Let them sound through the desert of despair and death. Let the winds of extinction become winds of life and change. We must remember we ourselves are animals. Let us not think of ourselves as above our kin, our family. I ask of you to hear the voice of our betrayed family through mine.

Biodiversity and ecosystem imply compromise and teamwork. Both will fail in the garden of Earth so long as it is a slaughterhouse, so long as we cultivate a land of genocide and ethnic cleansing. We brutally murder our kin and, as Malcolm put it, the genocide and ethnic cleansing apply to our fate well. Soon there will be 20 billion people and no animals whatsoever. Is that where we want to go, because this is the path we have laid out for ourselves unless we forge a new one, fast.

Our actions hold irreversible consequences. The beauty of life is that it is temporary. It is brief and as extinguishable as the flickering flame of a candle. Life, similar to all other things that hold value, is rare. In this entire universe, galaxy, Space, the species of Earth are the only known beings of life. If we humans continue to poach and drive these animals to extinction, we will be utterly alone on a rock that drifts to no end, utterly and irrevocably alone in Space. There is no sadder image, no sadder way to go than alone.

Damage is already done. Species are extinct. Nothing is worth the crimes, and there is no compensation for the loss. We were never more important than these animals. We were never better than these animals. Today we recognize, our lives are not of deeper meaning or of larger worth than theirs. While we may never deserve forgiveness, we will try to no end to right our wrongs. I have a dream that we, as the people of Earth, come together to save the megafauna. I have a dream that megafauna are given the territory they need to thrive and live joyously. I have a dream Earth’s garden will be restored to full bloom, healthy, green, embracing. May one day, we sleep at night in silence, without hearing the breaking of Mother Earth’s heart. May one day, we amend the broken relationship with our family. May one day, we be at peace.

Works Cited

Oliver Milman, “The killing of large species is pushing them towards extinction, study finds”, The Guardian, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/06/the-killing-of-large-species-is-pushing-them-towards-extinction-study-finds