To feel saddened that not enough people care about animals in the wild.

[TigerLiliys]

I am a mum of two under 6's. I find it so saddening that our children will grow up in a world where the animals we take for granted will be no more! No polar bears, no tigers, no elephants, no Giant pandas, the list is endless.

Why do people not care?

I've been trying to get people to sign a WWF petition to help save the tiger. There are only 3200 tigers left in the wild. WWF are trying to double the numbers, but need everyone's help.

Why do people not want to sign the petition?

If you are someone that does care, sign the petition. WWF have a facebook page called WWF tiger.

i agree it's sad. i visited the iow zoo last week they have some resuced wild cats, one belonged to an irish drug dealer.

lots are also bought as exotic pets still aren't they. sadly alot of people really don't see animals the same way most westerners do

YABU

Why are you assuming people don't care just because they haven't signed, or heard of, a WWF petition.

Needless to say, the idiots destroying the tiger's environment and culling them for "medicine" etc are going to ignore any petition to stop doing so. There are the people who REALLY don't care, not those who haven't signed a WWF petition.

Perhaps they don;t think a petition is the way to go.

Yanbu, did anyone see panorama a few weeks ago where they were putting all those staffys down because they couldn't rehome them ? I was crying watching that! Animals are treated so badly by selfish people who see them as possessions .

I forgot to say, I'm off to sign the petition! Emo and TFM are probably right that it won't work though

Yanbu to be upset. Some people might not have signed the WWF petitiont though because they have had a bad reputation in the past with animal rights groups

www.wickedwildlifefund.com/petaandwwf.html for more info

i live in canada. wildlife corridors are protected, and yesterday a group of kids out for a summer holiday wander round the outskirts of the city came face to face with a cougar. in these parts they shut down areas of the countryside if there is known animal activity. we have bears, wolves and all sorts. (no elephants or pandas though)

i think round here people are more actively protecting and engaging with what's on their doorstep, rather than completing an administrative exercise about something outside their immediate experience.

the wwf have been around for years though, it's not a new phenomenon. is this part of a new campaign? and, erm, (though i'm always frightened to ask) what is signing a petition going do actually? who is it going to that is going to change their ways? fund raising for breeding programmes has been quite successful in the past?

I'm not talking about people who haven't heard about the petition. Or are yet to sign. I'm talking about the reaction of people who I have asked. I think Emo76 you misunderstand my post.

The petition I mention was just an example.

I believe a lot of people thinnk it's someone else's job and responsibility.

The petition is a start, it's to take to the Russian Government. To tell it's politicians that people do care.

I can remember a time on ITV when the WWF had a programme to try and raise £500,000. They didn't even get £250,000. But on the same day the X Factor final was on and they raised over £8 million for Simon Cowell's pocket.

Think Riven's points about animal welfare are right on. vegetarianism or veganism are some of the best things you can do personally for the environment and in turn wildlife.

People are selfish and self centered, they would perfer to have a nice chest of draws then a forrest, and I'm sure the person who tucks into the last Cod will feel very pleased about themselves and l33t for doing it.

We have been sowing the seeds of our own destruction for years with our greed and evil nature.

What creatures do manage to live in our urban sprawl and hedgerows lining our pesticide ridden fields we call pests and try to kill anyway.

WWF patroned by Prince Philip a man who like to go around shooting things that are small and fluffy for fun.

I'd prefer to give my money to WSPA they may not stop animals being made extinct by us (thats impossible in my view) but at least they can make the lives of animal we exploit better.

As others have pointed out, perhaps people do care, but they don't feel signing a Facebook petition will do any good. In fact a number of the popular petition sites are actually clever websites that harvest email addresses so that they can be then used for direct mailings, targeted at people who have particular interests. I'm a member of a number of animal related organisations and I wouldn't touch a petition with a bargepole in general. Saving wildlife or any animal is a hard slog and there is a lot we can do by taking small steps. Join your local wildlife trust, be an ethical consumer, make your views known to holiday companies about the treatment of animals in holiday destinations,don't have a pet cat (they slaughter songbirds and small mammals), dont' buy or import exotic animals or their products, the list goes on. But always remember that for many people, animals in general are just not as important as humans, and how they spend their charitable giving/donate their spare time is a very personal thing, and I would never ever criticise someone who preferred to volunteer for say a medical charity than to join the local bat group. I try to support a number of charities, both animal and human, partly because of my own health history and that of family members.

ok, I realise I'll be unpopular but...

What difference would it really make to most peoples lives if there was no polar bears? Come on really the only time most people ever see then is at the zoo.

Sure its unfortunate but for most of the animals you mention the main problem is that they live side by side with people who are very poor and need to use the land. Imagine if someone told you - no I'm sorry you can't cut down some trees in order to grow food for your family to eat we need that land for the tigers and I don't care if your babies starve to death, some rich people abroad have decided the tigers are more important.

The best we can hope for is to create nature reserves where these iconic animals can live in relative freedom, which is paid for by tourism.

Thank you all for your replies.

It isn't a facebook petition, it has a facebook page (WWF tiger) that shows the petition. It is an official WWF petition, the link to it is www.wwf.org.uk/tigers

It's aim to get 100,000 signatures to take to the Russian Government in 28 days time.

PS new to here, what does YABU mean?

switchtvoffdosomethinguseful Have you ever heard of the Butterfly effect?

A third of the world's population of humans will not eat or have clean water today. We are apathetic enough about our own species, i don't know why animals would be different.

tiger lily - i assume you mean the theory that tiny variations can create large and unexpected effects? Or the Aston Kutcher film?

Are you suggesting that as a reason to do nothing, or a reason to do something?

Its been proven time and again that internet petitions don't work and are usually made up of people that don't exist to inflate the numbers.

WWF does a lot of good work. This may or may not be one of the things it does.

Humans rule the planet. That's the facts. Animals have to get the hell out of our way. Deal with it.

It's not about growing crops to feed starving people, it's about making money.

there are people in Africa flying around protected reserves in helicopters shooting rhino with tranquilizers, cutting the horn off em and leaving them to bleed to death, Tiger pelts are worth a fortune, every single part of a Tiger is worth a fortune to the Chinese medicine trade, orangutans are being killed to make way for palm oil plantations because palm oil is the cheapest oil on the market by a long shot saving the food industry millions of pounds a year.

Greed will never change and people will do anything for money.

A reason to do something.

There is a balance in nature. One example of what could happen if the Polar bears die out, the seal population could increase and the fish population decrease. Leaving the fishermen of Greenland and Iceland ect without their staple diet.

Human are the only animals that cannot live in harmony with their environment. tis sad for the animals but I don't think human sdeserve this planet.

Depends how you define 'harmony', surely? Plenty of predator/prey interactions are boom and bust (predators scoff all prey; predators mostly die off; prey numbers recover; predators scoff more of them again...).

I'm not saying it's a model we should aspire to, mind.