The Explorer's Club: Endangering Animals One Dinner At A Time

This past Saturday I had the pleasure of attending the Explorer's Club dinner at the Waldorf Astoria. This year's theme "Exploring the Ocean" honored those underwater filmmakers, photographers, writers, oceanographers, biologists, and environmentalists that have changed our perspective of the undersea world. The evening's particular emphasis was the rapid decline of our earth's waters and wildlife.

Amidst admirable hours spent reflecting a precarious future and surrounded by accomplished explorers, researchers, and conservationists from the world over, I was therefore shocked to encounter a circus mentality akin to a turn of the century Coney Island freak show: the annual presentation of 'endangered' species. Accompanied by dessert and the cymbal-clanging lame jokes of the organization's honorary president, handlers brought out several terrified animals: a large snapping turtle whose mouth was stretched wide in fear, a monitor lizard, and a mid-sized alligator from the Florida Everglades.

Last year's event was even worse when an arctic wolf was dragged shivering to stage and a falcon was loosed into the Waldorf's ballroom and alighted on a balcony, too petrified to fly back to its falconer. My family has been very active in conservation since early this century. And though I eat meat, wear leather, visit zoos, and do not throw tofu pies at Anna Wintour, something in me stirred at the sight of those terrified wild animals.

While this an anticipated highlight of the dinner, I cannot help but wonder why. Surely, the majority of members and friends are not novices when it comes to the wilderness and to endangered species? The handlers were not showing the animals to poverty-stricken children of the third world to motivate them to forgo the consumption of bush meat and refrain from kicking their dogs. At least the peals of laughter from the audience were tempered by the discontent at my table where several renowned underwater filmmakers were equally disgusted by the unnecessary parading and taunting of the animals, a display that debased the evening's noble discussion of conservation, preservation and our hope for a "Green" future.

This could not have been about education or fundraising. It was simply entertainment. And while some may find it hilarious to see a snapping turtle prodded with a celery stick on stage, I personally cannot see the humor. Perhaps if the president of the organization had dressed himself in a monkey suit and banged on cymbals, then I could have chuckled. Instead I was reminded of the poor Maya Indian at the World Fair, caged, objectified, mocked, and ultimately eradicated.

The falcon lost in the grand ballroom seems something of another era. To be quite frank, in this day and age, it's uncivilized. It is the imperialist mindset that nature is still ours for the taking. And if we continue to regard that which we do not understand with the same myopic glasses that have engendered over a century of environmental destruction, we will certainly never have the pleasure of seeing those animals in their natural habitat, let alone at the Waldorf Astoria.

Comments

[Rachel36]

Hopefully, the right people at the Explorer's Club will recognize their error and do away with the animal acts. It's only a matter of time before an animal or human is injured.

[QueenCeleste]

Such people are so hypocritical. For years (before it was easy to research everything) as a teenager I sent my little checks to the World Wildlife Fund and National Wildlife Federation, not realizing they were working to preserve wildlands and animals, but also hunting the animals whose homes they were working to preserve. Sick.

Displaying live, terrified animals at these dinners is a travesty. I hope someone has the chutzpah one year to march onstage and tell these Explorer's Club idiots to go to hell.

[ieatartichoke]

This is a great post, and incidences such as these should be exposed. I only take contention with the fact that you include zoos in a list that is supposed to contrast a conservationist mindset.

Many zoos are committed to and are an important part of the conservation of wildlife in their natural habitats. Th L.A. Zoo participates in 20 conservation projects, the Oakland Zoo 30. The Wildlife Conservation Society, which includes the Bronx Zoo, the New York Aquarium and other parks is also dedicated to the conservation of the wild. It is simply misleading to pit these two ideas against each other. And while I don't think you did this purposely, because most of the public is unaware of zoos' conservation efforts, it is a fallacy that needs to be corrected.

[ggm68]

I was there, too. And I was there the year they tried to fly an Andean Condor across the ballroom. Bad idea. Last year they had a cute little baby black bear in the Jim Fowler portion of the program, the same night that black bear was featured on their "exotics" cocktail-hour buffet. Some high-profile members resigned over that one. There are some who are working within the club to bring it into the 21st century, but it's slow going.

[lefty2026]

It sucks to notice cruelty in a room full of people who mostly don't seem to care or notice. Good article, hopefully you can convince them to forgo the annual presentation of 'endangered' species next year.

[DouglasD]

Ms. Odasso's insights are right on the money. I was also in attendance at the Explorers Club Annual Dinner at the Waldorf and witnessed the annual "taunting of the animals side show" in all its appalling glory. The guests at my table were horrified by the anachronistic display of animals for the genteel amusement of the assembled. One of my guests walked out in disgust, the others sat stunned as if they had just heard someone from another era make a racist joke and then try to convince you its okay because that's how it was back then, nudge, nudge, wink, wink.
It is so out of touch that one wonders if the Explorers have lost their way and are in need of a moral compass?
Save the animals for themselves, not as after dinner entertainment for socialites.

[sheila]

"It is the imperialist mindset that nature is still ours for the taking. And if we continue to regard that which we do not understand with the same myopic glasses that have engendered over a century of environmental destruction, we will certainly never have the pleasure of seeing those animals in their natural habitat, let alone at the Waldorf Astoria."

I hope this means that you will take a very aggressive and public stand against the total obliteration of hundreds of thousands of acres of fragile desert ecosystems in the purported interest of "renewable energy" when non-destructive alternatives are readily available? Wilderness needs advocates and the Sierra Club, NRDC, Union of Concerned Scientists, Wilderness Coalition and others are leaping into the sack with Big Utilities to forge what they term an "acceptable compromise" but which is really an extension of the rapacious Big Corporate chokehold on ratepayers. With a straight face, Johanna Wald and Carl Zichella claim to be saving the planet ("saving the Joshua Trees in Joshua Tree National Park") by KILLING enormous sections of Joshua Tree and animal habitats just outside the Park!

Please add your voice to our growing chorus of people who refuse to sell out and who are insisting that only previously developed land and existing grid be used in the "new renewable energy paradigm" or you will never see Bighorn Sheep, Desert Tortoise, Fringe Toed Lizards or many other species in their natural habitats, either.