I watched a very interesting documentary last night on a man named Timothy Treadwell, who was a grizzly bear enthusiast, and lived among them every summer for 13 years in Katmai National Park, Alaska. The documentary addressed the controversy surrounding this man's activities and his death at the hands of the bears he loved in 2003.
Treadwell was an athiestic, self-proclaimed "eco-warrior" whose mission was, in his mind, to protect the grizzlies in Katmai from poachers. He was about as "crazy environmentalist" as they get and practically loathed human civilization for threatening the grizzly's existence. His approach to studying the bears was the most controversial part of his story. Treadwell literally lived right next to the bears and considered them his friends. He would swim with them, play with their cubs, and get amazingly close to the adults, sometimes even touching them.
Watching footage from his extensive video recordings, it became very clear to me that the connection Treadwell perceived between himself and the bears was complete fantasy. He loved these bears with a passion, giving them all names, and their lack of aggression towards him was perceived to be friendship and acceptance. He went so far as to take on mannerisms of bears and expressed many times to wanting to be a bear and live among them. He did inject some reality into his fantasy. He was very aware how dangerous these grizzly bears were, and knew there was a chance one could turn on him one day. Despite this danger, he refused to carry bear mace or put up electric fences around his camp, which the Park Service suggested for his protection. He tried to be careful around them, but his fascination caused him to get much to comfortable with them.
The remains of him and his girlfriend were found by the bush plane pilot hired to pick him up in the fall of 2003. They were clearly attacked and eaten by bears, and not much was left to recover. The reason I found this story so interesting is because this seems to be a recurring theme throughout history. Man thinks he can tame or befriend wild animals, and eventually is killed by the animals he loved. What Treadwell perceived as friendship was nothing more than bored indifference on the part of the bears. He was not considered a threat, and was literally ignored by them. Only their curiosity would cause them to investigate him at times. His death occured because of natural bear tendencies. The year he and his girlfriend were killed, he stayed later in the season than he normally did. When the salmon were plentiful, the bears had plenty of food and had no reason to take notice of him. But late in the season, when the salmon are scarce and bears are trying to store fat before winter hibernation, he suddenly changed into a potential food source to them. I think these "save the world" liberal environmentalists sometimes live in a fantasy world where nature loves them because they are the heroes of the environment. The stark reality is that these animals are wild, and have two driving forces that never change: their need for survival and the urge to procreate. Beyond this, emotional attachment is an illusion.
Many environmentalists respect Native Americans because they lived "in harmony" with nature, but an Native American interviewed in the documentary said it best. He said there has always been an unspoken boundary between bears and humans. It's a level of respect. The indians leave the bears alone, and vis-a-versa. To cross that boundary into their world is disrespectful and foolish. The numbers tell it all. Treadwell and his girlfriend were the first humans to be killed by a bear in Katmai National Park. He didn't respect the bears enough to leave them alone and he died because of it.
