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Moon Bears

Some time ago there was a segment of a television programme like 60 Minutes given over to the fate of the moon bears - animals which are farmed in China for their bile which is used in traditional Chinese medicine. I found the treatment meted out to these otherwise endearing creatures hard to contemplate, and I wasn’t much helped when a recent edition of The Listener ran an article on the same topic. I began by deciding not to read it, knowing the effect it would have on me. But then, of course, I did read it, and after a rather disturbed night I contacted the Animals Asia Foundation, which is leading the charge against bear farming, asking for further information. The following is taken from the material I have received.

"On a freezing cold day in January, another 46 farmed bears arrived at our Rescue Centre in desperate condition, crammed in tiny decrepit cages they stared out in terror from their prisons as our expert team swiftly unloaded them and began to assess their pain-wracked bodies. With each new group of bears that arrives, we never cease to be shocked by their suffering and this group was no different: emergency health checks revealed missing limbs, crushed paws and bodies rubbed raw by the unrelenting cage bars; while surgery to repair their battered bodies showed that many of the bears had received multiple surgeries on the farms to convert their gall bladders from one excruciating method of bile extraction to another.

"Miraculously, nearly all of these bears have survived - and now join our other rescued bears in the sanctuary as new symbols of hope. One of these symbols of hope is Saskia, whose shocking picture on the front page of the San Francisco Chronicle had readers reeling in disgust and then pledging their ’support as they read of her new freedom.

"With 185 bears rescued so far and support for our work snowballing across China, our relationship with the Chinese Government continues to strengthen. Invited by our government partners on an official trip to investigate bear farms in Yunnan province [where the AAF found 531 bears suffering on just one farm all with crude metal catheters implanted into their gall bladders] we were given an up-to-date insight into the state of the industry. Using comprehensive evidence gathered during this investigation and from the 46 bears rescued in January 2005, we showed that the new methods of bile extraction are every bit as barbaric as the old methods. This powerful message was carried far and wide by the Chinese press.

"Media coverage in China continues to escalate, as seen by their support of the rescue of Emma and Caesar from Tianjin last year. Encased in painfulfull metal jackets that cut into their bodies, and with infection seeping out of the holes in their abdomens, [they] were in a terrible state. Today, following extensive surgery and masses of tender loving care, these two bears have blossomed into magnificent ambassadors for our work.

"With more and more days open to the public each month, the sanctuary is now a focal point for education and awareness as thousands of visitors from China and abroad stream in to meet the bears and pledge their support to help us end the barbaric practice of bear farming.

"’Crocodile Hunter’ Steve Irwin was recently swamped by the Chinese media at the sanctuary and was widely reported saying: "The work that Jill’s team is doing is not only helping repair the decades of suffering and abuse that these gorgeous bears have endured, but they are also educating the local people to respect and protect their wildlife." ["Jill" is Jill Robinson MBE, Founder and CEO Animals Asia Foundation.]

"With every farm shut down (over 40 to date) and every bear rescued, we are now closing the net around the industry as never before. With 3 years to go before the Olympic Games in Beijing in August 2008 we are calling on the Central Government of China to close every farm and help us accelerate the rescue. Until they do, bears will die in agony on the farms - and this is why your generosity and support is so crucial in the coming months and years."

I have quoted at some length from the material supplied by the Animals Asia Foundation (but still leaving out the worst) because I have been enormously shocked to discover that some people I have spoken to about the plight of the moon bears have been stoically unmoved by it. Perhaps I live on a different planet, but in the world in which I live animals (from my own careful observation) are just as capable of love, fear, joy and horrendous suffering as human beings. And the suffering of the moon bears is on a level with that of the inmates of Auschwitz - with the constant attentions of Dr Mengele and his perverted surgery thrown in for good measure.

In the eighteenth century lunatics were hired from asylums to entertain good Christian ladies and gentlemen at parties. On occasion, the lunatics actually committed suicide during the performance. It was all just part of an evening’s innocent fun. I wonder what future generations will think of us and our equivalent and steadfast refusal to recognise the reality of personhood in the higher animals. I imagine they will be under no illusions as to who are the dumb beasts.

I regret to say that the Christian Church has had a part to play in this terrible state of affairs. Although early Fathers like St Basil the Great, St John Chrysostom and St Isaac the Syrian were clear on the reality of animal suffering, later western theologians like St Thomas Aquinas taught (very influentially) that animals existed solely for our use, while Rene Descartes insisted that they had no souls and therefore no feelings at all. He described their cries of pain as being no different from the creaking of defective machinery. Yet another triumph for western intellectual arrogance - not to mention stupidity. And just to top it off, in the nineteenth century, Pope Pius IX refused to allow an office for animal welfare to open in Rome in case anyone thought human beings had any obligations to the lesser orders. God cares only about us, of course, and we should piously follow His example!

I am glad to say that times are changing, and I believe that just as Christians often used to support slavery and then changed their minds, so should we with respect to the animal creation. To start with, it is not at all clear that animals have no souls, and no part to play in the world to come. St Basil used to pray for their salvation, and St Paul makes it clear that the whole of the creation is to be redeemed. In any case, "God loves all existing things," according to Aquinas - and at least he got that right! In many ways our relation to creatures such as the moon bears resembles that of adults to children. If you can be indifferent to the suffering of children, then you can be indifferent to the suffering of the moon bears as well. But I wouldn’t try it on at the pearly gates.