“Pri·or·i·ty”
1. Precedence, especially established by importance or urgency.
2. Something afforded or deserving prior attention.
The beaver issue on Salmon Arm’s foreshore is all about priorities and priority-setting.
People complaining about the beavers and their natural activity, whether such activity be in the wharf or Christmas Island/nature trail areas, have clearly ranked their own wishes over nature and the resident beavers — and they should be ashamed of themselves for doing so.
Surely they must know that the beavers are behaving normally in their native habitat — an ecological role set out for them over millenia by evolution. Probably such ‘complainants’ do know, but by automatically setting themselves and their wishes over (and above) nature and its natural processes like the beavers, they foster and reinforce the misguided and dubious belief in humanity’s self-perceived dominance over natural processes.
(Consider the arrogant historical injunction for humanity to “have dominion over nature” — the sad results of that selfish ‘guideline’ being a nature that has been incessantly abused and degraded over the centuries, polluting and impoverishing plants and animals alike.)
On-the-other-hand, perhaps these complainants should be thanked for providing us with such a wonderfully clear example of this deeply embedded flaw in our dysfunctional relationship to the ‘real’ natural world ?
But why couldn’t complainants just simply choose a less threatening (to them) place to hike for a while, leaving the beavers in peace?
The Shuswap is, for the moment, still blessed with numerous appealing trails for exercise and nature education and enjoyment.
Also, do you perhaps wonder why local “environmental” groups are deafeningly silent on issues like the foreshore beavers, or McGuire Lake turtles and fish-stocking, for example?
Unfortunately, the same automatic setting of human priorities as central, all-important and preeminent, are curiously, but not surprisingly, mostly the reason.
Tom Crowley