A tad intimidating and, literally, Blunt!
Blunt and intimidating huh - and to think that I was really on my very best behavior and merely trying to be useful by providing some, I thought, valuable and impartial guidance!
Damned if you do, damned if you don't!
And the infamous education and awareness thing?
Regular readers of this blog know that it's one of my pet hates as it is so often invoked as an excuse for bad things with Sharks by the brazen self promoters, Shark molesters and new age idiots.
Don't get me wrong here.
We here do it every day, and hope that some of our in-depth conservation and research briefings "stick", and that our customers will go home and amplify the message among their friends.
But the very vast majority of the recent Shark conservation victories are not based on plebiscites but instead, have nearly always been the result of the right people talking to the right people at the right time, and of heaps of hard, persistent and anonymous work on the ground.
And Shark Stanley I hear you ask?
Dunno and likely never will - or is anybody about to finally analyze these things?
But my gut tells me that it was certainly
nice but by no means mission critical = the victories at the
last CITES CoP were the result of stellar but incredibly tedious and hard work by several individuals and NGOs, not of a social media campaign featuring cute Shark and Manta cutouts!
Long story short?
I believe that education and awareness are possibly (?) valuable as a long term strategy; but in the short term and considering the urgency of the task at hand, they remain a poor substitute for focused conservation work. And I equally remain of the opinion that intelligent and highly educated young people like Michele ought to channel their passion into more efficient and effective undertakings!
But I'm digressing as always.
Enjoy!