The Hamilton Spectator article, on Australia’s koala, discusses the decline in the animal’s wild populations due to stress. STRESS! How can Seton argue that animals have no souls and no intelligence when they experience the same feelings we do? I think he was using this idea as more of a social critique because his novel does more to show how animals are just like us than to separate them from us.
After all, we are animals, right? Deep down, we are animals. Or, as Canadian animal rights and environmental activist Paul Watson would argue, “we’re just a conceited naked ape, but in our minds we’re some “divine legend” and we see ourselves as some sort of god, thinking we can decide what will live and what will die, what will be saved and what will be destroyed, but honestly, we’re just a bunch of primates out of control.” With that, I would agree.