"Humanization?"

Well, that's an interesting bit of nomenclature to describe something we've always previously known as anthropomorphism. But perhaps the authors of the word humanization meant something entirely different. In that in anthropomorphism we attribute to animals other than humans traits that human beings appear to believe that they and they only are privileged to bear. "Humanization" on the other hand, is meant to convey the meaning that - what? we treat animals as we would human beings? The distinction is probably there all right, but it still escapes me.

As William Shakespeare had Shylock passionately declare: If I bleed, am I not human? In the case of animals bleeding doesn't make them human to be sure, but does it not confer on them equal consideration as living, thinking, feeling creatures, just like man? And when human beings feel empathy and affection for warm-blooded animals that have the ability to reciprocate attention and obviously feel affection and trust for those who care for them do they not have their value to us as creatures worthy of our attention?

Not that animals owe us anything. They are as useful in this world and as much a part of this world as human beings are; by their very nature perhaps more so. Certainly they cause less damage than humankind tends to. Their value as living creatures tend, however, to be understated by us, their attributes unrecognized, their function within the ecosystem nature has devised unrealized by us. Still, animals fascinate people, who seem to generally feel that these creatures were placed on earth mostly for our entertainment as oddities.

So we cage them, feed them, and display them. In zoos, of course. We live in an enlightened age where we realize that if we undertake to cage, feed and display animals we also have an obligation to be cognizant of all their needs, to be sensitive to their emotions, since they have long proven they have earned our empathy as living creatures. Yet there are animal specialists who believe we do animals a grave disservice by bringing them into our world, and with the exception of domesticated animals they are likely correct.

It is not animal liberationists who decry the neglect, misuse and exploitation of animals by humankind that I refer to here, but rather zoologists who study the physiology and physiognomy of animals, their habits and lifestyles, their habitats and needs. They would prefer humankind remain distant from the animals whom they describe as "wildlife" - and for the good of the animals themselves. Wild animals, be they birds or mammals need not be fed by people; they should be able to forage on their own, and to feed them distracts them and destroys their innate abilities.

That makes good, sound sense. But here is a conundrum, one worthy of the wisdom of King Solomon. what to do when a baby bear cub is birthed in a zoo and its mother rejects it, leaving it exposed to die? Well, in the Berlin zoo just such an occurrence transpired, and the zoo keepers scooped two cubs out of the bear compound with a fishing net and placed them in an incubator, feeding them with human milk and cod liver oil every half hour. One, named Knut, a tiny white fluff of a cub, survived.

Knut quickly became a city mascot, beloved of zoo visitors who will soon strain to catch a glimpse of him at his forthcoming first public appearance. He has become a beloved and pampered resident of the zoo, fed chicken puree, given his own Christmas tree. He sleeps with a teddy bear, plays with a football, and his keeper plays a guitar and sings to him to put him to sleep. Sounds quite wonderful, does it not? Trouble is, it is not.

Frank Albrecht, an animal rights campaigner states: "Legally speaking, the zoo should kill the baby bear. Otherwise, it is condemning the bear to a dysfunctional life and that is a breach of the law". The director of Aachen's zoo, Wolfram Ludwig, believes that Berliners are wrong to want to save this bear cub. "It is not correct to bottle-feed a small polar bear. He will always be fixated on his keeper." It is his contention that the cub should have been killed when its mother rejected it. "One should have had the courage to kill him much earlier."

In light of the fact that environmentalists are increasingly of the belief that Arctic species are facing possible extinction due to the shrinking Arctic ice mass and the inevitability of their habitat loss, zoos around the world are grappling with the problem of saving species like Knut from extinction. In any event, most zoos do keep polar bears. It defies intelligence that this tiny bear should be treated as a "humanized threat to normal wildlife" when it seems the expedient thing to do is to retain him in the environment he was born to, in any event.

The cub, now weighing in at 8 hefty kilograms should be seen as the gift that he is and cherished for his growing presence. To do otherwise is simply counter-humanization in quite another manner.