Riddle: Public Destruction of Ivory

Early in February, the French government made a big display of destroying tons of ivory to publicly declare its opposition to the illegal ivory trade that is costing African elephants their lives in such numbers that extinction seems inevitable if the trend is not reversed.

What was the consequence of this laudable bold step?Guess or research your answer. Post it below as a Reply.

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20 Responses to Riddle: Public Destruction of Ivory

  1. Benjamin Balesteri's avatar Benjamin Balesteri says:

    the purpose of the elephants dying was for the ivory. Now the elephants died for literally no reason.

  2. ryanmoyer450's avatar ryanmoyer450 says:

    The elephants are still dead and since they crushed all the ivory, they died for nothing. In my opinion, they should of sold the ivory, and used the profits to donate to groups trying to fight elephant poaching.

  3. Stephen Rivera-Lau's avatar Stephen Rivera-Lau says:

    I think doing the display in France didn’t help much. Yes, (French) people saw what happened, but now those who traffic ivory will be more careful or find other methods of trafficking. Also, now the elephants have died for nothing. Ivory trafficking will still continue.

  4. johncgross's avatar johncgross says:

    I don’t think it will fix anything. There is still demand and, if anything, they’re making the ivory rarer and more valuable. It is not a useless jester and can be certainly seen as a publicity stunt, but it will not fix the problem.

  5. pattersom1's avatar pattersom1 says:

    The consequence of this is the ivory was wasted. The elephant’s were not only killed, but were killed for no reason. They are showing the punishment to the wrong audience. The people of france are too far away and almost none would take the effort to help things. The only thing that came out of this is the government flexing its muscles for its people.

  6. casmirreihing's avatar casmirreihing says:

    I believe that the french are shedding light on the situation. They realize that the poaching won’t stop but at least their actions can help to make a difference. Well one would hope…

  7. meolal0's avatar meolal0 says:

    This action was supposed to send a message to the poachers, showing the results of their wrong doing. France’s actions will not effect the poaching at the source but stop the trade of it there. It functions as a publicity stunt as well as a small step towards ending poaching.

  8. recon740's avatar recon740 says:

    this could be a taunt by France to the rest of the world saying we can stop this, why cant you?

  9. muellera0's avatar muellera0 says:

    Burning the ivory essentially means the elephants died for nothing. The demand for ivory has also now gone up on the world stage.

  10. angelakot's avatar angelakot says:

    Pertaining to the Riddle: Though there was an elephant victimized in making this point, the idea that the French government is trying to stop the ivory from being transported throughout their airport is causing controversy and knwoledge to spread about it. It definitely won’t completely stop the problem but it is a government taking stance against it, and could lead to other governments following in the footsteps, or finding other ways to stop the spread of this valued ivory.

  11. simstilley's avatar simstilley says:

    I like elephants and it is sad that they are being harvested just for their tusks. However, France destroying the ivory really does not do anything for the elephants that died. If anything, now the elephants died for no reason.

  12. Alex LaVallee's avatar alexlavallee1 says:

    Poachers aren’t going to stop killing the elephants just because the ivory got destroyed. Killing elephants and selling ivory are two different things and trying to stop the problem in France–not Africa–is going to do nothing.

  13. taylorlacorte's avatar taylorlacorte says:

    This public display will not fix anything. If anything was accomplished, it brought more attention to the poaching of elephants for their tusks. The illegal trade for tusks will be even more competitive and ivory will become extremely expensive.

  14. erikobs's avatar erikobs says:

    Since the ivory was destroyed, the elephants died for no reason. I think the police should have tracked the ivory to the people buying it and arrested them because then at least the ivory was used for a good cause.

  15. bsharap's avatar bsharap says:

    I don’t think destroying the ivory accomplished anything. The French government hasn’t gone after the poachers, nor have they attempted to stop the poaching in the first place. The ivory will continue to be poached whether it goes through a French airport or not.

  16. prodanis0's avatar prodanis0 says:

    Yes, elephants died for no reason. But there will be poachers regardless of what the French government is trying to do. Elephants will continue to die until the problem is resolved in Africa.

  17. robins142014's avatar robins142014 says:

    I think that the french approach to this issues is most likely making the situation worst. And it is almost impossible to stop illegal trade.

  18. Josue Johnson's avatar johnsonj2 says:

    The consequence of this action was that the destruction of that amount of ivory makes ivory more valuable, essentially raising the demand and inciting more poachers to kill elephants.

  19. troibarnes's avatar troibarnes says:

    I believe that this action was needed to bring awareness to the elephant poaching, but this will not suddenly change the senseless killings of elephants.

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