# On 7 September, 1936, Benjamin died. **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [September 7, 2011, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-7-september-1936-benjamin-died/595529 "2011-09-07T19:22:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Arnold\_Winkelried](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2011, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-7-september-1936-benjamin-died/595529/21 "2011-09-10T16:48:21Z")
Cicero, if you are an expert on the subject, please enlighten me. Perhaps I have been misinformed. What did the British colonial authorities do to protect the Tasmanian culture, way of life, and indigenous population? ---
**Author:** ![Arnold\_Winkelried](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Arnold\_Winkelried](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arnold_Winkelried)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2011, 9:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-7-september-1936-benjamin-died/595529/22 "2011-09-11T09:48:16Z")
Anyway, I apologize to the OP for hijacking this thread. The topic I introduced would be better served in a different thread in Great Debates, if anyone is interested to start one. ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [September 12, 2011, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-7-september-1936-benjamin-died/595529/23 "2011-09-12T21:32:47Z")
> [@Lancia](#): > > The fact the humans can, in the space of a hundred years and a bit, completely wipe out an entire species, boggles the mind. Even the extinction of the passenger pigeon pales in comparison to [Steller’s sea cow](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stellar%27s_Sea_Cow), which was hunted to extinction a mere _27 years_ after Europeans first encountered the species. From what I’ve read, their behavior was their downfall: hunters quickly learned that when one was wounded, it would issue a distress call, causing other sea cows in the area to rush in and cluster protectively around the injured animal. Of course, that protective instinct just made it easier to kill a whole lot of them at once. ---
**Author:** ![Savannah](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b3f665/32.png) [@Savannah](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Savannah)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-7-september-1936-benjamin-died/595529/24 "2011-09-13T02:46:02Z")
I don’t want to live in a world that has nothing but crows and dandelions. I want to live in a world that also has orchids and hummingbirds. I mourn that we seem to be unable to live on this planet without sharing it; that for humans to thrive, we seem to feel that no other species has the right to exist. ---
**Author:** ![wedgehed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8edcca/32.png) [@wedgehed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wedgehed)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-7-september-1936-benjamin-died/595529/25 "2011-09-13T03:05:06Z")
Let’s see how touchy-feely you are when dingos eat your baby! :eek: ---
**Author:** ![salinqmind](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3ec8ea/32.png) [@salinqmind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/salinqmind)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-7-september-1936-benjamin-died/595529/26 "2011-09-13T04:32:13Z")
> [@Savannah](#): > > I don’t want to live in a world that has nothing but crows and dandelions. > > I want to live in a world that also has orchids and hummingbirds. > > I mourn that we seem to be unable to live on this planet without sharing it; that for humans to thrive, we seem to feel that no other species has the right to exist. This is why I paid $25 a pound for a little piece of halibut. Tilapia and farm raised salmon is plentiful, an actual wild fish from the ocean scarce and getting scarcer. Thank the bible-thumpers, the Catholics, the Republicans, the Duggars, the Chinese. Breed, breed, breed. Ravage the countryside. Expand. Build. Pollute. I feel exactly the way you do, Savannah. Exactly. I’m glad I’m on the other end of the spectrum and not a kid any more. God knows what the world will be like for our kids and grandchildren. They should just start re-writing picture books right now. Get rid of flowers, animals, and nature - substitute videogames, computers, and cell phones. ---
**Author:** ![DirkGntly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d9b06d/32.png) [@DirkGntly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DirkGntly)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-7-september-1936-benjamin-died/595529/27 "2011-09-13T04:44:34Z")
> [@Eonwe](#): > > Be careful . . . ever read Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency? No…why don’t you tell me about it? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-7-september-1936-benjamin-died/595529/28 "2011-09-13T14:12:21Z")
> [@salinqmind](#): > > This is why I paid $25 a pound for a little piece of halibut. Tilapia and farm raised salmon is plentiful, an actual wild fish from the ocean scarce and getting scarcer. Not quite following the logic here. Aren’t wild foish from the ocean getting scarcer _because_ people pay $25 a pound for their dead bodies? On-topic, the eponymous hero of the Mike Baron comic book [_The Badger_](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Badger) focused his energies on defending animals by attacking – sometimes quite savagely – people who harmed them. In one story arc, he journeyed to Tasmania to defend the last Thylacine from a demonic cult that planned to kill the animal specifically _because causing extinction is a sin so great_ it would give them the power to summon a potent demon. I like that formulation, placing human-caused extinction high in the hierarchy of terrible wrongs. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-7-september-1936-benjamin-died/595529.md?page=1)