“In 2015, an osprey live feed made headlines. The camera was set up by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute in Maine to watch a breeding pair at the nest with their chicks. The feed was set up with a live chat where people connected about their love for the ospreys, as well as created a hatching pool for guessing the date of emergence for each chick. At some point after hatching, the female osprey started attacking one of the chicks. As the attacks continued, the chat blew up with people asking the host organization to intervene. The Institute’s strict no intervention policy meant that whatever the conditions at the nest, nature should be allowed to take its course. The purpose of the cam was to monitor the birds, but not meddle with them. This made some viewers even more irate. Comments about the female osprey were full of rage, disdain, and a kind of misogyny directed to the bird as a “mother.”
One nest cam spectator was adamant: “It is absolutely disgusting that you will not take those chicks away from that demented witch of a parent!!!!!”
People watch nature and expect that it will reflect back the cultural norms that structure their thinking. This learning derives from the assumption that education and entertainment related to animals ought to be structured around anthropomorphized narratives in order to make them relatable. Combining this anthropomorphism with surveillance isn’t about education or making a connection with these species in order to understand the realities of their behaviours and life cycles. Instead, these approaches are about how people interpret nature.
When animal behaviour is anthropomorphized, it informs the ways humans will exert power over their lives. These interpretations justify forms of intervention under the guise of care or stewardship. One organization with a nest cam reported that their non-intervention policy frustrated spectators so much that they took matters into their own hands: viewers located the nest and attempted a rescue of the chick in question. The clandestine raptor rescue squad were concerned for the young osprey, but none of them studied the overall role of the bird in its ecosystem, or thought about what was actually normal for this species. Just like with the ospreys in Maine, they wanted to see a female bird perform the role of a good mother, to see a loving family being raised in the nest. When that didn’t happen in the way they believed was correct, they acted on their interpretation of what needed to be corrected.”
(via guurx)
