FARK.com: (6917778) How hardcore are bears? They're purposely killing themselves to protest the horror of bile farms

If you can read this, either the style sheet didn't load or you have an older browser that doesn't support style sheets. Try clearing your browser cache and refreshing the page.

		How hardcore are bears? They're purposely killing themselves to protest the horror of bile farms (mnn.com)		203
		More: Strange

• • •

13534 clicks; posted to Main » on 02 Feb 2012 at 1:53 PM | Favorite | share:

more» |

Get this fabulous T-Shirt and impress the methane out of your friends!

shirt it!

Share this link:

URL:

http://fk.cm/go/6917778

Bookmark:

Article Comments close

203 Comments (+0 »)

View Voting Results: Smartest and Funniest

First | « | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | » | Last | Show all

ksobby

2012-02-02 09:43:41 AM

Ugh ... I feel like I just read 10 Sarah McLaughlin commercials in a row.

/ sad story, horrendous practice

doglover

2012-02-02 09:53:44 AM

Good thing we still got tigers.

sweetmelissa31

2012-02-02 09:56:56 AM

ksobby: Ugh ... I feel like I just read 10 Sarah McLaughlin commercials in a row.

/ sad story, horrendous practice

Oh my gosh This.

/PS: I accidentally clicked "funny" on your comment, and now I feel even worse.

Blues_X

2012-02-02 10:07:47 AM

WTF, humanity?

exick

2012-02-02 10:19:53 AM

Aww fark!

ecmoRandomNumbers

2012-02-02 11:30:12 AM

I had to take the drug Ursodiol (which is basically the same as the ursodeoxycholic acid from bears), but it's synthesized. Most people in the world can't afford it without insurance, though. A 30-day supply was well over a thousand bucks.

gopher321

2012-02-02 01:49:06 PM

Can we go ahead and slaughter the Chinese now? Don't think anyone will miss them.

/no, I'm not serious
//much

5 dollar milkshake

2012-02-02 01:58:29 PM

Nice of the article to explain what bear bile is even used for. I mean, I feel awful after reading this. Anyone care to tell me what this is being harvested for? I don't want to google "bear bile" at work....my searches are weird enough as it is...

PsyLord

2012-02-02 02:00:12 PM

ksobby: Ugh ... I feel like I just read 10 Sarah McLaughlin commercials in a row.

/ sad story, horrendous practice

I'm all about respecting other cultures and stuff, but come on. Get with the 21st century, Asia.

www.gbmproductions.net

/I haz a sad...
/SO always covers her head or changes the channel when those commercials come on

BumpInTheNight

2012-02-02 02:00:32 PM

5 dollar milkshake: Nice of the article to explain what bear bile is even used for. I mean, I feel awful after reading this. Anyone care to tell me what this is being harvested for? I don't want to google "bear bile" at work....my searches are weird enough as it is...

...it did...you just have to have a larger attention span.

/really sad article is sad
//farking backward practices are backward

Mitch Taylor's Bro

2012-02-02 02:01:32 PM

ksobby: Ugh ... I feel like I just read 10 Sarah McLaughlin commercials in a row.

This.

/ sad story, horrendous practice

and that.

illicit

2012-02-02 02:03:46 PM

It's all done in the name of traditional Chinese medicine, for which bear bile is believed to be an essential ingredient.

Goddamnitsomuch. fark the Chinese and their "medicine" that almost always involves slaughtering animals so they can get boners in their tiny, tiny, penises.

Can we just carpet bomb China with Viagra?

ultraholland

2012-02-02 02:03:48 PM

Me Chinese, me play joke, me treat bear horribly to profit from bullshiat medicine.

averagejoe42

2012-02-02 02:04:09 PM

The fark did I just read?

i0.kym-cdn.com

Splinshints

2012-02-02 02:06:03 PM

5 dollar milkshake: Nice of the article to explain what bear bile is even used for. I mean, I feel awful after reading this. Anyone care to tell me what this is being harvested for?

It's Asians torturing and killing animals, take a wild guess what it's for.

They sell it as a commodity for use in largely pointless voodoo mumbo jumbo, otherwise referred to as "traditional medicine".

Headso

2012-02-02 02:07:50 PM

illicit: Goddamnitsomuch. fark the Chinese and their "medicine" that almost always involves slaughtering animals so they can get boners in their tiny, tiny, penises.

Pretty much, it wasn't so bad when they were all too poor to have any real demand for this stuff but now they have discretionary income it's a disaster.They have done for animal cruelty what Henry Ford did to auto industry, great legacy!

whither_apophis

2012-02-02 02:09:18 PM

5 dollar milkshake: Nice of the article to explain what bear bile is even used for. I mean, I feel awful after reading this. Anyone care to tell me what this is being harvested for? I don't want to google "bear bile" at work....my searches are weird enough as it is...

Pretty much used in anything: fevers, hep, shampoos, trauma...

"It's for your goodness"

/are any western medicines animal based? Excluding snake poisons, it seems they're all plant based.

8InchFloppy

2012-02-02 02:10:18 PM

What "Crush Cages" might look like...

i872.photobucket.com

Egoy3k

2012-02-02 02:11:49 PM

This is why when assholes starting talking about 'traditional medicine' I feel like punching them.

woodstock827

2012-02-02 02:11:53 PM

illicit: It's all done in the name of traditional Chinese medicine, for which bear bile is believed to be an essential ingredient.

Goddamnitsomuch. fark the Chinese and their "medicine" that almost always involves slaughtering animals so they can get boners in their tiny, tiny, penises.

Can we just carpet bomb China with Viagra?

No reputable Chinese medicine practitioner would use this, or other silly ingredients like tiger penis. One thing it's expensive, probably illegal, and there are other cheaper, legal and if not more efficient herbs that can be used.
The ones who use it are probably trying to scam you.

/Chinese

The sound of one hand clapping

2012-02-02 02:12:42 PM

Dammit so much. I was kinda having an alright day until I read that article. Now I just feel really sad for those poor bears. Can't we give China a swift kick in the balls and remind them that if they want to compete with the west they need to stop doing shiat like this.

syberpud

2012-02-02 02:12:56 PM

whither_apophis: 5 dollar milkshake: Nice of the article to explain what bear bile is even used for. I mean, I feel awful after reading this. Anyone care to tell me what this is being harvested for? I don't want to google "bear bile" at work....my searches are weird enough as it is...

Pretty much used in anything: fevers, hep, shampoos, trauma...

"It's for your goodness"

/are any western medicines animal based? Excluding snake poisons, it seems they're all plant based.

Some vaccines use eggs to grow the virus the vaccine combats, but they aren't fertilized (I think).

GrandDamnDeeDee

2012-02-02 02:13:50 PM

8InchFloppy: What "Crush Cages" might look like...

Is that real?? Yes, I'm serious.....

Ed Grubermann

2012-02-02 02:14:03 PM

whither_apophis: 5 dollar milkshake: Nice of the article to explain what bear bile is even used for. I mean, I feel awful after reading this. Anyone care to tell me what this is being harvested for? I don't want to google "bear bile" at work....my searches are weird enough as it is...

Pretty much used in anything: fevers, hep, shampoos, trauma...

"It's for your goodness"

/are any western medicines animal based? Excluding snake poisons, it seems they're all plant based.

Insulin used to be, but we've even managed to move that first to bacteria and now to plants.

retrograde

2012-02-02 02:14:26 PM

So, the Chinese like to brag about their 3000 year old "civilization". From my vantage point this so called civilization has been one long stretch of genocide, oppression, famine, plague and exploitation. Too bad the Mongols didn't finish the job.

Traditional Chinese Medicine ... shamanistic mumbo jumbo of the kind the rest of the world abandoned years ago.

Equic

2012-02-02 02:14:45 PM

Way to fight barbarity against animals with racism against Chinese people. Stay classy, internets!

Here is a rescue organization for those motivated to do something: Bear rescue at Animals Asia

BumpInTheNight

2012-02-02 02:16:28 PM

GrandDamnDeeDee: 8InchFloppy: What "Crush Cages" might look like...

Is that real?? Yes, I'm serious.....

Its from a campy dennis hopper sci-fi movie, space truckers or something. So its not real...yet.

KiplingKat872

2012-02-02 02:17:39 PM

For a vegetarian, I have a pretty high tolerance for carnivores and how they get their sustenance. I came out of a rural American hunting culture after all.

But practices like this are pure evil. For a culture that supposedly believes in Buddhism and Taoism, they are big fat farking hypocrites. Karma has a lesson waiting for those bastards.

ksobby

2012-02-02 02:17:41 PM

sweetmelissa31: Oh my gosh This.

/PS: I accidentally clicked "funny" on your comment, and now I feel even worse.

Thanks! I'll just consider it back pay for any other funny comment I may have made but went unnoticed.

LMark

2012-02-02 02:17:42 PM

retrograde So, the Chinese like to brag about their 3000 year old "civilization". From my vantage point this so called civilization has been one long stretch of genocide, oppression, famine, plague and exploitation. Too bad the Mongols didn't finish the job.

And this is different from which other civilization? You're holding up the Mongols as paradigms of virtue?

illicit

2012-02-02 02:18:02 PM

woodstock827: illicit: It's all done in the name of traditional Chinese medicine, for which bear bile is believed to be an essential ingredient.

Goddamnitsomuch. fark the Chinese and their "medicine" that almost always involves slaughtering animals so they can get boners in their tiny, tiny, penises.

Can we just carpet bomb China with Viagra?

No reputable Chinese medicine practitioner would use this, or other silly ingredients like tiger penis. One thing it's expensive, probably illegal, and there are other cheaper, legal and if not more efficient herbs that can be used.
The ones who use it are probably trying to scam you.

/Chinese

And yet here the article is, clearly stating there is a practice and demand for this very thing.

GrandDamnDeeDee

2012-02-02 02:19:57 PM

BumpInTheNight: GrandDamnDeeDee: 8InchFloppy: What "Crush Cages" might look like...

Is that real?? Yes, I'm serious.....

Its from a campy dennis hopper sci-fi movie, space truckers or something. So its not real...yet.

Thanks. Still a sad story.....

KiplingKat872

2012-02-02 02:20:36 PM

There are many great things about the Chinese culture. Their appalling barbarity toward animals and disgusting disregard for the environment are not among them.

Egoy3k

2012-02-02 02:21:24 PM

woodstock827: No reputable Chinese medicine practitioner would use this, or other silly ingredients like tiger penis. One thing it's expensive, probably illegal, and there are other cheaper, legal and if not more efficient herbs that can be used.
The ones who use it are probably trying to scam you.

As opposed to the reputable healers who are willing to align my chi for cash? I know when i buy my cooling beverage designed to treat excess heat which could be the cause of dry skin I always make sure I'm dealing with a reputable dealer in such items.......

neversubmit

2012-02-02 02:21:34 PM

retrograde: So, the Chinese like to brag about their 3000 year old "civilization". From my vantage point this so called civilization has been one long stretch of genocide, oppression, famine, plague and exploitation. Too bad the Mongols didn't finish the job.

Traditional Chinese Medicine ... shamanistic mumbo jumbo of the kind the rest of the world abandoned years ago.

Oh really? Water fluoridation (new window) homeopathy is alive and well here in the U.S.

mongbiohazard

2012-02-02 02:22:17 PM

Egoy3k: This is why when assholes starting talking about 'traditional medicine' I feel like punching them.

I like to reply, sounding as enthusiastic as I can, "Oh yeah, traditional medicine, great stuff! Medicine from the age when 35 was old age and we died of toothaches! Who'd want to use modern medicine with its stupid scientific tests and effective results which have tripled our lifespans and saved countless people from agonizing suffering and early deaths? That's so crazy!"

It's sad how beliefs and wasteful practices from our more primitive past just will not farking die.

KiplingKat872

2012-02-02 02:23:18 PM

As for the capacity of animals to commit suicide, yes. They are more capable than Humans are I think, as they seem to be able to will themselves to death when trapped in appalling conditions.

Are animals human? No. Can they still feel despair? Yes. That has been proven over and over and over and any "scientist" who denies it is receiving a paycheck from an animal exploitative industry,

CapeFearCadaver

2012-02-02 02:24:39 PM

I have never heard of this until now. What a horrendous practice. Goddammit.

gonna go puke now.

LMark

2012-02-02 02:25:43 PM

KiplingKat872 There are many great things about the Chinese culture. Their appalling barbarity toward animals and disgusting disregard for the environment are not among them.

THIS. Farkers, if you see evil in the world (and this mistreatment of bears is certainly a good example), publicize it and do what you can to try to eliminate it. Do not bash an entire culture based on the fact that this evil happens to come from that culture. No culture has a pure history.

Harry Freakstorm

2012-02-02 02:26:39 PM

I've called this meeting of the Inhumane Society to discuss the following: Bears. What can we do to them to make them suffer and wish they were dead? They make lousy pets. You leave them with the kids and the kids start disappearing. They can't pull a plow and they don't taste like chicken. What can we do with them?

We could harvest their fur for coats.

Fenwick. You always throw that old chestnut out there. We needs ideas people. What can we do to bears that make them regret being bears?

I think we could harvest their fluids in a painful way. Maybe call it traditional medicine so when the 'nice people' find out, we can defend the practice.

Good Idea, Cho. Ideas like that make me proud to be a member of the Inhumane Society. Let's set up a committee to research and develop which fluids we can harvest. Not blood. That can be synthesized too easily. Stay away from the sperm. That would only affect male bears and they'd probably like it. Okay, next item. Donations are way down. People are finding out that we are actually inhumane. Ideas?

We could go with initials: IS. People might donate without finding out what they stand for. People get in to it before they know what itt really means. I think it works for IHOP and KFC.

Fenwick! Stop. Using. Words. Now.

How about iSociety? Get a big old boost off Macintosh. That can't own all the combinations.

Cho! Brilliant! Move down here by me. Just push Fenwick aside. Call Jennifer Anniston. Ask her about St. Jude's and kind of infer that this is exactly like that but different. We'll start a huge ad campaign of Jen holding a sign that says "iSociety". If she's topless and showing a little underboob, it'll go viral.

Finster. Register the iSociety domain. Fenwick! My car needs detailing. See to it. The rest of you, we've got work to do. Bears. Body fluid. Pain. Get working. Chop. Chop!

Oh, sorry Cho.

nelsonal

2012-02-02 02:26:58 PM

syberpud: whither_apophis: 5 dollar milkshake: Nice of the article to explain what bear bile is even used for. I mean, I feel awful after reading this. Anyone care to tell me what this is being harvested for? I don't want to google "bear bile" at work....my searches are weird enough as it is...

Pretty much used in anything: fevers, hep, shampoos, trauma...

"It's for your goodness"

/are any western medicines animal based? Excluding snake poisons, it seems they're all plant based.

Some vaccines use eggs to grow the virus the vaccine combats, but they aren't fertilized (I think).

Epogen uses urine of mares.

dericwater

2012-02-02 02:27:01 PM

Forget the extreme working conditions at Foxconn. If Apple and other high tech companies can get China and the chinese population to agree to stop farming bear bile and rhino horns and other stupid eastern cult/quack medicine, that would be a good first step.

Geez China, can't you move on to at least the 20th century?

Rev. Skarekroe

2012-02-02 02:27:44 PM

Ah, the Chinese.

"Is there any way we can enhance your dining experience by hurting an animal?"

dericwater

2012-02-02 02:29:03 PM

Rev. Skarekroe: Ah, the Chinese.

"Is there any way we can enhance your dining experience by hurting an animal?"

Yeah, the fresh monkey brain... um, no thanks.

PsyLord

2012-02-02 02:30:02 PM

Rev. Skarekroe: Ah, the Chinese.

"Is there any way we can enhance your dining experience by hurting an animal?"

www.theinnovationdiaries.com

I take it you only eat free range animals?

Rev. Skarekroe

2012-02-02 02:30:28 PM

nelsonal: Epogen uses urine of mares.

Well, I suppose if they use catheters to get it I'd be against it.
But I can tell you from experience that horses will just piss on their own.

I May Be Crazy But...

2012-02-02 02:31:53 PM

Harry Freakstorm: I've called this meeting of the Inhumane Society to discuss the following: Bears. What can we do to them to make them suffer and wish they were dead? They make lousy pets. You leave them with the kids and the kids start disappearing. They can't pull a plow and they don't taste like chicken. What can we do with them?

We could harvest their fur for coats.

Fenwick. You always throw that old chestnut out there. We needs ideas people. What can we do to bears that make them regret being bears?

I think we could harvest their fluids in a painful way. Maybe call it traditional medicine so when the 'nice people' find out, we can defend the practice.

Good Idea, Cho. Ideas like that make me proud to be a member of the Inhumane Society. Let's set up a committee to research and develop which fluids we can harvest. Not blood. That can be synthesized too easily. Stay away from the sperm. That would only affect male bears and they'd probably like it. Okay, next item. Donations are way down. People are finding out that we are actually inhumane. Ideas?

We could go with initials: IS. People might donate without finding out what they stand for. People get in to it before they know what itt really means. I think it works for IHOP and KFC.

Fenwick! Stop. Using. Words. Now.

How about iSociety? Get a big old boost off Macintosh. That can't own all the combinations.

Cho! Brilliant! Move down here by me. Just push Fenwick aside. Call Jennifer Anniston. Ask her about St. Jude's and kind of infer that this is exactly like that but different. We'll start a huge ad campaign of Jen holding a sign that says "iSociety". If she's topless and showing a little underboob, it'll go viral.

Finster. Register the iSociety domain. Fenwick! My car needs detailing. See to it. The rest of you, we've got work to do. Bears. Body fluid. Pain. Get working. Chop. Chop!

Oh, sorry Cho.

Heh heh heh

nelsonal

2012-02-02 02:32:47 PM

nelsonal: syberpud: whither_apophis: 5 dollar milkshake: Nice of the article to explain what bear bile is even used for. I mean, I feel awful after reading this. Anyone care to tell me what this is being harvested for? I don't want to google "bear bile" at work....my searches are weird enough as it is...

Pretty much used in anything: fevers, hep, shampoos, trauma...

"It's for your goodness"

/are any western medicines animal based? Excluding snake poisons, it seems they're all plant based.

Some vaccines use eggs to grow the virus the vaccine combats, but they aren't fertilized (I think).

Epogen uses urine of mares.

Oops Premarin, they were both in an article about difficult to manufacture drugs (even though they're off patent there aren't any generics of either).

trippdogg

2012-02-02 02:33:27 PM

Are bears purposely commiting suicide to protest the horror of bile farms?

No, they're not. Horror, like the dismay brought on by bad journalism, is a uniquely human emotion.

Rev. Skarekroe

2012-02-02 02:34:31 PM

PsyLord: I take it you only eat free range animals?

When given the option. But while I'm not happy with conditions like that I have to point out the difference between factory farming, which is done to supply a gigantic demand, and bile farming or eating live octopi (which may be a Japanese thing), which is apparently done for cruelty's sake alone.

Displayed 50 of 203 comments