Apparently, society needs monsters – larger-than-life perils to make life interesting.
Take, for example, Trevor the dog.
In May, the Mae Bachur Animal Shelter found a home for Trevor in Burwash Landing.
The prospective owner has wanted the dog for more than a year, but has been prevented by liability issues – city officials fear the erratic animal will bite again, putting them in the legal doghouse.
You can imagine the hoopla if the Rottweiler-shepherd cross were to bite someone else, in this case an unwitting Burwash resident.
Undeterred, Trevor’s champion in the remote village 284 kilometres up the highway has somehow finagled liability insurance, protection in the event the 65-pound animal bites again. And so, it’s possible this one blessed-with-crazy-luck animal will finally find peace.
This one dog has cost society thousands of dollars in medical and legal fees, insurance, staff time, dog training, evaluations and simple food and shelter.
The mind reels when you consider how many gentle, loving animals could have been helped had the money and resources been diverted to their care.
Of course, that hasn’t happened.
And neither has Trevor’s move.
Instead, he remains in limbo because officials won’t act until the community can be properly consulted about having this dog in its midst. And that’s not going to happen until mid-September, at the earliest, when the First Nation holds its next council meeting.
Consider this a minute. When this is resolved, it will have taken society more than four months to decide this latest stupid wrinkle in the Trevor saga. That is, whether to ship a moderate-sized mutt with a sketchy temperament to a remote village surrounded by wilderness. And bears.
Alright, let’s shift gears a minute.
Last week, a grizzly bear roamed around Takhini and Porter Creek in search of castoff banana peels, old bones and coffee grounds found in the neighbourhood compost bins.
Local radio stations covered the story with zeal, providing breathless, up-to-the-minute updates, “the bear still has not been caught,” and warning people to keep out of the woods.
Conservation officers trapped the binner bear on Friday evening.
He was relocated back to the Yukon bush with little fuss.
Conservation officers did not hold the bear until the next council meeting so they could discuss with the locals in the nearby community whether it was OK to let the compost-fed griz go. They just took the beast to some little-populated area, opened the trap and let the animal amble out.
And that was a grizzly, not an easily muzzled pet with attitude.
Society’s courts, councils, advocates and bylaw officers created the monster that is Trevor, a simple house dog that has been abused his whole life. First by his owner, and now by the rest of us.
Enough already. One way or the other, it’s time to end this lunacy. Free the dog, or free society and “send him to a nice farm” somewhere.