Kate’s 2¢: “An elephant in my kitchen: what the herd taught me about love, courage and survival” by Françoise Malby-Anthony with Katja Willemsen

Kate’s 2¢: “An elephant in my kitchen: what the herd taught me about love, courage and survival” by Françoise Malby-Anthony with Katja Willemsen

“An elephant in my kitchen: what the herd taught me about love, courage and survival” by Françoise Malby-Anthony with Katja Willemsen

Kate’s 2¢: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as,     describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ merely shares my thoughts about what I read.  I’m just saying…

   I enjoyed Lawrence Anthony’s “The Herd Whisperer”, so when the NLS sent “An Elephant In My Kitchen” written  by his wife after his death, I started listening to Roshina Ratnam read  the rest of the story.

   There were a variety of references to the events in “The Herd Whisperer”, but, still plenty of things happened to keep this story moving along. Some of the things were horrendous and sickening, yet other things were heart warming and hopeful.

From the WEB:

Malby-Anthony was born in the South of France, brought up in Paris and has lived in South Africa since 1987. She founded the Thula Thula game reserve in 1998 with her late husband, the renowned conservationist and bestselling author Lawrence Anthony.

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

An elephant in my kitchen: what the herd taught me about love, courage and survival DB97344

Malby-Anthony, Françoise; Willemsen, Katja. Reading time: 8 hours, 27 minutes.

Read by Roshina Ratnam.

Animals and Wildlife

Nature and the Environment

Widow of the author of The Elephant Whisperer (DB 85906) shares what her life was like running the Thula Thula game reserve after his death. Discusses combating poachers, issues with employees, the elephant herd’s matriarch who didn’t like her, and the arrival of a lost baby elephant. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2018.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Anthony was born in Johannesburg, South Africa. In the 1920s, his grandfather, who was a miner in Berwick-upon-Tweed, England had migrated to the area to work in the gold mines. His father, who ran an insurance business, went about establishing new offices across Southern Africa; Anthony was raised in rural Rhodesia (now called Zimbabwe), Zambia, and Malawi, before settling in Zululand, South Africa.[4]

Following his father, Anthony also started his career in the insurance sector, though subsequently started working the real estate development business. Meanwhile, he started working with Zulu tribespeople, by mid-1990s, his passion for the African Bush inspired him to switch careers, when he bought the Thula Thula game reserve, spread over 5,000-acre in KwaZulu-Natal starting his career as a conservationist.[4] A turning point in career came when he was called by a conservation group to rescue a group of nine elephants who had escaped their enclosure and were wreaking havoc across Northern Mpumalanga,[5] and were about to be shot. He tried to communicate with the matriarch of the herd through the tone of his voice and body language, eventually rescued them and brought to the reserve, and in time came to be known as “Elephant-whisperer”.[1][4]

In the following years, he established a conservation group, The Earth Organization in 2003, and his efforts lead to the establishment of two new reserves, the Royal Zulu Biosphere in Zululand and the Mayibuye Game Reserve in Kwa Ximba, aimed at providing local tribe people income through wildlife tourism.[4]

Anthony had a reputation for bold conservation initiatives, including the rescue of the Baghdad Zoo at the height of the US-led Coalition invasion of Iraq in 2003, and negotiations with the infamous Lord’s Resistance Army rebel army in Southern Sudan, to raise awareness of the environment and protect endangered species, including the last of the Northern White Rhinoceros.

Anthony died of a heart attack at the age of 61 before his planned March 2012 conservation gala dinner in Durban to raise international awareness for the rhino-poaching crisis and to launch his new book, The Last Rhinos: My Battle to Save One of the World’s Greatest Creatures.[2] Following his death, there were reports that some of the elephants he worked to save came to his family’s home in accordance with the way elephants usually mourn the death of one of their own.[3]

www.grahamspence.comActions for this site

GRAHAM SPENCE is a journalist and editor. Originally from South Africa, he lives in England. Together he and Lawrence Anthony wrote Babylon’s Ark: the Incredible Wartime Rescue of the Baghdad Zoo.

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

The elephant whisperer: my life with the herd in the African wild DB85906

Anthony, Lawrence; Spence, Graham. Reading time: 13 hours, 9 minutes.

Read by Jon Huffman. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress.

Animals and Wildlife

Nature and the Environment

“An elephant in my kitchen: what the herd taught me about love, courage and survival” by Françoise Malby-Anthony with Katja Willemsen

Kate’s 2¢: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as,     describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ merely shares my thoughts about what I read.  I’m just saying…

   I enjoyed Lawrence Anthony’s “The Herd Whisperer”, so when the NLS sent “An Elephant In My Kitchen” written  by his wife after his death, I started listening to Roshina Ratnam read  the rest of the story.

   There were a variety of references to the events in “The Herd Whisperer”, but, still plenty of things happened to keep this story moving along. Some of the things were horrendous and sickening, yet other things were heart warming and hopeful.

From the WEB:

Malby-Anthony was born in the South of France, brought up in Paris and has lived in South Africa since 1987. She founded the Thula Thula game reserve in 1998 with her late husband, the renowned conservationist and bestselling author Lawrence Anthony.

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

An elephant in my kitchen: what the herd taught me about love, courage and survival DB97344

Malby-Anthony, Françoise; Willemsen, Katja. Reading time: 8 hours, 27 minutes.

Read by Roshina Ratnam.

Animals and Wildlife

Nature and the Environment

Widow of the author of The Elephant Whisperer (DB 85906) shares what her life was like running the Thula Thula game reserve after his death. Discusses combating poachers, issues with employees, the elephant herd’s matriarch who didn’t like her, and the arrival of a lost baby elephant. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2018.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Anthony was born in Johannesburg, South Africa. In the 1920s, his grandfather, who was a miner in Berwick-upon-Tweed, England had migrated to the area to work in the gold mines. His father, who ran an insurance business, went about establishing new offices across Southern Africa; Anthony was raised in rural Rhodesia (now called Zimbabwe), Zambia, and Malawi, before settling in Zululand, South Africa.[4]

Following his father, Anthony also started his career in the insurance sector, though subsequently started working the real estate development business. Meanwhile, he started working with Zulu tribespeople, by mid-1990s, his passion for the African Bush inspired him to switch careers, when he bought the Thula Thula game reserve, spread over 5,000-acre in KwaZulu-Natal starting his career as a conservationist.[4] A turning point in career came when he was called by a conservation group to rescue a group of nine elephants who had escaped their enclosure and were wreaking havoc across Northern Mpumalanga,[5] and were about to be shot. He tried to communicate with the matriarch of the herd through the tone of his voice and body language, eventually rescued them and brought to the reserve, and in time came to be known as “Elephant-whisperer”.[1][4]

In the following years, he established a conservation group, The Earth Organization in 2003, and his efforts lead to the establishment of two new reserves, the Royal Zulu Biosphere in Zululand and the Mayibuye Game Reserve in Kwa Ximba, aimed at providing local tribe people income through wildlife tourism.[4]

Anthony had a reputation for bold conservation initiatives, including the rescue of the Baghdad Zoo at the height of the US-led Coalition invasion of Iraq in 2003, and negotiations with the infamous Lord’s Resistance Army rebel army in Southern Sudan, to raise awareness of the environment and protect endangered species, including the last of the Northern White Rhinoceros.

Anthony died of a heart attack at the age of 61 before his planned March 2012 conservation gala dinner in Durban to raise international awareness for the rhino-poaching crisis and to launch his new book, The Last Rhinos: My Battle to Save One of the World’s Greatest Creatures.[2] Following his death, there were reports that some of the elephants he worked to save came to his family’s home in accordance with the way elephants usually mourn the death of one of their own.[3]

www.grahamspence.comActions for this site

GRAHAM SPENCE is a journalist and editor. Originally from South Africa, he lives in England. Together he and Lawrence Anthony wrote Babylon’s Ark: the Incredible Wartime Rescue of the Baghdad Zoo.

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

The elephant whisperer: my life with the herd in the African wild DB85906

Anthony, Lawrence; Spence, Graham. Reading time: 13 hours, 9 minutes.

Read by Jon Huffman. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress.

Animals and Wildlife

Nature and the Environment

Conservationist relates his experiences caring for a rogue herd of elephants on his South African game reserve. Describes his misgivings in accepting them, challenges faced with both the herd and local communities, lessons learned from individual elephants, and the joys and sorrows he encountered. 2009.

Kate’s 2¢: “White fragility: why it’s so hard for White people to talk about racism” by Robin J. DiAngelo

“White fragility: why it’s so hard for White people to talk about racism” by Robin J. DiAngelo

Kate’s 2¢: There is a plethora of in-depth biographies of authors and reviews of their books, that state the title, author, published date, and genre; as well as,     describing what the book is about, setting, and character(s), so, Kate’s 2¢ merely shares my thoughts about what I read.  I’m just saying…

A few take-aways from this book:

–DiAngelo states that we all have prejudices. Discrimination is when we act on those prejudices.

–Instead of saying, for example, that Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier to play baseball, DiAngelo says the statement should be; Jackie Robinson was allowed to play baseball by the whites.

–Today’s white nationalists…recognize the importance of distancing themselves from explicit expressions of white supremacy.

–The white racial frame…explicitly and implicitly re-enforces the white supremacy as ideal, leaving “others” as inferior.

–If we are equal, why do we live separately?

–Systems of oppression are deeply and not over-come with simple passage of legislation, ie. Same sex marriages, American with Disabilities Act.

–We can’t change what we refuse to see. Aversive racism is subconsciously directing choices white make.

— A racism free up-bringing is not possible, because, racism is a social system embedded in the culture and the institutions.

— Am I actively seeking to interrupt racism in this context…How do I know?

— “White Rage” by Carolyn Anderson

— The paradigm needs to change, so that whites don’t become defensive when racial insults are brought to their attention.

— Take the initiative and find out on your own, to break with the condition of whiteness that makes us apathetic about racism and prevents us from developing the skills we need to interrupt it.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Robin J. DiAngelo (born September 8, 1956)[1] is an American academic, lecturer, and author working in the fields of critical discourse analysis and whiteness studies.[2][3] She formerly served as a tenured professor of multicultural education at Westfield State University and is currently an Affiliate Associate Professor of Education at the University of Washington. She is known for her work pertaining to “white fragility”, an expression she coined in 2011.

   She has written that her “experience of poverty would have been different had [she] not been white”, reflecting that although she feels that she faced “class oppression”, she also benefited from “racial privilege”.[7]

   There are many youtube presentations by DiAngelo, if you’d like to do further research.

From NLS/BARD/LOC:

White fragility: why it’s so hard for White people to talk about racism DB91860

DiAngelo, Robin J. Reading time: 6 hours, 23 minutes.

Read by Amy Landon. A production of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress.

Social Sciences

Bestsellers

Antiracism educator explores counterproductive reactions white people have when discussing racism. Topics include the intertwining of racism and white supremacy, racism after the civil rights movement, the impact of race on the lives of white people, defining the term “white fragility,” and more. Commercial audiobook. Bestseller. 2018.

On the other hand:

Here’s another perspective written by Todd Wood, a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy, who flew special operations helicopters supporting SEAL Team 6, Delta Force and others.  After leaving the military, he pursued his other passion, finance, spending 18 years on Wall Street trading emerging market debt, and later, writing.  The first of his many thrillers is “Currency.”  Todd is a contributor to Fox Business, Newsmax TV, Moscow Times, the New York Post, the National Review, Zero Hedge and others.

By L. Todd Wood – – Tuesday, September 26, 2017  [Carole Lynn updates: He wrote this when all the kneeling crap started, and it applies more so now!]

I know of no white person alive today in the United States who has ever legally owned a black slave, or any slave for that matter.  Almost 700,000 mostly white men died 160 years ago to end slavery.  Jim Crow ended generations ago.  Yet black America, for the most part, is still locked in inner-city gang violence and economic hardship.  Why?

Is it because America is racist?  Is it because of some overhanging white supremacy?  Is it because of the Illuminati?

No, unfortunately, it is because of black culture and the adoption of Democratic Party government dependency.

We have just had eight years of the first black president.  Black athletes, and entertainers, routinely earn multi-million dollar incomes.  I can easily name several black billionaires without even trying too hard.  A large percentage of black America is very successful.  But, it is not enough.  Too many black youth are being left behind.

And it is no one but black America’s fault.

No one can solve this problem but black America.  No one can throw enough money at it.  We’ve tried that.  Black America needs to look in the mirror and stop blaming others, especially white people.

I am obviously white and conservative, and I served in the military, which, during my time, was as color blind as you could be. I can also honestly say I don’t give a damn what color your skin is, neither do any of my friends.  I do care about your actions.

Blacks are around 15 percent of the population.  Depending on what study you look at, they commit around 40 percent to 50 percent of violent crime in America.  Of course, there is going to be a problem with police.  And, of course, there are some bad policemen.. However, those bad apples do not kill black people statistically any more than they kill white people.  Even Harvard said that recently. If you were a cop, and you had to work in a neighborhood infested with crime and murder, wouldn’t you act differently than in a neighborhood where there was little crime?  The most effective thing black America could do to improve its relationship with police is to significantly reduce violent crime where they live.  Yes, that means change the culture of where you live and your community.

I for one am tired of being blamed.  I am tired of dealing with people who only want something from others.  I don’t oppress anyone.  I don’t hold anyone down.  I’m tired of getting on the D.C. metro and seeing white people being harassed by roaming gangs of black youth with their pants around their knees.  Yes, you want a white person uncomfortable?  That makes me uncomfortable.  It’s our nation’s capital and it’s embarrassing.

Blacks have nothing but opportunity in America.  Try finding the same opportunity anywhere else in the world.  If you are born in America you’ve won life’s economic lottery.  Take advantage of it.

The problem is this generation has been taught an agenda of cultural Marxism by our education system.  They’ve been taught to be a victim, and it’s still going on.   All you have to do is watch the young black, female student at Yale screaming at the college president to understand that.  Blacks in America don’t even know how good they got it.

Don’t kneel when my anthem is played.  Too many people died for that flag.  You are free to protest but not then.  I am free to not watch, or pay to watch you play if you do that.  The NFL should make it a rule that you stand for the national anthem.  There is no free speech to disobey a private employer on private property.  This would solve the problem immediately.

The NFL has deeply offended most of America.  They will pay an economic and reputational price, as they should.

We have a real cultural problem in this country, the result of the Leftist multicultural agenda.  Multi-ethnicity is perfect and should be encouraged..  Having more than one American culture is destroying the country.  But then again, that is what the Left wants.

Do Black Lives Matter?

It is your job to determine if this is a racist rant or just a review of factual data…

WHAT IF ALL THE BLACKS SUDDENLY LEFT AMERICA, WHICH IS 13.3% OF THE TOTAL US.POPULATION:

Amount of people in poverty would drop – 34%,

The prison population would go down by -37%,

Welfare recipients would go down by – – – 42%,

Gang members would go down by – – – – – 53%

Chlamydia cases would go down – – – – – – 54%,

Homelessness would go down – – – – – – – -57%

Syphilis would go down  – – – – – – – – – – – – 58%.

AIDS & HIV would go down by – – – – – – – -65%

Gonorrhea would go down – – – – – – – – – – -69%,

Average ACT scores would go UP – – – – – 5.5 points.

Average IQ would go UP – – – – – – – – – – – -7.4 points,  putting us 3rd in the world tied with Japan,

Average SAT scores would go UP almost – – – – -100 points,

The average income for Americans would go UP over $20,000 a year,

BUT DEMOCRATS WOULD LOSE 76% OF THEIR VOTING BASE!!!

And, many criminal defense attorneys would have to find another line of work

Yes, Black lives DO matter!

Kate’s 2¢: The views expressed by these two authors are their own and may or may not reflect Kate’s personal view.