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What happens when wildlife becomes an online sensation?

Social media is posing a new and increasing threat to vulnerable species and habitats around the world as nature enthusiasts calling attention to rare biodiversity on their platforms are unintentionally sending viewers flocking to snap their own photos of already-endangered flora and fauna.

On social media, gatekeeping is standard practice. Yet as much as this irritates netizens – rightly so when it involves an item of clothing or value-for-money foodie-haven – it’s inarguably necessary.

Think about it: though the democratisation of information is no doubt important, how many previously untrodden hiking trails have we recently seen destroyed by crowds of wanna-be influencers who went purely to post about it and left trails of litter in their wake?

Or desktop-background-worthy natural landscapes permanently altered by people who automatically assume that because they β€˜saw it on Instagram or TikTok’ it’s acceptable to ignore the β€˜protected area’ signs and flock there en masse?

Considering our average screen time and that this means a significant majority of us are bound to be at least aware of our planet’s demise (even if some of you swipe past those videos as soon as they pop up), you’d expect people to be more sensitive towards conservation efforts and the fact that these sites limit public access for a reason.

But no, if it’s trending, then of course that’s an open invitation to visit without questioning whether or not doing so has the potential to be environmentally damaging.

Increasingly (not to mention concerningly), this phenomenon is also beginning to take its toll on precious ecosystems which, prior to the digital age, where were biodiversity experts and documentarians alone would venture to record, study, and quietly observe the behaviours of the species residing there.

Trained to do so with the utmost care and respect for these remote habitats, we wouldn’t learn that said professionals had journeyed to such locations until they were long-gone, either by reading National Geographic, or by having David Attenborough narrate it to us in dulcet tones through the television.

Today paints a different picture, however.

With the world at our fingertips, a mountain of footage is now available to us at the touch of a button.

Shared by enthusiasts seeking to educate on our obligation to safeguard the Earth’s vulnerable flora and fauna, this well-intentioned content is contributing to harmful human-wildlife interactions as viewers, in their hordes) are inspired to go and create their own.

For endangered species, this can put them further at risk – forcing those tasked with saving them to walk a fine line between calling attention to their plight and discouraging people from going in search of them simply to snap a quick photo and often using unethical techniques to guarantee that they’ll lure the subject into frame.

Highlighting the already-visible negative repercussions of this and driven by a β€˜collective rage’ at the havoc this disturbance is wreaking on pristine natural spots across the globe is new research that was published in the journal Science of the Total Environment.

β€˜There’s actually probably never been a time in human history where you can share information so rapidly to so many people, and with that has come this immense pressure to systems,’ says the paper’s lead author, Robert Davis.

β€˜You get a lot of pushback from people saying: β€œWhy are you the gatekeeper? Everyone has a right to see this – what’s the harm in just one person?”, but when something’s that rare, you could single-handedly push it to extinction.’

As he explains, this was the case with a variety of slipper orchid (Paphiopedilum canhii) that was discovered in Vietnam in 2010. Once images with GPS-coordinates had been uploaded to the Internet, it took just six months for more than 99 per cent of all known individuals to be collected and for the flower to disappear completely.

β€˜Ultimately, it fuels demand: the rarer something is, the more people want to see it,’ adds Davis. β€˜It’s a really tight balance. Social media is great for drawing people’s attention, but there needs to be a level of discretion.’

While he recognises that the impact of this is minor relative to the broader threats posed by climate change, he stresses that social media is perpetuating the problem, particularly amid growing conflict between preservation objectives and investment in seeing certain animals or plants before it’s too late.

With this in mind, maybe gatekeeping is our best bet after all.

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