The decision has been made: the deer of Longueuil can be slaughtered for ecological reasons. But that doesn’t stop some people from coming to the Longueuil municipal court to denounce this decision while putting forward arguments mainly based on emotion. To understand the reasons behind such interventions, Mario Dumont received an interview on his QUB radio show with Emmanuelle Fournier Chouinard, a psychologist and speaker in animal mediation-zootherapy.
According to her, these people operate from a logic of the heart and not necessarily of reason. These are people who followed the case, who met these animals and came to develop a personal relationship at a distance with them. Thus, this explains the attachment that was created and their stubbornness, in certain respects, to protect these animals.
- Listen to the interview with Emmanuelle Fournier Chouinard on Mario Dumont’s microphone via QUB radio :
Furthermore, for many, as Ms. Fournier Chouinard argues, we are in the realm of representation here. These people see the deer of Longueuil as a symbol linked to the difficulty of acting on a large scale in the face of climate issues. They may also see a connection with their own animals.
Finally, the psychologist discusses anthropomorphism where we tend to attribute human psychological characteristics to animals. If Disney can certainly have contributed to this phenomenon with these numerous animated films featuring animals, the fact remains that anthropomorphism is something normal and which can contribute to this attachment to the deer of Longueuil.
NB This text was written using artificial intelligence from the QUB radio audio interview.