Do we blame the racoon?

We sometimes get a racoon in our neighborhood. They hide during the day and prowl at night. I might not see one for a year, and then I catch a fleeting glance as one scurries over a fence.

Racoons are omnivores. They do not plant crops. They do not herd livestock. They prowl. If you do not keep your trash secure they will prowl the depths of the receptacles. They also enjoy eating cats.

Several times I have had neighbors tell me that the local racoon must be hunted and killed because it got their cat. Is that the fault of the racoon? When I have a cat, I keep it indoors at night. If you lock up your trash and your cats, then the racoon will move elsewhere.

I like to organize people into teams. Inevitably, whenever I have a strong team, some corporate racoon will come along and devore the results of my effort. There are simple precautions. If the team bands together, they can resist. If the corporation stopped rewarding the predators, then the predators would move elsewhere. But that is not how American corporations work.

What I have learned, is that this cycle repeats endlessly. I have learned there is no blame in a racoon being a racoon. The best I can do is to heard my cats, create a strong organization, and do what I can to help that organization learn to survive when the corporate racoons arrive.

Corporate racoons do not know how to build. They do not know how to organize. All they know how to do is devour. They are good at it.