In a nutshell: Common sense uncommon, and the poor rhino suffers

By: Tom Oleson

Posted: 08/13/2011 1:00 AM

With the stock markets in a frenzy and the price of gold reaching celestial heights, a lot of people are looking for a safe place to put their money and others are wondering if they'll have to postpone their wedding because, with gold going for record prices, those little bright bands that bind us together for life -- or are supposed to tie the knot, at least -- are becoming more precious by the hour.

I was talking this week with a guy who found a collection of costume jewelry in the trash that contained a couple of small gold items he was able sell for almost $200 just for the karats they contained -- not many -- regardless of whatever craftsmanship may have gone into them.

That's one way to get through the storm, I guess, but most of us don't really have a lot of gold lying around. The little we have in rings or bracelets or lockets or cuff links is usually worth more sentimentally than it is on the market, even at $1,700 an ounce -- well, maybe not the cuff links.

So how are a poor Jack and ordinary Jill supposed to ride out this economic storm called down on us by bickering American politicians? Well, one way out is if your great-grandfather happened to be a big-game hunter and you inherited a stuffed rhinoceros head that is now hanging on the wall of your recreation room or your bedroom, depending on your predilections.

That rhino horn is worth its weight in gold. Actually, right now, it is worth twice its weight in gold, selling on the black market -- trade in rhino horns is illegal -- for $97,000 a kilogram. This has led to a rash of break-ins and burglaries at museums in Europe, where the horns have been cut off stuffed rhinos on exhibit and to an alarming surge of poaching of the rhinoceros population in Africa, which is already endangered.

That market is driven mostly by China, where traditional Chinese medicine uses it for treating a variety of illnesses. It has a Western market, as well. Contrary to popular belief, the Chinese do not use rhino horn as an aphrodisiac. That particular foible is the fantasy of Western men that arose about 200 years ago, probably because of the unmistakable phallic symbolism of the rhino's horn, which can grow to an enviable 50 centimetres and never droops.

There is no scientific evidence for either its efficacy as a healing agent or, especially, as an aphrodisiac, but that's never stopped anyone in all of history from doing strange things -- witness the current spate of TV advertisements for "male enhancement" products; there is a sucker born every minute.

The world would be a better place and everyone would be a little happier, particularly the poor rhinoceros, if we could grasp the fact that a rhino horn is just a rhino horn, or as Freud said in one of his more lucid observations, sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. But common sense is not a common quality. Vanity, thy name is man, and the rhinos pay the consequences for that.

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition August 13, 2011 J2