Whether it’s their vibrant orange fur, their stripes, their menace, or their elusiveness, tigers attract us all. But tigers are in trouble. There are more of them in captivity than in the wild, and global forces have begun to unite and strengthen their efforts in protecting the tiger from extinction. This article, written by Leslie Kaufman, discusses the initiative of Russian Prime Minister Vlaidmir V. Putin in the battle for tiger preservation. The two-sentence lead paragraph is as follows, “Ministers from several countries gathered Sunday in St. Petersburg at the invitation of Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin of Russia to begin a five-day meeting with the goal of protecting tigers. Only a little more than 3,000 are estimated to be living outside captivity.”
It’s a solid lead that hooks the reader with the alarmingly low number of tigers left in the wild. From this lead, it would be safe to assume that the reader will learn more about the status of tigers in the wild and in captivity, and about the plans from Putin and others on how to solve the problem. The title of the article would have you think the same thing, that the story was about Putin’s meeting and tiger preservation: “Meeting Aims to Turn Tiger Fascination Into Conservation.” But it is not. Kaufman does not touch on these subjects until the end of the article and she does so only briefly. Most of it is about something completely different: our human attraction to large felines, such as tigers, as opposed to our general disgust with large wild canines, such as hyenas. Right after the lead, she writes, “Mr. Putin is so fond of the animals that he was given a cub for his 56th birthday…Throughout history, prominent men have identified with the majesty, power and machismo of large cats.” It’s a very interesting topic but it catches the reader a little off-guard with a somewhat misleading lead and title.
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