What should be the focus of World Tapir Day?

One of the challenges that we - "we" being the small group of WTD volunteers - faces is deciding what we communicate with you, our fellow tapir fans, about tapirs.  It's no secret that our most popular posts throughout the year generally involve a video or series of photos of a newly born tapir.  And that's no surprise, let's be honest - who doesn't like a baby tapir, or a video of a tapir being tickled and groomed?  Sometimes a post on 27 April, World Tapir Day, attracts more publicity than we'd ever dreamed of in WTD's first year in 2008.

So much pressure for such a little tapir. It's hard being so sweet, and we feel the pressure at times too (even if not for the same reasons).

Every now and again, we post a link to an article about issues that pose serious threats to the longterm survival of all four extant tapir species (not to mention to individual tapirs).  Two recent confronting examples are this post from the Malaysian Nature Society and another from Patricia Medici, President of the Tapir Specialist Group (NOTE: the links are confronting and contain disturbing reports about tapirs).  When we share such reports, we do so in the knowledge that some readers will find the reports upsetting - as do we.

We share them with the best of intentions.  We are firmly of the view that, regardless of the how confronting the reports and accompanying images may be, it is important that such information is shared.  Part of our passion for tapirs is also about raising awareness of the threats that they face, and this includes reports that we wish didn't have to exist.  But we know that not every supporter of WTD feels the same, and we've come in for criticism after some of some our posts on our Facebook and Twitter pages.  We acknowledge this criticism and do take it to heart.

It isn't as tapirs are the only species that face similar issues.  If you read news about rhinoceros conservation, the horrendous reports of poaching seem to be the predominant theme, and it can be difficult to find anything positive amongst the massive losses every year.

But World Tapir Day isn't just about what we think is important.  The strength of WTD is the sense of community that has developed to support WTD's goals, not to mention share our love of tapirs.  Part of the responsibility that we feel towards you is knowing how you feel about this topic.  So please tell us below: should we continue to post the occasional distressing report, or should we only focus on the positive side?