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Many types of zoo now
exist, from the petting zoos that encourage the public to get up and close with
the animals, to the large ‘safaris’ that provide space for people to roam
around within. And most famously the urban zoos such as London Zoo
which include elephants, lions and penguins and are usually notable tourist
draw cards for the cities concerned.
However these animals are
being subjected to being tormented by ogling tourists with their gaggles of
screaming children; people who seem to not understand the simple ‘do not feed’
statement present in every zoo; and confinement for the rest of their lives.
Often clouded by the nostalgia of childhood reminisces, these cruel
institutions are far from so.
They are suffering in
zoos just for our own amusement. As well this, it is common for
visitors to tease and provoke caged animals.
Deprived of their natural habitat, the animals are then thrust into the bitter
limelight of forced proximity with humans, an unnatural and destructive
scenario. This factor alone has caused many animals to die due to unfamiliar
parasites and diseases from humans and the unsuitable climates. Was it really a
good idea to have a polar bear in a zoo in Florida? Or in fact, any state or
country that simply cannot replicate
the original surroundings and climate of the animal?
A study of British zoos
found that elephant enclosures were over 1000 times smaller than their natural
habitats. They suffer psychological distress, which is often displayed by abnormal or
self-destructive behaviour. Aquatic animals such as whales do not have nearly
enough water, birds are prevented from flying away by having their wings
clipped and being kept in aviaries. Furthermore, the locations of zoos in urban
areas leads to incidents like the urban foxes’ attack at London Zoo in 2010
that killed 11 South African and Rockhopper penguins. An esteemed establishment that was London zoo was unable to prevent the destruction caused by
these other animals.
No matter how we may try
to replicate their habitats in a zoo, we will never achieve the full result.
Predators need to hunt and taking from them their ability to do so by taming,
caging or drugging them is beyond cruel; depriving them of their natural social
structure and companionship. A study by the journal Science in 2008 found that 'Asian elephants in European zoos had a
median lifespan of just 18.9 years compared to 41.7 years for wild elephants in
an Asian logging camp. We are subjecting them to a much lower quality of life
with very little to gain. Territorial fights between animals have also lead to
the death of several animals due to cramped conditions especially amongst rare
big cats and large mammals; as they become bored, depressed and
institutionalized.
Some zoos have also killed their animals
purposely because they regard them as 'excess animals'. Excess animals are
caused by poor planning in zoos in breeding programmes that produce for more
offspring than expected and thus creating surplus animals. In a herd of lions only a few males are required to
service the females; this leads often to the sale of the excess males to
inappropriate establishments. The two most controversial options are
using surplus animals for legitimate medical research and, failing that,
culling. It is like having China’s one child policy all over again.
The press have often been criticized
for the uproar it causes as it publicizes these failures, however, more talk is being created against the media's way of getting the message across, rather than the actual message itself. And could it really be such a big uproar, that less than a third of
zoo-goers do not know what culling even is?
Government funded zoos are often
started and continually supported by city tax money. An increase in revenue for
services such as better healthcare in hospitals and education in schools could
easily be ensued by removing these establishments. Providing a large carnivore
such as a tiger with food, shelter, keeper time, and veterinary care during its
lifetime can cost a minimum of $25,000, according to Dr. Lewandowski. Primates are also usually more expensive to maintain, he added. This does not include the care of rare animals and require the further cost of a specific trade and care licence (i.e. Pandas from China).
Where animals are rare and hard to
breed in captivity (for example, the Giant Panda), removing specimens from the wild to
zoos may result in population falling. The procedure of breeding is both costly
and unsuccessful. Although conservation programmes
generate a lot of good publicity for a zoo, they in fact often do not result in a high
success rate – many species are going extinct each week despite the good
intentions of some zoos. This is partly because a very small captive community
of a species is more prone to inter-breeding and birth defects from the very
unvaried gene pool, a problem which the animals would evidently not have in the
wild.
Many zoos are unable to keep a large
enough number of individuals to provide a sufficiently varied gene pool for the
species to breed without problems. As well as this, the benefits to the overall
species population do not compensate the individual animals for the negative
effects of living in a zoo. Returning successfully bred animals to the wild
itself is a difficult procedure, as the animals become dependent on humans and institutionalized,
leaving them weaker than if they had been left to thrive for themselves in the
wild.
Zoos are said to spread
awareness and educate people from an early stage on animals including their behaviour
and habits. With this aspect, zoos are not educational as they only
teach us how an animal behaves in small, confined spaces, at the mercy of
humans. Statistics have also shown that the
average zoo-goer knows less about animals than those who claim an interest in
animals, like fishermen, and little more than those who claim no interest at
all or students who grasp basic knowledge from school lessons. The education
lessons obtained from zoos could just as effectively, and more humanely, be
presented in the classroom. Animals should be left in their natural
surroundings and not used as tools for public entertainment.
Would we accept a human
being subjugated to these conditions? With our DNA 96% identical to a
chimpanzee; an animal often seen behind the zoo bars, why not us as well? With
the human race also deriving as a mutation
in genes from chimps, does this mean we would have to be worth less and so
treated less? In theory it should. With so little difference genetically and
socially, why must they be imprisoned against their will?
As well as this, there is now an increased
rate of animals dying from an increased use of medical drugs that are both more complex
and stronger than before. Zoo animals are often exposed to chemicals, solvents
and other toxic substances. And excessive human involvement by humans
has caused major disruption in food chains, interfering with integral
ecosystems. Zoos fail to treat animals with the respect that they deserve, and violates the animals' right to live and it treats them as a simple means to
achieve some human end, whether it be for profit or ‘education.’
Charities such as the
WSPA work towards true conservation and protection of animals as they campaign
against poaching, illegal hunting with a slow but steady successes. They
have aimed to remove the imminent problem head on without the need for
alienating random animals and sending them to cells. However, a higher
percentage of funding goes into zoos than all of these charities put together. As we
fund into this twisted parody of a utopia that are zoos, is it not just a
matter of time before each visitor begins to have more blood on their hands
than the hunters and poachers themselves?
Even Noah’s Ark lasted
for just 40 days, and it should not happen again.
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This was an article written by me as an English assignment when I was 13. I found it whilst cleaning out my computer :) I've got 16 exams in the next 5 days and so I've been so busy with revision! I didn't want to leave you guys without a blog entry this week and I thought that you might find this interesting. What are your opinions on this topic?
Disclaimer: This article may reflect some of my views but not all. It must be remembered that this was an English assignment, something I do for homework. It's not a speech or a campaign but a way for me to practice my argumentative writing skills when I was thirteen.
Song of the Day:
Everything at once by Lenka
Hooked on this song ever since I heard it on the Windows advert. Not sure what I think about the beginning but damn it's a catchy song once it gets into your head.
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