1725:
Zoos busily justify themselves on the
grounds that they provide "captive breeding programmes" and
"constitute a 'lifeline' for endangered species", implying that they
offer a sort of protective custody for them from the unsafety of the wild. But
with diminishing habitats, there’s little likelihood of returning animals to
the wild, either for present or future generations. In reality zoos are for entertainment.
But I wasn’t entertained. I was ashamed. I
saw things which haunt me still, particularly the once-mighty lion reduced to a
mere shadow of his former glory, living in concrete well. There was a clouded
leopard with merely six square metres of flooring and no exposure to any
sunlight. Great apes walked about like zombies. The fur of the Kodiac bear was
rubbed to the skin, from lying on concrete all day. I saw Back Swans swimming
in a shallow concrete tank with their wings clipped to prevent escape. The
mysterious Dancing Brolga was cooped up in a 4 metre high cage, and was
certainly not dancing. A 2½ metre-wingspan Andean Condor was imprisoned in a
similar sort of cage.
But it gets worse. I visited the ‘Nightlife
Show’, inside a concrete bunker. There was a row of glassed-in cages,
containing some of Australia’s nocturnal animals and birds. They are being kept
here in perpetual dim blue light (to simulate night in the bush). To give the
place a ‘realistic atmosphere’. These creatures endure a continuous ghostly
drone of a dingo howling (from a hidden tape recorder). A nasty addition from a
particularly sadistic imagination.
If we want children to grow up immune to
cruelty like this, give them a day out at the zoo.
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