Thursday, February 25, 2010

Wild Thang

Yesterday (Wednesday) an animal trainer was killed by an orca at SeaWorld in Florida. While my heart certainly goes out to the woman's family and friends, a report such as this doesn't surprise me in the least. Whenever we take animals out of their natural surroundings and place them in a contrived setting for human study and/or enjoyment, we run the risk of said animals and creatures behaving as they naturally behave.

Humankind has been domesticating dogs for thousands of years, yet rarely a week goes by in which one or more canines attack people. Even though most domesticated animals would have a hard time surviving in their previously natural environment, a smidgen of their internal wild nature remains locked in their DNA. In reality, they simply are doing what comes naturally.

Look, two of my most favorite activities as a child were going to the zoo and the circus. I loved watching the lion tamers skirt on the edge of sanity and safety. At the zoo, my favorite haunt was the ape house; I could spend hours mesmerized by the movements and behaviors of these magnificent creatures. I even worked for several months in my twenties at a place called Animal Wonderland in Hot Springs, Arkansas (my fondest memory was the day I got to shovel four inch deep duck poop out of two holding areas) .

While I do understand the fascination with other beings, both they and we would be better off if we simply left them alone. If we must contain them, the very least we could do is to place them in settings that mirror their natural environments. Placing an orca (killer whale) in a small -- by their standards -- concrete tank doesn't fit the bill any more than it does placing a tiger or lion in a cage.

It's tantamount to treating the rest of the creatures on this orb like condemned prisoners for being nothing more than themselves.

1 comment:

  1. ...and then some people say "She died doing what she loved"...she loved being pulled by the hair and being drowned?...such a tired cliche

    ReplyDelete

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