One teenage summer when I was attending St. Martin’s School of Art, I worked a short order cook, flipping burgers in the cafeteria in the London Zoo. During breaks I’d wander around and look at the animals behind the bars. Most seemed depressed and many looked close to psychotic. I have disliked zoos ever since. The unfortunate death of SeaWorld's Dawn Brancheau at SeaWorld seems to have brought the conditions of captive animals to the fore. We’ve already run Alexander Cockburn’s piece on Orca revolt and now there’s more.
"Disturbingly recent exceptions aside, civilized nations now agree that burning fellow human beings at the stake, torturing them or enslaving them is inhuman. The day will come when civilized nations will agree that imprisoning wild animals in zoos, whipping them about in circus acts from city to city or forcing them to do tricks for our amusement in such places as SeaWorld, Marineland and Epcot is as cruel to the animals as it is lewd of the people watching them. That day is far off, no doubt. Pulling profits and emoting power over weaker creatures, vicariously enjoyed by those audiences that delight in the safe splashing of a killer whale or the harmlessness of a caged animal, are strong impulses. Too strong to be outdone by notions of rights for beasts that don't speak English or pay taxes. Until then, handlers of animals forced into unnatural situations will continue to die, as SeaWorld's Dawn Brancheau did in February when a killer whale dragged her underwater after turning the tables and making her its plaything. I keep reading references to Brancheau's death as "tragic." What lazy news writers mean is that her death was sad, unfortunate, avoidable and, from the spectators' (but not the whale's) perspective, lurid, as it was for SeaWorld's PR." (Click here for the rest.)
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