The costs of captivity.

This post was inspired by the shooting death of a gorilla at Cincinnati Zoo in the US last weekend after it "attacked" a three-year-old boy who crawled into its enclosure.

I should probably say at the outset I doubt anybody would call me an objective person, and I am not a vegetarian or vegan, although I do try to have at least one meat-free day each week. But I am very much a nature and animal lover, and I have been for much of my life. I have numerous outdoor places, be they national parks or my local botanic gardens, I can visit where I am transfixed in every way, the whole time, every time, with the aura they have. They stimulate and nourish me profoundly, and watching the wildlife there interacting with each other and even us humans, and how they work WITH rather than against their own environment, can teach all us humans a thing or to. I even have several nature books at home, each of which I can spend at least an hour slowly flicking through.

But late last year, despite the mixed feelings I already had about them, I visited a chimpanzee feeding at a zoo hoping to see a co-dependent interaction between them and their handlers. Instead I saw them being made to eat yoghurt from a punnet (with a spoon and all) and to drink juice from a popper, rather than being free to consume them as they would in the wild, and of course for an audience. That was when I walked off in disgust; as far as I was concerned, that was just plain exploitation. I went and sat down then at the kiosk area and was nearly in tears, which prompted a lady nearby to come and ask me if I was okay. And last night when I heard on Facebook about the news from Cincinnati Zoo, I was even more upset and angry.

That has not abated at all. I can understand the handlers there were just trying to do their job, and I'm certainly glad the boy was rescued in time, and plus visitor safety should never be taken for granted anywhere. But here, well beforehand, it was. The gorilla's enclosure had a VISIBLE BARRIER at ground level which any unsupervised child could easily open and crawl through. That is a stunningly irresponsible oversight which would've been a piece of cake to avoid while they were building the damn thing. Secondly, what the hell were the boy's parents and all the other visitors doing while all this was happening? Clearly not WATCHING or trying to stop him. Plus, while it may not have realised its behaviour towards the boy could've seemed dangerous or threatening to humans, the gorilla really was just playfully and curiously shaking the boy around, and in many cases they are likely just as scared of us as vice versa.

I acknowledge how important zoos are for conservation, and how much enjoyment many others, particularly children, get from them as outlets for seeing endangered wildlife up close and personal. None of you have to agree with any of my views anyhow. But for me, tragic incidents like this particularly cannot help but reinforce the question: when living in captivity, are animals really free, and safe, from EVERYTHING?