Animal captivity is a cruel money-maker for zoo and circus owners; everything done nowadays is rarely ever in pursuit of the wellbeing of animals. This practice has been around for many years and has always been for the benefit of humans. Keeping animals captive disrupts natural selection, which is a way of life. Being held captive causes depression among animals; these beautiful creatures do not get nearly enough space as they should be getting. Captivity ultimately hurts animals by changing their whole surroundings, inhibiting breeding, lowering the quality of life for the animals, injuring, or even killing them through animal testing,
Animals are either taken straight out of the wild into captivity, or born into this cruel practice, which causes them to never even know how their lives are supposed to be. For example, in captivity, a lion can get as little as 1500 square feet indoors. In the wild, a lion is free to roam wherever it desires. Although there seems to be an increase of the lifespan of a lion in captivity, the animals quality of life is exponentially lower than wild lions. Humans would certainly rather travel wherever they wanted for 80 years, as opposed to being in a cage for 100. Most of these establishments decimate the animals quality of life; there are very few facilities that better the animals, such as rehabilitation centers, and releasing sanctuaries. Keeping animals contained and out of the wild for extinction purposes simply messes with natural selection. Natural selection has been the way of life for as long as organisms have been around. If the world changes and a species does not adapt well to the change, the organisms simply can not survive on its own in the wilderness; the species are not supported anymore. This is a very sad truth, but something even worse is having these animals caged and depressed.
Many animals do terribly in captivity. Asian elephants and polar bears, some of the most frequently visited animals at zoos, are effected the most. These poor animals are very likely to develop problems that lead to declining health and gives the species a hard time to breed. These caged carnivores simply do not receive the proper amount of nutrients to thrive in captivity. If captivity prevents the animals to live the way they were born to, the species can become aggravated and stressed; the animals then do not act appropriately. The animals pace around the enclosures, and also swayed back and forth repetitively and head nodded. The babies of the captive species also have a higher mortality rate because of lack of maternal care from the depressed mothers. The lack of space is also detrimental to infant size, because of the smaller amount of roaming they can do each day.
Animals in zoos and circuses live in mental and emotional slums. For one African elephant named Lucy, 76 percent of her life is spent in a small, tiled cage. The other 24 percent is spent being led around sarcastically to show humans the happy elephant at the circus. Zoos and circuses claim to be educational, but staring at an animal pacing around in their tiny enclosure is anything but that. At the circus, nobody questioned where the animals went back to after their ten minutes being showed to the crowd. The audience never saw the scars on these poor animals, or how depressed they were. Zoos claim they make habitats just like the animals had in the wild, but most of the time, these habitats were made of synthetic material to look, but not feel, like the real thing.
The public is not actually fully aware about how horrible animal captivity is. Animals become stressed and aggravated when they are put in these unnatural situations. In the documentary Blackfish, Seaworld is featured, showing why the mistreatment of their whales caused one to act out. A whale named Tilikum was stressed and frustrated; he lived in a very small space. Blackfish told the story of how Tilikum had been involved in the attack of three different people. Seaworld tried to blame the death of one trainer, Dawn Brancheau, on the victim herself! Seaworld made a statement that Brancheau’s ponytail triggered Tilikum to attack. Maybe the ponytail was the final push, but Seaworld was trying to hide the fact that Dawn Brancheau’s death was ultimately caused by something much bigger. Seaworld’s small tanks, and mistreatment of the whales should be to blame. The fact that Seaworld was so disrespectful and blamed Dawn Brancheau’s death on her ponytail, shows that companies that show animals are only trying to make their business bigger to make more money. Also, a chimpanzee from one zoo mauled a woman when she was trying to leave. The chimp was obviously aggravated and stressed; the cage was filthy and water and food bowls were barren. Chimpanzees do not usually attack, and they are caring in the wild. Animal captivity completely changes the behavior of animals for the worst.
Another animal being seriously affected by captivity is an Asian elephant named Happy. This animal used to have a companion named Grumpy. Once Grumpy had passed, Happy was isolated and alone for more than a decade. People had taken notice to this, and even an online petition was started to prove it. Finally, the Nonhuman Rights Project took legal action. They argued that Happy was anything but happy. The Asian elephant was alone for years, and these elephants should not be left alone at all. The group wanted to move Happy to an animal sanctuary with other elephants. The zoo claimed that the group did not know enough about the zoo or the staff to make such accusations. After the last elephant at the zoo dies, the zoo claims that they will no longer house them. Sadly, the animal rights group did not win the case.
Zoos being shut down has not been a new idea. This question has always been up in the air. Zoos have been around for 4500 years. Zoos have tried to change their way of operation to lessen the protest against them, and gain consumers. Humans have the right to freedom, so why do animals not have it? Just because animals do not talk does not mean they want to be put in a tiny cage and stared at all day. Animals have simply evolved to be out in the wild; hunting for their food, roaming around, and socializing with other animals were ways that animals should live. In zoos, if they are kept too long, the animals can not fend for themselves anymore! Animal captivity should be nonexistent for animals that are healthy and able to live on their own.
Humans have always been attended by domestic animals for thousands of years. When asked if this should be changed, one might shrug and say that it is too late to change something that has been happening for so long. Domestication and keeping an animal is one thing, and keeping a wild animal in a zoo is another. For example, domesticated cats have been bred and adapted to living in houses or on farms. Wild animals are supposed to only be found where they can hunt and travel. Domesticated animals would not likely survive out in the wilderness. Because of this, it is simply inhumane to let them roam around without proper caretakers. The domesticated animals want to live inside alongside humans and get taken care of, wild animals do not. This might cause a wild animal to act out and be violent towards another person, or cage-mate.