Should Animals be Kept in Zoos?
Many environmental activist groups are fighting zoos because they believe that caged animals are suffering due to poor living conditions and diets.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, claims zoos are prisons for the animals on their website and cite several reasons to back up this claim, as well as how they are dying in their caged cells. According to PETA’s findings, zoos do not care about the living conditions for their animals, and they breed these animals so that they can attract a steady customer base of visitors to pay $25 a head to buy a ticket to see locked up animals in lab-like conditions.
Since these wild animals are supposed to live freely in their habitats, PETA claims that zoos are a “living hell” because the animals are trapped in such tiny cages and are forced to roam in confined spaces in part to satisfy the greed of zoo managers.
However, these claims have faced mounting criticisms from some experts who advocate humane treatment. Dr. Robin Ganzert, president and CEO of the American Humane Association, wrote in a Time magazine article published June 13, 2016, that zoos help to keep these animals alive and avoid extinction.
Her article, “Zoos are not prisons,” cites several claims to support this argument. First, zoos around the world have helped many animals avoid extinction by encouraging them to breed in healthy living conditions. Secondly, zoos use some of their dollars collected at the gate to research ways to help protect wild animals and identify threats to their habitats. Lastly, zoos help to heal wounded animals and then return them to their natural habitat.
However, some zoos do the exact opposite. They let the animals live in terrible conditions. This is why Uniqlo and the Los Angeles Zoo decided to create a new foundation, Fund for LA Animals.
The goal is not only to help animals in the Los Angeles Zoo but also help those animals that are desperately needing help in nature. They hope to eventually expand this foundation and improve the living conditions for many animals in zoos all around the world.