Zoos Should Be Shut Down - Essay Example

Zoos should be shut downThe recent controversy about the euthanasia of perfectly healthy giraffee named Marius in captivity (Elliot et al.) has evoked calls that zoos should be shut down. Zoos should be shut down because it is a ridiculous idea to keep zoos as an entertainment center because animals are used for recreation or entertainment when they should not be. Animals in the zoo do not also live long because it is not their natural habitat or in the case of Marius, being shot if they breed to many.

Many of the reason that the zoos were opened such as for education, conservation and entertainment are not really serving its purpose and in fact, Zoos are doing more harm to animals and therefore it should be shut down. Using animals for entertainment is just despicable and utterly cruel. It teaches us nothing except to be insensitive to cruelty and hardship as we get used to sufferings of the animals in the zoo. Moreso, when the kind of entertainment we get is twisted because it is at the expense of animal lives and well-being.

Nor are we educated about animals because we are not seeing the animals in zoos in their true nature. All animals in the zoo relatively behaves the same because of the small space and they are caged in. Zoos are harmful to animal lives. It has already been proven that animals live longer in the wild than in the zoo. It is because the wild is the natural habitat of the animals where their instinct to survive, adapt and feed on their own is honed. In the wilds, they can run, hunt which is good for them because their ability to hunt and survive is present not to mention that they can exercise there (all living animals needs to exercise!). When one cage them, animals loses their instinct to hunt and survive and becomes dependent to the zoo keeper making their lives miserable, depressed making them look like pathetic animals rather than a strong and wild.

Animals in the zoo live a miserable life because it is not their natural habitat and many of them even some of them display neurotic behavior because of their confinement. If you wonder why some animals kept on walking in circles on ages and keeps on shaking their heads, it is because the animal is suffering from neurosis which is wrought by the despicable environment of the zoo. As a result, the lifespan of animals in the zoo are shortened. Elephants for example, which are known to be survivors in the wild only live less than half of its natural years.

Where it usually lives for 56-60 years in the wild, elephants can only live for an average of 17 years! Thus, the arguments used by zoo owners and keepers that zoos conserve animals are false. Keeping animals in zoos is not conserving them but in fact killing them. Imagine the lion that we see on TV with all its might running and hunting its prey, that suddenly when it was caged, it became lethargic and slowly dying like a poor cat dependent on the food given by the zoo keeper and it is equally sickening when they have to be shot when they grow too many and healthy.

Zoos should be closed.Work CitedMcLaughlin, Eliott, Bharati Naik, and Marie-Louise Gumuchian. "Zoo official on Marius the giraffe: Conservation isn't always clean." CNN. Cable News Network, 11 Feb. 2014. Web. 26 Feb. 2014. .