It's About Animals

The Ringling Bros. Barnum and Bailey circus rolled in to town the other day and not everyone was so happy about this. In fact, protesters lined the streets as they approached. More and more educated consumers are boycotting the event, too aware of the atrocities that take place with the care and handling of their animals. A Hudson News reporter who traveled with Ringling Bros. Circus reported in an article dated August 8, 1986, that the sound of a trainer's club repeatedly striking a chimpanzee, as well as the chimpanzee's screams, could be heard outside the arena building. Big cats, bears, and primates are forced to eat, drink, sleep, defecate, and urinate in the same cramped cages. Animals in circuses are hauled around the country in poorly ventilated trailers and boxcars for up to 50 weeks a year in all kinds of extreme weather conditions. Access to the basic necessities of food, water, and veterinary care is often scarce.

Most elephants used by circuses are captured in the wild. Once removed from their families and natural habitat, their lives consist of little more than chains and intimidation. Baby elephants born in breeding farms are torn from their mothers, tied with ropes, and kept in isolation until they learn to fear their trainers. Some elephants spend almost their whole lives in chains. In the wild, the life expectancy of elephants is the same as ours. In the circus, many elephants die prematurely of disease and the stress of confinement. Elephants in circuses are rebelling in attempts to escape their sad existences. Since 1990, elephants have killed at least 46 people and injured many more. In 1994, an elephant killed her trainer and injured 12 spectators before being gunned down by almost 100 bullets while running terrified through downtown Honolulu. In 1994, officer Blayne Doyle, who had to shoot 47 rounds into Janet, an elephant who charged out of the Great American Circus arena, lamented: "I think these elephants are trying to tell us that zoos and circuses are not what God created them for. But we have not been listening."

The circus deprives animals of their basic needs to exercise, roam, socialize, forage, and play. Stereotypic behaviors such as swaying back and forth, head-bobbing, pacing, bar-biting, and self-mutilation are common signs of mental distress. Laws protecting animals in circuses are insufficient and poorly enforced. The Animal Welfare Act establishes only minimum guidelines and even these paltry standards are often disregarded. As People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals spokesperson Kristy Sigmon told me on It’s About Animals, the radio talk show on Saturday’s at 9:00 PM on NewsTalk 1050 WEVD, “Children, who are naturally fond of animals, would have to be dragged kicking and screaming to the circus if they knew of the suffering these animals endure for a fleeting moment of so- called amusement.”

Bob DeFranco is an animal behavior therapist, executive director of the Animal Behavior Center of New York and president of the American Foundation for Animal Rescue, Inc. in Queens. Watch him on Pet Talk Live, Saturdays at 8:30 PM on Channel 34 in Queens and listen to him on the new radio talk show It's About Animals on NewsTalk 1050 WEVD AM on Saturdays at 9:00 PM. Questions or comments? Write P.O. Box 7623, Rego Park, NY 11374 or e-mail him at: bob@canines.com

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