Return to Home Page

The Issues - Animals In Entertainment

Children have a natural affinity for animals and take delight in seeing them and being around them. As part of our childhood most of us visited the circus, aquarium, zoo, or other places where animals were kept or brought to perform tricks. We may even look back on these memories with fondness and feel a desire to share this experience with our children. Kept hidden from view, however, is the price animals pay so that we may be entertained by them.

Large animals in circuses are usually chained up and beaten into submission with whips and bullhooks, and forced to perform up to 50 weeks out of the year. Between shows they are kept in small cages and given almost no room to move around. It they cannot be properly trained, or when they are too old to perform, they are typically killed or sold to laboratories.

In events such as bullfights, bulls are usually sickened to give bullfighters a fighting edge. In rodeos young calves are often electrically shocked to startle them, and usually end up being permanently injured and sold to slaughterhouses.

Animals in zoos have no desire to be kept in captivity on display for others to see. Many animals at zoos are wild-caught, or the children of wild-caught animals. No zoo, regardless of how much it invests, can adequately provide any animal with the habitat it needs to be happy and free.

Fortunately, there is no need to financially support cruelty to animals in order to enjoy them. There are many animal sanctuaries around the country where you can visit and interact with animals that have been rescued from situations of abuse. State and national parks teem with wildlife, and we are offered more travel options to different ecosystems than any generation before us. There is also an incredible amount of information and imagery that can be gleaned from television stations like Animal Planet and National Geographic, books, and magazines.

Please teach your child the most important lessons when it comes to animals: compassion and respect.