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Wow, these people went a long way to see penguins...that's why we have zoos people!
I know there's international agreement that no nation will 'invade' and try to take control of Antarctica, but I often wonder why no private group has 'annexed' at least part of it and started a new country. There's plenty of 'free' land, and natural resources galore in both minerals and a large percentage of the worlds fresh water. There must be some reason I'm just not getting.

...and zoo feed captive weight toward the high side as well....

my next door neighbor owned timberwolves as part of his private zoo. They stood 3 - 4 tall.

Yep, he's zoo-bound:

"Because this kitten was so young at the time of rescue, he will not learn survival skills from his mother and therefore cannot be released into the wild.

Although he will not return to the wild population, this panther will help to raise awareness and aid with potential research efforts. Initially the kitten will not be on public display but, once old enough, he will be transported to the Ellie Schiller Homosassa Springs Wildlife State Park, where park visitors may observe him."

http://myfwc.com/news/news-releases/2014/february/20/kitten-rescue/

G'oh! SO CUTE! I hope he's able to return to the wild someday, rather than a zoo.

Zoos, feed your damn animals!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2565697/House-fit-tyrant-Protestors-storm-sprawling-luxury-estate-Ukraines-fugitive-president-private-zoo-golf
-course-half-size-Monaco.html


Protesters have now seized the presidential palace. FUCK YEAH!

Heroes in the Ukraine today, may the rest of the world follow suit accordingly when the time is ripe.

Couldn't agree more.

In the past, there was some justification from an educational point of view where most people could never see these animals in the wild. These days we have David Attenborough (and if anyone argues that seeing wild animals in person in a zoo enclosure is better than seeing them in their natural environment on tv, I will pimp slap them).

I also accept that there are some species that are so endangered that zoos provide a useful breeding program, but ultimately the goal should be to do away with zoos altogether.

That is really the heart of this whole conflict, right there.

Zoos and the destruction of natural habitat.

I dont understand the interviewer or people being wildly upset by this, do they really think the zookeepers, who feed and care for this giraffe are simply sadistic morons who kills a giraffe for fun or just because they can? Obviously there was a reason for this.

I am , however, in principal against zoos. they may be educational on some level, but I have a distaste for the concept of keeping wild animals imprisoned like this. But I do think that most zoos and zookeepers do their best under the circumstances to keep the animals happy as they can be. Most wild animals in the wild of course, live in perpetual fear and/or hunger, and so forth, but I am much more in favour of us spending money on preserving wilderness, and stop the perpetual destruction of their natural habitat, instead of keeping specimens in special "cages"/zoos.

@A10anis

They probably didn't let the lions hunt it because there would be a chance of the lions being injured during an actual hunt (for example, if the giraffe fell over on top of one of the lions).

Also, there is probably not enough room in the zoo for an open hunt. And it seems even crueler than killing the giraffe outright. The animal will run for its life in terror and might even evade the lions for a while but since the hunt must take place in an enclosed area there's no hope of escape for it.

And as others have mentioned, the death itself would be a lot more painful.

I'm not sure how anyone could have thought this was a terrible thing? Lions have to eat meat, and animals will have to be killed for all their meals. If it wasn't a giraffe, it would be a cow. Is a giraffe's life more sacred than a cow's life? If so, why? Just because we are used to the idea of cows dieing for our food?

This is real life, and I don't think we should hide it from children. Shooting a giraffe in the head is brutal, but way less brutal than a bunch of lions biting it to death. If people aren't fans of feeding animals meat, then maybe they should be protesting against keeping carnivores in zoos.

As I said repeatedly, I agree with you that zoos are unnatural.

You start with unnatural, you end with unnatural.

You start with unnatural, you end up making unnatural choices.

This is a hard hard world, and we as humans are killing it more and more every day.

Zoos have morphed from being horrible cages, confining animals to be gawked at by unfeeling humans. Now zoos, the good ones, do their damnedest to create as natural an environment as possible.

Which still isn't very natural.

You say that this was an "unconscionable" choice, the killing of poor Marius (by the way, I mourn him, too.)

Do you think they should have taken the $600K from the wealthy person wanting to save his life? Even though it would have sentenced poor Marius to isolation and depression for the rest of his "natural" life? To me, that would be unconscionable. Blood money, made off the suffering of a single animal.

I think the real problem here is the very existence of zoos. There would be no Marius if there were no zoos.

I keep thinking about my dad's second wife. She was a piece of cake -- not the sharpest knife in the drawer, not capable of reasoned, step by step thinking. She had a great native -- almost feral -- intelligence though, it just wasn't that "logical."

One day, my uber-logical engineer father said something that she didn't like. I didn't like it either. So Oleta said, in a thick Okie drawl, "Just because something is right, doesn't mean it is right."

I almost started laughing at the absurdity of her statement, until I realized what she was really saying. So I asked her, "Do you mean just because something is logical, that doesn't mean it is right?" Yep. That was what she meant.

I think this is one of those situations. There are logical step by step reasons that led to poor Marius being literally fed to the lions. And then there is the emotional truth of a healthy and happy young giraffe being treated like he wasn't an individual with a right to a natural life.

Just because it was right, doesn't mean it was right.

One thing not mentioned here is that the zookeepers were offered $600K to "sell" Marius to an individual. They refused -- giraffes are herd animals and Marius would have had a horrible existence. They could have done a lot of good with that money, but they turned it down as the ultimate ethical decision.

Here's the thing -- zoos are unnatural places and they lead to unnatural results. @A10anis is correct. Against this, one can ask what GOOD do zoos do? Maintain a healthy gene pool to populate the wild. Instill a love of nature in city folks.

And maybe help foster the wildlife conservation scientists and wildlife biologists for the future.

The world isn't perfect. Terrible things happen. The world is a place of scarcity of resources. As thinking, reasoning, feeling beings, we must make choices.

And as I keep thinking -- for those who are appalled at the waste of this young giraffe's happy life, maybe shift your focus to the lions? In this unnatural place of the zoo, those lions got fed their natural diet for a change. Consider being happy for them? In this unnatural world?