Open Thread for Wednesday
Letters in Tuesday's edition of the Los Angeles Times express various views on the elephant situation at the LA Zoo. What's your thoughts? Blog away dum dums!Re "Death of Gita Renews Calls to Move Elephants to Sanctuary," June 12
How convenient for L.A. Zoo Director John Lewis to proclaim Gita at 48 as "old." Asian elephants live into their 70s when not confined to a zoo's limitations and the hard surfaces with which they are forced to contend. The zoo has refused to hold itself accountable for any of its elephants' early deaths, and it continues to refuse to move these giants to a sanctuary where their lives would extend far beyond the zoo's horrific record of shortened lifespans.
DARCY SILVER
Calabasas
The mention in this article of animal welfare groups' objection to keeping massive pachyderms in relatively small, uncomfortable and lifelong enclosures was excellent. Causing creatures to suffer for our momentary amusement seems beneath civilized humans.
CHANTELLE WALLACE
Austin, Texas
Gita's death should not be allowed to disappear into yesterday's news. I implore people to urge the zoo, the City Council and Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to scrap plans to expand our elephant exhibit and release Billy and Ruby to a sanctuary before they too die far short of their natural lifespan.
ERIC PRESCOTT
Los Angeles
Send the two remaining elephants, Billy and Ruby, to sanctuaries. Close the elephant exhibit and plant a garden in its place in memory of the elephants that have died there over the years. Through attrition, close each exhibit and plant memory gardens with plaques of past captives.
DEBORAH FAMIGLIETTI
Los Angeles
Posted by Mayor Sam @ 6/14/2006 12:00:00 AM
8 Comments:
I agree. Send the remaining two elephants to a sanctuary. It seems the majority of the city is asking for this anyway. Why is the city basing this important decision on what a small group of people want? Soon there will be state legislation banning the very expensive exhibit the city is building. I thought Villaraigosa was going to end all of the fiscally ridiculous decisions made by our "esteemed" city council. The only supporting people appear to be a few of the zoo employees, Betty White, LaBonge, a couple of volunteers who love the last two elephants personally and are speaking out of emotion rather than what's best for the elephants.
Seems like a no brainer to most of us who have seen better webcams of elephants than we've ever seen at the LA Zoo.
Yes, send the remaining two elephants to the sanctuary before John Lewis kills them.
Put Lewis and Labonge in the existing exhibit and let them stand on concrete all day long in separate enclosures.
Let them get arthritic legs and start calling them old aged. Hell, they are both 48 as well, right?
It seems like Villaraigosa went from a good position to a bad one on this issue for a couple of reasons.
The first one was that the people who think it's important to have elephants in zoos came out of the woodwork when they realized there was a real possibility the elephant exhibit could be closed, abetted by zoo director John Lewis and his staff, who are wedded to an old school approach to running zoos. Despite plenty of evidence from other zoos that elephants do not fare well in close confinement, kids learn more about elephants on TV than in zoos, and zoos do NOT need elephant exhibits to thrive, these dogmatists persist in flogging fiction as fact.
The second was that, compared to so-called "big time" issues like taking over the school district, zoo elephants weren't something the mayor wanted to spend his political capital on. In other words, political pragmatism got in the way of good public policy.
That may be the biggest indictment of Villaraigosa in this situation - an innocent elephant died prematurely and two others may be condemned to live (and die) in the equivalent of prison because of somebody's idea of political priorities. If that doesn't tell you all you need to know about this mayor, then nothing does.
The Mayor should pressure John Lewis to adequately staff the Zoo with veterinarians. there are only two full time vets on staff at the L.A. Zoo which has over 1300 animals. Gita's death could have been prevented if she would have been getting the medical attention she deserved. John Lewis has failed to staff the Zoo's medical center appropriately.
I love elephants. I would never want to see them mistreated or abused in any way. But saying to a kid that it's just as good seeing an elephant on TV as seeing one in real life is like saying it's just as good seeing a giant sequoia or the ocean or a mountain on TV. No need to see it in real life. It's just not the same. Without learning to love elephants by seeing, smelling, hearing, touching them, kids won't develop an appreciation of the elephant. And without that appreciation, elephants and conservation efforts to save them are doomed.
Nahuatl rituals repeatedly express the place of evil and nature in the overall scheme of things. Ritual impersonations of La Malinche, Cortés, Huehuenches ("old ones"), Tenanchis (the grandmothers of the Christ Child), and the figures of the bull and the deer testify to the importance of the Adamic.
Yeppers, Antonio fucked up on this one. Big time. Nobody wants the elephants at the zoo besides John Lewis and LaBonge.
Every once in a while a parent comes out whining abou the children, but let's just consider the source and move on. Mommy wants Johnny to see the elephant... or Johnny will cry... boo hoo.
Other than them, try and find the elephant supporters.
No where to be found, huh?
Never agreeing with Phil Krakover, I'm breaking that streak tonight and I'm ready to help get Lewis and La Bonge in the cages.
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