Here’s a fun misinformation campaign going on about the Denver Zoo’s announced polar bear moves, courtesy of a misunderstanding of polar bear behavior PETA perpetuated last spring.
In mid-October, the Denver Zoo announced that their two resident polar bears, Cranbeary and Lee, would be moving to other AZA-accredited institutions. This reasons for this move are two-fold: to facilitate the Species Survival Plan conservation breeding program for polar bears, and so that Denver can begin work on remodeling their bear habitats. The polar bear population within American zoos is very small – only 44 animals – and has a lot of older individuals, so it’s really important for the sustainability of that program that bears of reproductive age are with partners with whom they’re producing cubs. Cranbeary and Lee have both been at Denver for six years, but have never had cubs – so they’ve been paired up with bears at other facilities with whom they’re a good genetic match. After their departure, the polar bear exhibit will be home to the zoo’s grizzly bears while funds are raised for the construction of a new, modern polar bear habitat.
As soon as this move was announced, a petition showed up on Care2 (a non-profit petition platform that helps animal rights campaigns with their media strategies, and makes money by selling the contact information of petition signers to various groups – including PETA) saying that splitting up the bears was immoral… because they were in love. What’s more, that petition demanded that the bears be removed from the zoo population and sent to a sanctuary to live out their lives in each other’s company. But there’s a problem with that: polar bears are solitary, and Cranbeary and Lee are not “bonded.” Polar bears are naturally only social with other adult members of their species during the breeding season – maybe a month out of each year. The cute photos that populate the Care2 petition, as well as news releases about the move, were all taken during that short window. Just as the bears wouldn’t want to be near each other the rest of the time if they were in the wild, the zoo manages them as solitary animals and gives them space from each other the rest of the year. Denver zoo’s director of communications also noted publicly that the bears aren’t even getting along for the full breeding season: “Cranbeary has been losing interest in Lee even before that period ends, Kubie [said], noting that she ‘starts getting pretty agitated with Lee.’”
So where did this idea of “bonded” polar bears in zoos come from? It was certainly popularized in April of last year, when a polar bear at SeaWorld Orlando died shortly after the zoo’s other female polar bear was transferred to another facility for breeding purposes. PETA’s vice president made public comment that the solitary female polar bear remaining at SeaWorld had lost all hope, given up, and died “of a broken heart.” This pseudo-scientific interpretation was then repeated internationally by news sources, and only a few bothered to include the AZA’s statement on the incident – none of them actually interviewed wild polar bear researchers to ascertain if there was any veracity to the claim. Some of it might be due to history, too – for a long time it was common practice in American zoos to house adult polar bears together year round – until research started indicating that they were avoiding each other, and would prefer to be more solitary except during breeding seasons.
Because of the Care2 petition and all of the other animal liberation organizations voices that have boosted their message, there are now hundreds of thousands of people who believe that naturally solitary bears maintain emotional “friendships” with each other similar to those of humans. They’ve been convinced that sending these two polar bears to a sanctuary to “keep them together forever” is better for their welfare than keeping them within an accredited zoo program. There’s actually no information in the short petition about the behavioral, medical, and physiological needs of polar bears in human care, and how a sanctuary would be able to fulfill them better than an AZA-accredited zoo. (Instead, it repeats claims about stereotypical behavior and ignores the body of published, peer-reviewed research by the zoo world that informs polar bear habitat design and management programs.) There’s no sanctuary specified in the petition, probably because it’s hard to tell if there’s a sanctuary in the United States would be able to provide an appropriate habitat or care for for polar bears. Given that Care2 is openly and frequently anti-zoo, it’s much more likely that this petition was created with the intention of further increasing anti-zoo sentiments among the public (when the zoo chooses not to remove genetically valuable animal from a conservation breeding program and send them to facilities whose quality of care it cannot guarantee) rather than actually improve the welfare of Cranbeary and Lee.
TL;DR Animal rights groups and the petition sites that support them are spreading incorrect information about bears to further their anti-zoo agenda and to try to remove animals from zoo conservation breeding programs.
This “sanctuariosis” syndrome in the public needs to die.
We need to really wake people up about this BS.
Do the people yelling “sanctuary! Send X animal to a SANCTUARY! Build sanctuaries!” have any idea what a “sanctuary” even is?
Do they have any idea what a zoo is?
No!
A sanctuary is just another place that keeps animals “captive”, but they (generally) live off of donations instead of tickets, for the most part don’t let the public go see their animals (I’m looking at you, BCR) because they for some reason think that’s detrimental to the animals(?), don’t let the animals breed (and thus, prevent them from living natural lives, which is the #1 reason for sanctuaries that AR orgs pimp to the public), don’t aid in conservation, don’t perform any research, and are often run by AR lunatics who don’t subscribe to modern standards of animal welfare and training, because they think they are “above” that, due to their moral preachings and convictions.
In essence, a sanctuary is nothing but a zoo, without all the good parts.
Or I should say scamtuary, as there are real sanctuaries out there (but I don’t trust anyone anymore due to all the scamtuaries).
Or to put it the shortest way I can – it is nothing but a fancy label. Perhaps in the future, if the AR lunacy passes, all zoos will be called “wildlife sanctuaries” or something, because the word “zoo” feels “bad”.
And I wonder how much longer it is before they ask us all to send our pets to “sanctuaries”?
Stop projeting human emotions and feelings onto animals, animals act very different than humans and if you treat them like humans you could do more harm than good
Capitalism is only sustainable through a system of violence and social control
I still have a copy of the t*rget team lead guide to dealing with union activity that I nicked from the office when I worked there, it’s mostly the same stuff but it also revealed just how much of their management tactics were intended to frustrate any unionizing activity. For instance, they said that cross-training in multiple departments was the best way to get reliable hours, and encouraged everyone to do it; according to the manual, however, it was their way of keeping departments mixed up and jumbled, making it impossible for any single department to unionize (and forcing anyone who wanted to unionize to get the entire store to do it).
And that’s just part what the store managers are taught. Throughout, it mentions holding off on action and consulting a labor relations officer in the company on how to proceed. Who knows what kind of shady shit the people a step above do?
If you’re in retail and wondering how to go about unionizing, contact an existing retail workers union.
They are all very familiar with the anti-union tactics of retail owners and managers, and will have some advice for you, some literature to distribute, and strategies to counter these tactics. It has historically been extremely hard for retail and fast food employees to unionize specifically because the owners and managers keep us scared, disorganized, and are happy to fire us for unionizing, labor laws be damned. Their entire business model hinges on us being overworked and underpaid. Contact a union for help organizing in your store.
And don’t forget the IWW! THEY HAVE A CHAPTER FOR EVERYTHING.
“Transgender people in Uruguay are celebrating after the country’s Congress passed a comprehensive trans law yesterday (18 October).
The law brings in a host of new rights for transgender people.
Most notably, trans people can now self-identify their gender and update their legal name, without approval from a judge.
The new law also creates scholarships for trans people to access education, as well as sets up affirmative action. It also now acknowledges the self-identification of non-binary people.
The reparations are effective of 1 January this year and affect anyone born before 31 December 1975.
The new law also requires government services to employ a minimum of 1% of the transgender population.
62 of 88 senators voted in favor of the new law.”
Read the full piece here
WOW!!! Go Uruguay Go!!!
U.S. readers, register to vote here – in some states you can still register for the November election! This week shows how much we have to gain or lose depending on who gets in office.
“This takes a position that what the medical community understands about their patients — what people understand about themselves — is irrelevant because the government disagrees,” said Catherine E. Lhamon
This is straight up scary:
“the lack of clarity allowed the Obama administration to wrongfully extend civil rights protections to people who should not have them“
Buzzfeed is the latest national news site to report on what residents of Arizona cannot avoid — a hellscape second in the Inner Solar System only to the surface of Venus in parched, inhospitable real estate.
Man, they built a city in the middle of the fucking desert. Color me shocked.
Most of this stuff has been in place for decades. It’s only melting this summer. This is shocking. This is Climate Change. Stay tuned.
yeah… they built cities in the desert designed to LAST in the desert. shit should not be melting. it’s an average of 120F/48.8C there.
hey so i live here and uh….. yeah people’s dog’s paws are being badly burned, people’s skin/bodies are being burned, our homeless population is absolutely frying out here and the people of Tucson happen to be… decidedly dispassionate about the safety of these homeless people so if you’d be so kind, please donate to some of the shelters and organizations out here because there is virtually no shade on our streets and no humidity or breeze at all
and if you live here too, have a heart. i spent the last three bucks in my bank account on water for a gentleman who was out in the hot sun holding a sign at an intersection and he almost cried for it. everyone deserves a little help, especially when it’s 110 degrees before 9 am.
A new report by Ontario’s environmental watchdog has some strong words for successive provincial governments over the better part of the last half-century related to ongoing mercury poisoning at two First Nations in the northwestern part of the province.
The 2017 environmental protection report by Dianne Saxe, Ontario’s Environmental Commissioner was issued on Tuesday. Part of the document chronicles the history and current state of the historic pollution of the English-Wabigoon River system and its effects on Grassy Narrows and Wabaseemoong First Nations.
Speaking to reporters in Toronto during the release of the report, Saxe called the issue “shameful.”
“Both governments and business have long turned a blind eye to pollution of Indigenous communities,” she said.
The report itself was no less harsh.
“After accepting financial responsibility for the mercury contamination, the Ontario government declined to take action for decades, largely ignoring the suffering of the Grassy Narrows First Nation and Wabaseemoong peoples,” it stated, referring to a settlement reached in the mid-1980s between Ontario, the pulp mill and the First Nations.
If you wanna read an excellent history about this whole goddamn shitty racist mess, read Anastasia M. Shkilnyk’s incredible A Poison Stronger than Love: The Destruction of an Ojibwa Community. Apparently you can download it for free here.
These folks are now on their third generation of Minamata Disease because of the Canadian government’s policies. Minamata Disease is when your neurological system is destroyed due to mercury poisoning.
QueerGalaxies 