Dead Monkeys

[radiantsoul]

The internet seems to be aflame with the dead Gorillas story. The story seems to be a 3-4 year old boy somehow slipped away from his mother and climbed into the Gorilla cage in the zoo. The Gorilla got close to the animal and the zookeepers shot it dead

Comments

[m_tessa]

I didn't hear about that case. But it remains me a few days ago, in my country there was a man who was in a zoo too, in the lions cage.
The man was naked and entered in the cage to  suicide himself by let him as meet to the lions. When the people saw the man, the guards shot the lions trying to save him. After they took the man out, they found in the clothes a suicide note...

And it began all the same discussion.... the guards who acted without knowing the situation of the man, the lions that are dead and weren't guilty, the right of life. .. etc....

[m_tessa]

The world is crazy. That's for sure!

[howlin_wolf_66]

"Had her son slipped off and bought a beefburger no-one would have condemned her

[radiantsoul]

So basically animals only have value in so far as they meet or exceed the expectations of human beings? I suspect there is some truth in and so maybe it is sad because the true purpose of the gorilla was to be watched by humans in a fake natural environment rather than being shot. But then I struggle to see any more argument against gorillas as bushmeat, for some people presumably that is a gorillas purpose

[howlin_wolf_66]

Yeah; it might be a cynical and horrible way to look at it, but I expect that's how a lot of people feel... We're at the top of the evolutionary scale, so we get to call the shots (no pun intended

[deadlevel]

my social media pages are bursting at the seams with commentary about this issue. my thoughts are: why did the zoo have an enclosure that was so easy for a 4-year-old to fall into? nobody (child or adult) should be able to get into an area where a potentially dangerous animal is housed.

it's a shame the gorilla had to die, but (as i saw someone else point out) if they had tranquilized it, it may have a) taken too long for the tranqs to take effect and the gorilla could have harmed the child in the meantime or b) it could have collapsed on the child, crushing them, when it passed out.

i'm a pretty crazed animal person, and i'm not a fan of zoos to be honest. but this could have been any mother. at some point (or - more likely - many), you're going to lose track of your child, because nobody is perfect. and if the zoo had been built properly, then the situation wouldn't have escalated into an emergency.

[radiantsoul]

Something was going to die, and our societies ethics and value system will always prefer a human over a gorilla. Even in the case above where someone wanted to kill themself in a lion enclosure, the zookeepers killed the lions.

I think the zoo is responsible, not to say that any one person or person made a mistake. But it really should have been impossible for a child to get inside. Even if the mother was negligent it still should not have happened. You could have school trips or mentally ill people who also cannot be allowed access to a cage with an animal that whilst it may look cute is great threat to life.

I do like zoos, but I do wonder if they are so appropriate for the 21st century. I think for large mammals you probably need large enclosures with so much security you have to wonder if the economics makes sense - especially in city zoos.

[deadlevel]

Something was going to die, and our societies ethics and value system will always prefer a human over a gorilla.

yep, that is an apt summary.

hopefully that zoo (and others) re-evaluate the types of enclosures they have so this can't happen again.

[sayuri2023]

I probably dont hate the mother but I do feel angry at her. In her facebook post, she mentioned Accidents do happen but she is happy it turned out okay in the end etc. So I cant help but be angry.. when I heard the news the first time, my immediate reaction was how did the child get in the first place?

[radiantsoul]

Like I said her reaction hasn't helped her.

She cared more about her son than an animal. Probably someone should have stopped her posting on social media, but her initial reaction of "Thank god my son is ok!" is not that awful when you consider she had 10-20 minutes of wonder if he was going to be crushed to death in front of her eyes. I think most people who are condeming her are not really taking the time to consider it from her point of view.