HOST: Virtuous viewers, this is Stop Animal Cruelty on Supreme Master Television with today’s program focusing on animals in captivity and the horrific suffering they endure.

Zoos around the world vary widely in size, but whether they are large or small the animals they house, who are used to roaming wide expanses of wilderness, swimming freely in the deep oceans, or flying through vast blue skies, do not belong in concrete-and-steel exhibits.

No matter how hard a zoo tries to enhance its animal enclosures, the fact remains that its residents are not free and can never experience the complex social, environmental and physical benefits that nature bestows.

Zoos are businesses that rely on income from ticket sales and the selling of merchandise in order to continue to operate.

To keep costs low many zoos are under-staffed, and those who are employed there may lack the training and skills to properly care for the sensitive animals.

Thus the residents’ welfare is low on the priority list when zoos try to stay profitable. Let’s first examine from where the imprisoned beings in zoos are obtained.

Some are bred in the zoos, a process fraught with danger and untold misery for the animals involved. In order for successful captive breeding to occur, the conditions must be as close to the animals’ natural environment as possible in terms of climate and habitat.

A large enough space, minimal human contact and a population of sufficient size to avoid the negative effects of inbreeding are also required. Small gene pools lead to inbreeding and in turn decreased vigor, longevity and survival rates among offspring.

As zoos can never provide the ideal circumstances for natural breeding, they typically resort to the degrading, painful and emotionally damaging process of artificial insemination.

Let’s learn about this procedure from Catherine Doyle, the elephant campaign director of the esteemed US-based non-profit animal welfare group, In Defense of Animals.

For more details on In Defense of Animals,
please visit www.IDAUSA.org