By Bob Gaydos

A family of lions has been killed by the Copenhagen Zoo.

Cruelty, meet irony.

The human beings who run the Copenhagen Zoo apparently have a single-minded approach to managing the institution: If the animals trapped in their breeding program do not measure up to the humans’ arbitrary standards (too old, too young, too weak, too common), the animals are killed.

Only they don’t call it that. Instead of killing, they call it culling, which the humans apparently think sounds better but doesn’t make any difference to the animal involved. Dead is dead, however one tries to gussy it up with phony, save-the-species kind of language. And dead for no good reason is, at heart, cruelty.

In March, the Copenhagen Zoo bosses killed a healthy, 18-month-old giraffe, named Marius, because, they said, his genes were not needed in their breeding program. He was surplus. They rejected offers from other zoos to take Marius and shot him in the head with a bolt gun, dissected him front of a crowd that included young children, and fed his remains to the zoo’s lions.

This week, they killed the lions, a family consisting of a 16-year-old male, a 14-year-old female and their two, young cubs. The humans said the adult lions were nearing the end of average zoo age (which is actually 25) and were simply too old for breeding, even though they had just produced two young cubs

The cubs, like Marius, simply had the misfortune of being born at the Copenhagen Zoo. They were killed because the zoo had its eye on a young lion at another Danish zoo that it wanted to mate with two younger females at Copenhagen, to create a new pride. The females are offspring of the deceased male and the zoo officials said they wanted to avoid in-breeding. They also said the young male they had their eyes on would just kill the young cubs anyway, so bye-bye.

Apparently, sterilization or merely swapping healthy animals between zoos to let them live out their lives are concepts that do not fit into the breeding program of the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria, to which the Copenhagen Zoo and about 345 others in Europe belong. The Copenhagen Zoo said it had no offer to take the lions off its hands, but its treatment of Marius shredded any credibility on that count. In addition to rejecting an offer from another zoo to take the giraffe, the zoo speeded up his execution in response to a petition signed by tens of thousands of people around the world to spare him.

When Marius was killed, the corresponding zoo association in the United States said such a thing would never happen in this country because the zoos sterilize or swap healthy animals. That’s instead of killing them for expedience, or budget-balancing or ego-satisfaction or whatever is driving the men in charge in Copenhagen. Certainly, it’s hard to believe animal welfare enters into their calculations.

Zoos are ostensibly a means to protect and preserve species of animals on this planet and to expose and educate millions of people about the beautiful diversity of wildlife most of us would never have the opportunity to witness. But grabbing animals from their native habitats and breeding them in captivity, for whatever stated reasons, does not give humans the right to mistreat the animals, to cage them and treat them as entertainment, or to regard them as some kind of laboratory experiment which can be discarded in the name of science or conservation.

What the Copenhagen Zoo (and others that operate under the same principles) does has nothing to do with wildlife conservation, humane education, or respect for animals. It is strictly about the convenience of the humans. EAZA said it “regretted” the deaths of Marius and the lions, but that the Copenhagen Zoo has been consistent in its approach and has broken no association rules. That’s lame and, frankly, should be embarrassing to other members. It is time for zoos in Europe and elsewhere to rethink their mission and find more humane, compassionate ways to go about meeting it.

Certainly, people who respect animals as living creatures can avoid visiting zoos that blithely dispose of animals as so much “surplus.” Those who wish to voice their desire for a change can sign a petition at: https://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/to-the-executive-director-of-eaza-to-work-with-british-and-european-parliaments-for-relegislation-to-ensure-the-reduction-in-occurrence-of-surplus-healthy-animals-in-captivity-relocated-and-not-killed

Finally, there’s another word they sometimes use in zoos when they talk about animals — euthanize. A lot of reporting on the Copenhagen Zoo killings said the giraffe and the lions were “euthanized.” No they weren’t. Animals who are sick or injured or lingering painfully near death are euthanized to relieve their suffering. There is no mercy in killing a healthy animal being held in captivity.

bob@zestoforange.com

By Bob Gaydos

Marius the giraffe, is butchered in front of an audience full of young children.

They killed a giraffe in Denmark Sunday. Executed him, actually, with a bolt gun, at the Copenhagen Zoo. Then they performed an autopsy and butchered his body while an announcer explained what was happening to a crowd of onlookers that included lots of wide-eyed, young children.

Finally, they fed the carcass to the lions and tigers.

The Romans couldn’t have made more of a spectacle of it.

The giraffe, Marius, was 18 months old and, apparently, in the best of health. He posed no known threat to any other living creature. His “crime,” according to the two men responsible for killing him, was that he was too normal. The product of a breeding program at the zoo, Marius was apparently unfortunate enough to possess the type of genes that the scientists said were already well-represented in the zoo’s giraffe population. Allowing him to continue as part of the breeding program would not be good for the giraffe population as a whole, they said. He was surplus material.

Bam! Bye,bye, Marius.

There’s more. Copenhagen Zoo officials had an offer from Yorkshire Wildlife Park in Britain to take Marius off their hands. The British zoo is part of the same breeding program as the Copenhagen Zoo and has a state-of-the-art giraffe program. In fact, Marius’ older brother lives there. But Copenhagen Zoo officials didn’t even bother to answer the British zoo’s inquiries, saying they felt Marius and his surplus genes would also be taking up valuable space in the British zoo’s program. The offer of a private individual to buy Marius for $680,000 and place him in a wildlife preserve was also ignored.

One more thing. When word of Marius’ impending execution was revealed, more than 20,000 people signed online petitions to find him another home rather than kill him. Rather than discuss the matter with people who organized the petition, zoo officials moved up the execution without telling anyone.

There is so much wrong with this story, it’s hard to know where to start.

Let’s go with the arrogance that permeates this entire affair. First of all, giraffes are not considered to be an endangered species and the zoo scientists acknowledge the animals breed well. So why the breeding program in the first place? If the species is taking care of its diversity on its own, why do humans have to meddle in the process? Because we know better what’s good for them? Breeding a giraffe in captivity and then killing that same giraffe two years later because he possessed no special genetic makeup (Oops! We made a mistake.) hardly suggests a higher order of thinking. Callous disregard for life, yes. Enlightenment, no.

To then insist that the pubic butchering of the animal and feeding him to the lions was a scientifically and culturally valuable experience for the young children who watched is utter nonsense and reeks of a desperate attempt to justify the act. I have no idea what was going on in the minds of parents who allowed their young children to be subjected to this abuse, but this was not “natural” as zoo officials insisted. This was a man-made spectacle. In nature, Marius would at least have had a chance to evade his predators. Zoo officials lured him with a piece of rye bread before they shot him in the head.

As for moving up the execution when public protests grew, the haste with which the zoo, not only killed Marius, but got rid of his remains, might suggest to a suspicious person a sense of urgency to get rid of the evidence. Of what, I have no idea, because I’m not schooled in what zoos might do to their animals.

Which leads me to the bigger point here and perhaps the only good news to come from Marius’ untimely demise: It raises an awareness of the need to find out what exactly does go on in zoos and whether they are really necessary — in any way — for the benefit of animals, as opposed to entertainment of humans.

Copenhagen Zoo officials said such killings are routine in zoos, to preserve and protect the animals. Or perhaps, to balance the zoo’s budget? Zoos are limited in funds as well as space. After all, lions have to be fed and today’s cute giraffe baby can easily become tomorrow’s lunch in such conditions. How routine is this culling of zoo populations? Who decides? Does zoo staff have any input in the decisions? What are the regulations or guidelines? These questions beg to be answered.

Animals also obviously get bored being confined in zoos or even safari parks. And exploitation and abuse of animals is not unknown, especially in zoos lacking oversight by outside agencies. But Marius was killed in a respected zoo in a major European capital in a country with a reputation for progressive thinking. And he was the byproduct of a breeding program to which zoos throughout Europe subscribe and whose scientists endorsed the execution of Marius, the innocent.

In effect, they decided the world, never mind the Copenhagen Zoo, was too small for one more healthy, young giraffe

In the same week Marius was killed, thousands of dogs were poisoned and shot in Sochi, Russia, to “clean up” a sub-tropical city that was chosen to host the Winter Olympics. Apparently, the humans there and in Copenhagen never heard of controlling a population of animals by neutering them instead of killing them.

Such arrogant disregard for life will ultimately be the downfall of the human race.

bob@zestoforange.com