Animal Trainer Cruelty Charges

“Colorful pageantry disguises the fact that animals used in circuses are mere captives, forced to perform unnatural and often painful acts . . . they would quickly lose their appeal if the details of the animals’ treatment, confinement, training and ‘retirement’ became widely known.” Thus People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals’ (PETA) position paper on “Circuses: Three Rings of Abuse,” begins.

Besides spending much of their lives in cages, legally required to be only large enough for the animals to stand and turn around, in transit the climatic conditions around the country force the animals to face radical shifts of both heat and cold (bears especially suffer from heat, lions from cold) that would not normally be encountered under “free range” (natural) conditions. During the off-season, animals may be kept in crates, barn stalls or trucks, as few circuses desire to put much money into comfortable winter housing.

As for training, physical punishment is giving way to mental control to teach entertaining “tricks.” However, some animals are less adaptable to various training techniques and are stressed enough to require drugging and tooth removal in order to make them manageable. As for the “tricks” themselves, bears balancing on balls, apes riding motorcycles, elephants standing on two legs--are physically uncomfortable and behaviorally unnatural.

After the animals have outlived their usefulness, they are permanently kept in winter housing, or, more likely, sold to other circuses, zoos, private menageries, game farms (to be shot for recreation or “exotic” meat) or even research laboratories. They spend the balance of their lives in confinement, coercion and misery.

Overseas, animals in entertainment have been restricted or banned in several countries, including Sweden and Denmark. In England, circuses with animal acts are often denied public space.

CRAIG HUMPHREY

Advocate for Coalition

for Animal Rights; Experienced

Long Beach