THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, December 2, 1994 TAG: 9412020006
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A20 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Letter
LENGTH: Short : 44 lines
Many people say that circuses are a natural part of childhood. I've been to one before, and, for me, once was enough. I felt ashamed to be in an audience that was clapping at wild animals in captivity.
I researched wild animals of the circus recently and found many disturbing facts.
Traveling circuses offer no space for wild animals to graze and exercise. Wild animals must be contained at all times. This continual confinement causes boredom, disorientation and, sometimes, self-mutilation.
When circuses move from one town to the next, the animals are shipped, by train or van, in cages that are just big enough to hold them. If they were given room to move about, any sudden jerk or stop of the vehicle could cause them to fall and perhaps injure themselves.
Jumbo, the most famous animal ever exhibited, as well as other wild animals in the circus, no longer has access to his native foods. Jumbo was fed food so unlike his natural coarse diet that his teeth did not wear away as they would have in the wild to make room for naturally occurring replacement teeth. Huge sets of molars emerged and, with nowhere to go, impacted within his jawbone. It was so painful for Jumbo to chew that toward the end of his life he began swallowing his food whole, as an autopsy report indicated.
The New York Times reported: ``In Hawaii a circus elephant named Tyk went wild, killing its trainer and injuring a dozen people.'' How does a wild animal go wild? It's like saying a human went human.
Perhaps it's easier on human consciences to say that the animal went berserk rather than say that maybe the animal's natural instinct to roam, coupled with the frustration of incarceration in cramped cages and chains, provoked the animal into making a desperate attempt to attain freedom.
Stupid Pet Tricks are funny on the David Letterman show. When those animals are done performing, they can go home.
SUSAN PERNA
Chesapeake, Nov. 28, 1994 by CNB