This particular blog was inspired by a very short news article I read today on CNN.com entitled “Pet Bear Kills Pennsylvania Woman.”  The article, found here, is very short, so I’ll go ahead and paste it right into this blog, in addition to the link I just provided:

“A 37-year-old Pennsylvania woman died Sunday after being mauled by her pet black bear, authorities said.

Kelly Ann Walz was attacked when she entered the bear's cage to feed the 350-pound animal and clean its cage, according to Pennsylvania State Police. The bear lived in a 15-by-15-foot steel and concrete enclosure on Walz's property in Ross Township.

The bear wasn't the only unusual animal living on the property, an official with the State Game Commission told CNN affiliate WFMZ-TV. The homeowner had a permit to keep a Bengal tiger and an African lion, and the property routinely passed inspection and had no violations, he said.

A neighbor shot and killed the bear that attacked the owner, state police said.

An investigation continues.”
 

            I understand that it is in cases like these where animal activists are misunderstood, and so I hope no one will think me insensitive, but there is a part of me that cannot feel sorry for this person.  She chose to keep a black bear in an enclosure the size of a small livingroom, made of concrete and steel, and on top of that, also had a tiger and a lion, in Pennsylvania.  I can’t help but get angry at the selfish ignorance of people like her, who keep these wild animals under these types of conditions and then wonder why they snap, like the woman whose chimp attacked her friend and nearly left her for dead this past year.  And it always ends with death for the animal, without fail.  The animal can’t speak for itself and plead for its side of the story to be heard, so it rarely ever gets a second chance.

            Although there are no photos, and the police claim the property passed inspection, I dread to think of the conditions these animals live in.  Bears, lions, and tigers are massive animals made of nothing but muscle who need miles of space to live out their lives, yet people, and the government that allows for such ridiculous permits, feel that it’s okay to keep these predators under lock and key in someone’s backyard.  The governments that allow people to keep these animals should consider the safety of the people.  As long as these leaders are going to dictate what we can and cannot consume, if we can or can’t own guns, etc., all in the name of our “safety,” then it should be common sense to outlaw the keeping of wild animals as pets.  The animals suffer indefinitely, no matter what some people will tell you about how they’re treated, and the humans often suffer consequences as well.

            There are sanctuaries across the United States and around the world that rescue and take in wild animals who were formerly kept as pets in horrendous conditions.  It happens all the time, and their goal is to give these animals a better place to live out the rest of their lives because it’s usually too late to release them back into the wild.  When people refuse to continue caring for these animals, or when they simply cannot afford to anymore, they pick up and leave them behind to die slow deaths without food and water in their tiny enclosures, sometimes with no sunlight.  Some make it out when they’re rescued, some don’t, and some that do make it have permanent damage from diseases or injuries from which they will never recover.  Let’s also not forget the ones that are sold off to canned hunts or are shot and killed for their fur or so someone can hang their head on the wall.   

            I call it selfish ignorance because people who do things like this are just that: selfish because they want to keep these cute and cuddly animals while they’re young, disregarding the lives they are meant to lead, and ignorant because they don’t know what these animals really need in terms of space, diet, enrichment, companionship, etc., and they don’t even think about how uncontrollable they’ll be once they reach maturity.  Do I feel sorry for these people?  How can I?  Am I siding with the animals?  Yes.  Am I crazy for thinking this way?  No. 

Keeping wild animals should be a criminal activity; the fact that it isn’t is precisely where the problem begins.  Despite non-profits lobbying government to ban the breeding and trade of animals like big cats, for instance, different states have different laws and they are all too vague and filled with loopholes to make a difference.  This woman’s life did not have to end this way, nor did that bear’s.  Her family and friends did not need to suffer the loss of her.  It wouldn’t have happened if we had federal laws prohibiting the breeding, trading, keeping, canned hunting, and use of wild animals in any way.  But people are selfish, and people are ignorant, and people think that we should control these powerful creatures, and people think that they have the right to keep them in captivity to “see and learn about them.”  If keeping an animal in captivity should teach us anything, it should be that wild animals should never be kept in captivity. 

- Lisa Selvaggio