Marius the Giraffe
 

I have been following the killing of Marius from when the petition was released. I think breeding and then disposing of your "less important" abhorrent and don't understand why they just didn't geld him. What are your thoughts?

Danish zoo kills healthy giraffe, feeds body to lions - CNN.com

Yeah, I saw this story. What a sad thing. With that said, I have mixed feelings about zoos as a whole. While they provide a great learning opportunity for many who would never get a chance to experience the wonderful animals of the world, zoos also place these same animals in extremely unnatural habitats. There doesn't seem to be an easy answer.

Man at his finest - this is terrible and when I became old enough to understand I stopped going to zoos and any other attraction that exploits wild animals.

I find it remarkable that there is such a frail rationalization. And I am not sure what they thought the teaching moment was. There was also a private party who stepped forward with a large sum to save this young giraffe. They wouldn't allow it because he wasn't part of the "association". I find the entire idea of breeding and disposing of "surplus" or "less important genes" to be reminiscent of master race arrogance.

Once again, there is simply no rational explanation for man's cruelty to those who coexist with us on this planet. I'm upping my donation to the ASPCA.

Maybe they should have just aborted the fetus before it was born? Kind of like mankind does. If for any reason you don't want it, just get rid of it.

While there may have been valid genetic reasons for this slaughter, the way it was handled was horrific in my estimation. Euthanizing, autopsying and eventually cutting the dead animal in the prescience of youngsters is not an acceptable way to teach biology, genetics, etc.

There were options that might have saved this creature, I can't imagine why one of them wasn't used.

I do wonder if there would have been such an uproar if the animal in question was something other that a doe eyed, beautiful, young giraffe. My education is in biology and while I personally don't agree with the actions taken, I do understand the reasons given....and as might have been mentioned, why wait so long to do what was done.

http://zoo.dk/BesogZoo/Nyhedsarkiv/2...20giraffe.aspx

They mention some problem with gelding animals in zoos. http://abcnews.go.com/International/...eding-22430192

I do find their reasoning a bit disturbing if they see themselves as caretakers of the zoo animals rather than their owners. Would not a good caretaker want a healthy giraffe to live for as long as it possibly could in whatever other healthy environment they could find for it? They need not have "sold" it to another caretaker but made some other kind of arrangement. It does not seem like they tried very hard to care for this giraffe.

This story totally disgusts me.
Killing like this should be illegal.
Truly horrible!

From the above abc news article: Copenhagen Zoo doesn't give giraffes contraceptives or castrate them because that could have unwanted side effects on their internal organs, and the zoo regards parental care as important, said Holst.

I think extermination trumps "the unwanted side effect on internal organs ".

This whole situation disgust me! This is so wrong on so many levels. What is wrong with mankind that they will do something so savage to a living creature?? ....and in front of an audience of young children!

I'm surprised we haven't heard from VillagesPL yet. Everyday we kill millions of cows, chickens and pigs. We kill one giraffe and the world goes crazy.

I guess you didn't see how it was done and dissected and eaten in front of children. Cows, chickens and pigs are different......have you been eating giraffe lately??...good grief, don't compare.

A living creatures worth is not determined by how it tastes, or how it was killed, or who was present when it was slaughtered. I personally think the zoo was guilty of a tremendous public relations mistake, but in the same hour it took the zoo to kill and dissect the giraffe, we killed 4000 cows in this country alone. Almost 3 million healthy and adoptable dogs and cats are killed each year. Heck, almost 3 million children die of hunger related causes each year. I'm just not going to get all worked up because a zoo killed a giraffe and fed it to the lions. The lions weren't eating salad every day before this happened.

I guess this "learning experience" worked for you. Do you suppose all the children that viewed this also learned something from it.....if so, what? Hard to believe that you are comparing children dying to the slaughter of an animal.

If folks are disturbed by this action...as I am....why are you trying to justify it by comparing it to other deaths? How does ones caring about an animal being killed have anything to do with its worth? It's a living creature....people care. Maybe you don't, but other do. Don't tell others not to care.