"Zoos and Eyes"

My first zoo experience was a grammar school field trip to the Franklin Park Zoo in Boston. I was deeply traumatized by the horrific condition of the animals and their environment. My next zoo-like experience came a decade later when I visited the San Diego Wild Animal Park. People were confined inside a monorail. The park was artificially divided into regions representing the world’s ecosystems. Animals were grouped according to the region where they would normally be found – except predators were arificially separated from their prey. I was delighted with the concept of confining the people instead of the animals.
My next zoo experience came about a decade later at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C. The enclosures I could see were clean, but too tiny for any mammal. I remember the tigers and the wolves. I thought they all looked depressed. I had an amazing interspecies experience with a silver back gorilla who offered to share his meal with me. We were separated by a sheet of glass. He repeatedly tapped the glass with his green beans and carrot pieces while I held my hand against the glass. I remember being amazed at his hands, his fingers, and his eyes. His graciousness couldn’t mask his sadness. I repeatedly apologized to him about his circumstances, but I had no solution for his plight. I was both exhilerated and anguished by this zoo experience.
At the New England Aquariam in Boston, a seal and I shared a brief encounter that I enjoyed. But again, the enclosure was unacceptably tiny. I went to Sea World, and hated it. I went to Busch Garden, and Disney’s Animal Kingdom. These places were considered among the best zoos and parks. I found them depressing. Unable to enjoy them the way most of the public seemed to be, I thought there must be something wrong with me. These animals have been objectified to such an extreme that most human spectators do not recognize their suffering. There seems to be no innate human compassion for the suffering of their fellow creatures.

This year I went to an animal park in Quebec, where the human spectators were confined to their vehicles and following an assigned route. Sighting of particular species was not guaranteed. Time of visit, season, weather, and the nature of the species, are factors affecting potential sightings. The animals have sufficient assigned territory to avoid human eyes, but I don’t know at what cost to them. We watched cars and the bus choose to keep moving instead of waiting to see if animals would come into sight. For many human spectators, there was a real impatience with, and intolerance of, the natural needs and rituals of the animals. This clearly was what Acampora was speaking of, those people had come to be amused, entertained. The animals were objectified, valueless. The spectator's experience of viewing was all that had value here.

“Zoos and Eyes” validated my experience with these zoos. I agree with many of Ralph Acampora’s statements supporting his argument that zoos are pornagraphic. Modern zoos are not healthy for the animals or the spectators. It would be optimum if there was opportunity for interspecies encounters, if it was a voluntary encounter for all parties. I would not want to never have the opportunity to encounter extirpated species, or non-native species. I will always cherish and be saddened by my encounter with the silver back, and the seal. I must question some of my assumptions of what I have seen in the Quebec park. As you can see from one of my coyote pictures and one of my wolf pictures taken there, sometimes the animals do choose to make eye contact with the human spectators.