Friday, 03.28.08
Knut-Case
JOHN MACDOUGALL/AFP/Getty Images
Among the Pandas
December 2007
James Fallows on China's soft underbelly.
Panda Land
December 2007
James Fallows narrates a slideshow of China's pandas.
Shooting Britney
April 2008
One of J. M. Coetzee's characters says the history of zoos is an extension of the history of warfare. The first zoos erected fences less to protect man from beast than to protect beast from man. Zoo-goers viewed the animals as POWs in a long inter-species war, on display to be jeered and attacked as representatives of the enemy. This hostility survives today in the sick exhibition of Knut, the cute bear-orphan who has been the object of exploitation for the first fifteen months of what one hopes will be a short life.
Knut is a combination of abused child-soldier and abused child-star -- treated as a useful spectacle, with too little regard for his long-term psychological well-being. In Knut we see soul-withering effects of early fame, and of exploitation of the weak by the powerful. These effects are as evident in him as in Michael Jackson or the cast of Diff'rent Strokes. Now that his youthful charms are fading with his white coat, he still demands constant attention from humans. They stare at him, or he screams in misery. Anyone could have guessed that the lack of same-species companionship and endless train of adoring tourists would eventually damage him, but the zoo kept him on display because apparently cuteness trumps morality. Eventually, cuteness fades, and Knut will turn on his keepers as surely as Michael turned on Joe Jackson. There is a solution to all this, and its name (at least in Knut's case) is euthanasia.
Death to KnutWhen Knut was born, this blogger anticipated that keeping him alive would pose problems. |
The way we bear itWhen Knutmania displaced other foreign affairs stories, Nick Amies observed that humanity is "blessed with the ability to crawl under a warm, mental blanket of denial when things get too much." |
Bear glossAnnie Liebovitz photographed Knut for the cover of Vanity Fair. |
Unbearably lonelySpiegel Online says Knut is pining for his keeper. |
The kid is not my sonRichard Corliss looks at Michael Jackson's Peter Pan complex. |
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Here's hoping Knut lives a long life and makes a lot of people happy watching his antics. Why people assume the animal must be unhappy because he lives in a zoo where he never needs to worry about getting shot by a hunter, or where his next meal is going to come from, etc., I don't know. This reminds me of the folks who demanded that that Orca from the movie be reintroduced into the ocean, when the whale showed no evidence of wanting or being capable of living in the wild.
If a person wants to get gender reassignment surgery, cover their body in tattoos and then give birth out of wedlock, liberals shrug and say "where's the harm?" Well Knut is never going to be a "normal" bear - he has become addicted to humans - but so what? People like watching him and he likes being watched, so where's the harm? I'm not advocating going out and capturing more bear cubs to raise in activity, but Knut was born there so let him do what he enjoys - sure this should be a lesson for how to deal with future cubs, but why get so worked up because he isn't "normal"? Polar Bears are not scarce like Pandas - this is hardly a species tragedy.
What on earth is the point of this article?
The real issue isn't the treatment of Knut - the issue is the treatment of Knut's natural environment.
Knut is the poster cub for a species that appears doomed for extinction; along with gorillas, tigers, elephants and hundreds - nay thousands - of less celebrated species.
I feel badly for Knut. But I feel even worse the the mass extinction that is unfolding before our eyes.
I have seen the enemy...and he is us.
Oh no, my poor tortuered schnauzer! How could I have not realized that she belongs in the forests of Europe hunting rodents and rabbits! And here she forces herself through the unnatural rituals of playing fetch and jumping on the couch to get pet every time I sit down; I should have seen the light and killed her years ago.
No, bears are not domesticated animals like schnauzers. Yes, it is entirely possible that there will be difficulties with Knut's imprinting on humans when he reaches sexual maturity. But to claim that this animal is abused and better off dead is incredibly narrow-minded and misguided.
According to this author's twisted logic, every animal in every zoo (or circus or other environment contaminated by human contact) should be put to death. Having exploited the rejection of a baby polar bear by its mother for financial gain, the Berlin Zoo's responsibility is to continue to care for this animal throughout its life. If that means - God forbid! - daily contact with humans, then so be it. Knut is never going to spend a single day of his life on an Arctic ice floe searching for a seal for dinner. He is, because of the circumstances of his birth, entirely dependent on humans, as is every animal in every zoo everywhere. Killing Knut would be an act of barbarism. I shudder to think of what this writer would suggest as the appropriate fate of child actors who have reached adulthood.
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Methinks Knut is not the only psychopath around here....
Posted by Freddie | March 28, 2008 9:19 PM