The Merriment and Moral Dilemmas of Zoos and Aquariums

As WordPress continues to recycle old prompts, I pulled another prompt from The Coffee Monsterz Co to respond to today

What are your opinions about zoos and aquariums?

This is kind of a tricky one because, as much as I enjoy aquariums and zoos, I’m also concerned about the ethics behind putting wild animals on display.

As a father, I love being able to take my children to the zoo. I love to be able to show them different types of animals, from different parts of the world. And it’s not as if the animals are simply on display. There’s usually information placed around The animals “living area“ that tells you about the animal where they’re from their diet and their endangerment status.

One of my favorite areas of the zoo is the aquarium. Having been a dad with small children and traveling to the zoo in hot and humid weather, it is absolutely essential to occasionally get out of the sun and get into a cooler area – if only to get your body temperature to fall a little bit. Aquariums provide that. It is cool, it is dark, and the aquatic life is the highlight. I like the aquariums because I see things there, just as I do in the zoo, that I would likely never see in my lifetime as I’m not a huge traveler.

I love the fact that when you go to the zoo, everything is eco-friendly. They probably have more recycling canisters and they have actual garbage cans. All of the contents that you buy food in at the zoo are usually 100% recyclable. They even have recyclable, cardboard, straws. Suck on that Trumpsters!

In many instances, some of your better zoos actually take on the daunting task of trying to save and danger animals from extinction. This of course is a very noble endeavor; as is the mission of most zoo, as I explained to previous previously.

But…

There’s always a “but“ isn’t there? I can’t ignore the fact that zoos are still taking these wild animals out of their natural habitats. While their cages made out of metal and consisting of a vertical black or silver bars, a cage is still a cage.

Growing up, my dad dabbled a little bit in fish tanks. After all, he was very much a guy of the 70s in the 80s. At one time he had a 50 gallon tank in our living room. And while the fish aren’t need to look at, I still can’t help thinking to myself that their entire world has been relegated to that one box. Say another sea life should not be relegated to a tank. They should have the whole ocean or river or lake as their ecosystem and playground!

I think it was the first time I saw the original Happy Feet that I really started to feel bad for animals in the aquarium. What do you think about it, it’s really not much more than a glorified fish tank.

Zoos will do as much as they can in order to re-create an animal natural habitat, but that is simply impossible. Certain animals don’t belong in certain parts of the world because the local environment is not suited to them.

One of the first things that comes to mind are the early struggles of Disney’s Animal Kingdom, open in 1994, Animal Kingdom struggled because they were often times unsuccessful and re-creating an animal natural habitat in an area that was previously Florida swamp land. As a result had many animal deaths in the early days of the Animal Kingdom. do their credit, Disney put their money with their mouth was and they started bringing in actual scientists and zoologists to replicate the natural habitat of various parts of the world.

But still, a cage is a cage.

Overall, I like zoos and aquariums. I’m sure that I will continue to frequent them. But at the end of the day, I can’t help thinking to myself that these animals are stuck there.

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3 responses to “The Merriment and Moral Dilemmas of Zoos and Aquariums ”

Silk Cords

February 27, 2025

The flip side is that some of these animals would be extinct if left solely out in the wild. Poachers have pushed elephants and tigers (as two examples) to the verge of extinction.

I haven’t seen bars on a zoo enclosure in decades either. It’s all trench barriers and / or plexiglass walls.

IMO zoos and aquariums are fine if they properly mimic natural environments and the animals are properly fed and cared for, including keeping the enclosures clean. Animals seen only in pictures are no different than video game characters to some people; there’s no real connection or empathy developed. That changes when the animals are seen face to face.

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1. rebuilding rob
  
  February 27, 2025
  
  That is true. And I didn’t want to come across like I was blasting zoos – they do do some great things.
  
  I probably just watched Happy Feet too many times.
  
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  1. Silk Cords
    
    February 27, 2025
    
    Great movies, but they do have a pro-nature bias. FWIW, I used to be much more pro-marine parks also. Sea World in SoCal and Marine World were pretty nice and I don’t think deserved MOST of the heat they got. The enclosures were FAR too small for Killer Whales though. I completely changed my view though after visiting the one in Hawaii. Filthy beyond all measure among a dozen other issues and despite being run by a conservation group.
    
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