Written by PETA
As I'm sure many of you are aware, circuses that use elephants and big cats in their acts are not on PETA's approved list! Circuses—including Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, for instance—use aggression, violence, and confinement to "train" elephants to perform asinine tricks. This often results in pain, suffering, and trauma. Some elephants go mad, while others become infected with deadly diseases, like a human strain of tuberculosis (TB). Quite a few suffer early deaths. (If this is the first time you're hearing that all is not glitter and glamour for animals in circuses, I think I've got some sad news for you about Santa Claus as well.)
However, while we PETA activists have become well equipped for tackling Ringling's lies to the public about their practices, up from the slimy depths slinks Carson & Barnes Circus.
Let me back up by telling you about Joy. She's from a group of elephants that the Illinois-based Hawthorn Corporation was forced to relinquish because of chronic Animal Welfare Act violations. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the elephants at Hawthorn accounted for 21 percent of known cases of TB in elephants, and it's likely that these elephants are infected with drug-resistant, latent TB. In fact, half of Hawthorn's 22 animal handlers tested positive for TB exposure.
While most of the elephants at Hawthorn went to sanctuaries, we fought the USDA tooth and nail to prevent Joy from going to Carson & Barnes Circus. An overreaction on our part? Heck no! One of our incredible undercover investigators exposed cruelty so vicious that it brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it. Elephants shocked with electric prods and repeatedly hit with bullhooks become so frightened that they trumpet and recoil from the trainer's vicious attacks.
This is the routine nightmare of elephants in their "care." They're tortured. Yet somehow these depraved animal abusers are still in business and were allowed by the USDA to acquire Joy with the understanding that they'd never use her in their traveling show or for any sort of public contact because the USDA determined that the Hawthorn elephants posed a danger to the national elephant herd and public health.
Then! Less than a year after they got Joy, Carson & Barnes turned right around and submitted a request to the USDA to use her anyway for "educational demonstrations and possibly for elephant rides." Here's the USDA's rather irritated response:
As you might recall, you had several conversations with Dr. Elizabeth Goldentyer, Eastern Region Director, Animal Care, in March and April 2005 regarding EAF's [the circus's Endangered Ark Foundation, which is nothing more than a breeding facility to supply Carson & Barnes with more unwilling performers] willingness to be a donee for Joy. In each of those conversations, you, among other things, agreed on behalf of EAF not to allow Joy to travel or be in contact with the public. Therefore, EAF's plan to use Joy for "elephant rides" or any other exhibition that involves public contact or travel would not be acceptable to [the USDA].
Yeah, these carnies really care about the animals, eh? They will stoop so low as to risk the health of Joy, other elephants, and little kids just to make a buck off elephant rides.
Boo-yah! Little C&B thought they run with the big dogs in janky dirty dealings? But remember what we told you the five fingers said to the face? SMACK!
Posted by Missy Lane
She's blue about being pimped out to a circus and a zoo! Meet Sydney—the pachyderm protagonist in Sanctuary Song, a new opera opening this summer in Toronto. A dynamic combination of song, dance, and theater, this ele-friendly opera follows Sydney as she recounts her life during a journey to a sanctuary in Tennessee. Discussing her abduction by poachers and her years spent in a circus and a zoo, she relives the fond memories of her friends and family as well as the fearful memories of captivity. Will Sydney be reunited with her childhood friend in the last act? No spoiler alert here! Like they say, it's not over until the elephant sings.
Can't make it to Toronto to see Sanctuary Song? Put on your favorite aria, and check out the lovely ladies at this real-life Tennessee sanctuary.
Update: There was a great investigative report on this issue that was on KHOU-TV this week. Check it out here.
Our Captive Animals department has been working overtime on a case involving two elephants named Tina and Jewel. The elephants belong to Cole Bros., a circus that was assessed a $10,000 penalty by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) for abusing elephants with bullhooks. To make a long story short, after confirming a whistleblower report stating that Jewel was emaciated, we filed a complaint with the USDA, leading to the removal of both elephants from the road. But now they are being housed at an unapproved facility in TX, and according to one recent inspection, an elephant expert “determined that both elephants showed an alarming amount of weight loss.”
Cole Bros. is leasing the elephants to the family that formerly operated the King Royal Circus, until its USDA license was permanently revoked when a young African elephant named Heather was found dead in a crowded, overheated trailer. Lovely.
Please help us convince the USDA to confiscate the elephants and relocate them to The Elephant Sanctuary, where they can receive proper nourishment and veterinary care from qualified elephant caretakers. You can take action here.
Don’t worry if you don’t get that subject line. It’s just a shout out to my homegirl, Anuradha “Slim Shady” Sawhney, who does a hell of a job running PETA India.
The point of this post is really to give props to the whole gang over at PETA India, who just released the incredibly exciting news that the city of Mumbai will no longer allow elephants within its borders. Mumbai's compassionate decision will spare many elephants a lifetime of abuse and neglect, and it sends a powerful message to other towns and cities across the country. You can check out the full story here.
Now PETA India is expanding the campaign to other cities, and they’ve enlisted India’s A-list to help. They just sent this petition, featuring heavy-hitting Indian celebs like Dilip Kuman, Saira Banu, John Abraham, Raveena Tandon, and others, to Chief Ministers across the country, and hopefully we’ll be hearing more on this issue soon.
Way to go PETA India!
As lawyers go, Ringling Bros. has some pretty fancy, expensive ones, but despite their best efforts last week, they couldn't keep the circus from being dragged into the courtroom once again, this time on charges of (surprise, surprise) elephant abuse. Judge Emmet Sullivan announced Thursday that a last ditch attempt by Ringling's attorneys to hold up the proceedings was a "waste of a considerable amount of [the court's] time and resources," and that the case, which was brought by a consortium of animal protection groups and a former Ringling Employee, will go forward. The circus stands accused of violating the Endangered Species Act by "abusively training and disciplining elephants with sharp implements such as bullhooks, by intensively confining and chaining the multi-ton animals for prolonged periods, and by forcibly separating baby elephants from their mothers." Given that the ol' Endangered Species Act doesn't look too kindly on those training practices, it sounds like Ringling's going to be in a world of trouble. 'Cuz that's pretty much all they do.
Hope you’re having a good “Be Kind to Animals Week” Thursday. Remember the Hawthorn elephant campaign from a couple of years ago? If not, the short version is that after extensive negotiations over many months, a circus operation called the Hawthorn Corporation agreed to relinquish twelve elephants to a sanctuary, resulting in the single largest elephant rescue in history. If you’re interested, the longer version with more details is here.
My friend and colleague, Debbie Leahy, was a big part of that whole campaign, and she wrote an extremely moving account of the rescue of one of the elephants named Sue. Never one to seek the spotlight, Debbie never shared her story publicly. But as soon as I read it I knew it had to see the light of day, so I asked her to let me post it here. She agreed, and so here we are.
“It was the Wednesday before Christmas, and just as I was drifting off to sleep, I received a late-night phone call. It was Carol Buckley of The Elephant Sanctuary. She had an elephant emergency. Carol explained that Scott Blais and other sanctuary staff members had traveled to the Hawthorn Corporation in Richmond, Illinois, owned by John Cuneo, to assist Cuneo’s veterinarian with drawing blood from the elephants in preparation for their January transport to the sanctuary. Cuneo’s vet sedated Sue, who was considered to be very dangerous, for the blood draw. Sue collapsed on her sternum in a splayed position and was unable to stand up after coming out of sedation. They needed a forklift immediately. I told Carol that I didn’t know of any forklift companies, but then I shook off my grogginess and powered up my computer to help her find one.By midnight, I had called a dozen different places and left frantic messages asking if they offered emergency forklift rentals. One of the companies had an answering service, and I’m certain that the woman who answered thought that I was a crank caller. She repeated, “You need help with a downed elephant?” I finally located a forklift, and after a series of phone calls, the company agreed to wake up a driver and delivered the forklift to Hawthorn by 3 a.m.That Thursday at noon, Carol asked if I could go to the Brookfield Zoo, pick up some straps that were designed specifically for elephants, and take them to Hawthorn. The straps filled two large Hefty bags. While I was in transit, the forklift company called me. They wanted to know how the elephant was doing. When I dropped off the straps, I went inside the barn to take a peak at Sue. I was shocked at the conditions at Hawthorn. The overwhelming stench of feces and urine made it difficult to breathe. Sue’s stall, in which this 8,000-pound animal had been forced to live for years, was approximately the size of a box-stall for a 1,000-pound horse. It was very dark, but I could see that Sue was awake and lying on her side. I thought to myself that after all the elephants were moved out of here, the place should be bulldozed, as nothing would ever remove that stench.Cuneo kept four elephants in the protected-contact area where Sue went down. Sue was born in 1965 and captured in Asia. She was first transported to Circus Vargas in 1969, when she was still a baby, and she was transferred to Hawthorn in 1995. Sue reportedly almost killed one of Hawthorn’s trainers. Billy was another one of the elephants I met in the protected-contact area at Hawthorn. Billy has lived there since 1971. And then there was Frieda, the elephant Hawthorn acquired from the Clyde Beatty-Cole Bros. Circus after she rampaged twice in 1995, injuring about a dozen people and causing around $20,000 in property damage. The USDA prohibited Hawthorn from putting Frieda back on the road. Nickolaus, the fourth elephant, was born to Ronnie at Hawthorn in 1993 and had grown into a dangerous juvenile bull elephant. Nick’s father, Tunga, died three years after Nick’s birth, when he was just 32. On Friday, Carol asked that I pick up hoists from an equipment-rental company. One of the company’s employees had used a magic marker to draw a cute little picture of an elephant on the cardboard under each 150-pound hoist. I took another call from staff members at the forklift company, who were hoping for good news on Sue’s progress. I was touched that even strangers expressed concern over the plight of this elephant. Carol told me that they also needed 30 cases of Pedialyte. That translated into 240 1-liter bottles. No single store had that much Pedialyte in stock, so I went to several drugstores, loading up shopping carts with grape, orange, bubble gum, apple, and unflavored Pedialyte and cleared their shelves of approximately 100 bottles. I decided I would get the rest later. When I arrived at Hawthorn, Sue had been moved to an open area in the barn so that the forklift would have space to maneuver. Scott pointed out the other elephants while I was there. Hawthorn kept the rest of the elephants on the other side of the barn. They were chained by two legs in what the circus calls a “picket line.” The animals swayed ... and swayed ... and swayed. I could see that Liz, one of the elephants, was petite in comparison to the others. Two elephants toward the front, Minnie and Lottie, were clearly very attached to one another. They stood as close to each other as their chains would allow them and intertwined their trunks. Some of these animals, I learned later, were infected with tuberculosis.There were several empty places along the picket line where other animals had once stood—a ghostly reminder of all the elephants who have died at Hawthorn over the years, including Hattie, Joyce, Tyke, Maude, Tess, Bombay, Dumbo, Amy, and Jackie. These vacancies caused me to reflect on how differently things could have turned out if the USDA had only moved faster. Why wasn’t Hawthorn shut down immediately in 1994, after Tyke killed her trainer and police shot her to death in Honolulu? Or in 1996, after Hattie and Joyce died of tuberculosis and the other elephants were quarantined? Or after Lota became emaciated as this highly contagious bacterial lung disease ravaged her system? Or after Debbie and Judy rampaged through a church in North Carolina? Or after a trainer was convicted of cruelty to animals in Norfolk? Or after the elephant Delhi was confiscated because she was in imminent danger from lack of veterinary care? Over the years, how could USDA inspectors stand in the same spot that I was standing in, see the same things that I was seeing—filth, neglect, abuse, emaciated elephants, sick elephants, dangerous elephants, neurotic elephants—and just leave those animals there to suffer?I was glad, at least, that I was able to play a role in finally getting those elephants out of there. The USDA subpoenaed me to testify against Hawthorn after the agency filed charges alleging 47 violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act. Some of my many visits to the circus had provided the agency with evidence of lack of veterinary care—which led to Lota’s being taken off the road—and unsafe handling.While I was there, Scott gave Sue a banana. She made yummy slurping noises as she ate it. I was amazed that after all she’d been through—including her current life-threatening predicament—she could still find joy in the simple pleasure of a tasty treat. I wasn’t really surprised when Scott said that there wasn’t enough produce at Hawthorn for the elephants. On Christmas Eve, I fought the crowds of last-minute shoppers in order to buy more Pedialyte and produce for the elephants. I loaded up my station wagon with hundreds of pounds of carrots, apples, bananas, pears, mangoes, watermelon, onions (yes, elephants like onions!), oranges, tangerines, broccoli, cabbage, tomatoes, peanuts, and celery. I left just enough room to see out of the rear view mirror. My four-cylinder engine ran sluggishly under so much weight, but it managed.On Christmas day, I returned to Hawthorn to deliver the goodies and stayed for several hours to lend a hand. One of the sanctuary’s veterinarians was there monitoring Sue’s blood. She was showing signs of improvement. The sanctuary staff members were working desperately to save Sue’s life. Scott was trying to help her stand up with the forklift, which was attached to straps around her chin, chest, and waist. The forklift gently pushed her forward and lifted her up inches at a time. Then workers adjusted the tension on the straps and pushed the tires that she was leaning on for support closer to her. I’m sure it was all very strange for Sue, but she was patient and understood that everyone was trying to help her. Scott kept rubbing her, patting her, and giving “Suzie Q.,” his nickname for her, soothing words of encouragement. A couple of times, Sue roared out of frustration with not being able to get her legs to work. The other elephants immediately reacted by vocalizing, squealing, and trumpeting in order to let Sue know that they were there and were concerned over her distress. The other elephants wanted so desperately to be by Sue’s side to comfort her that they strained against their chains. Nickolaus, who was watching Sue’s dilemma from just a few feet away, hurled himself against the bars of the cage, which made a frightening noise that made me jump each time he did it. The sanctuary staff members made sure that Sue had as much food and drink as she wanted. They would open a bottle of Pedialyte, pour it into a bucket, and push it close to Sue’s trunk. Sue would then dip her trunk into the bucket, suck up the liquid, and squirt it into her mouth. Sue loved the orange flavor but didn’t care for the bubble gum flavor. Instead of squirting the bubble-gum flavored Pedialyte into her mouth, she sprayed it onto her back, drenching Scott a few times. I scrambled to pull all the orange flavored bottles from the dozens of bags piled against the wall. Staff members also sliced up a watermelon and other fresh produce for Sue, who eagerly took each piece with her trunk, placed it in her mouth, gobbled it up, and stretched out her trunk for more.Sue was lucid, and her appetite was strong. She was a spirited elephant, and she was clearly a survivor, having lived for so long in such horrible conditions. Over the next few days, we kept up hope that she would make it. Carol reported that Sue rallied a few times, trying to get on her feet. Scott provided a pool filled with warm water to help her. Scott and other staff members gently eased Sue into the pool and pumped in warm water. Immediately, Sue became energized, and she began to play. After splashing the water with her trunk in joyful abandon, Sue became still and passed away. All the other elephants—even Nick, who had become so loud and animated when Sue struggled in vain to get to her feet—fell completely silent. They knew that their longtime companion was leaving them.I had company visiting when Carol called on December 30 with the sad news. I didn’t care that I had visitors—I wept. It’s terribly unfair that Sue wasn’t given the opportunity to enjoy a new life at the sanctuary. But at least she knew comfort, tenderness, and dignity in her final days.”
There are a million other animals like Sue who need our help, so please, never patronize any circus or other act that uses animals. And please, share Sue’s story with others to make sure they don’t either.
Some great elephant news on two fronts for you today, as two famous elephants have found new places to live. The first, an elephant named Dulary from the Philadelphia Zoo, has been released to a sanctuary to spend the rest of her life following the zoo's decision to close down its elephant exhibit for good. It's amazing to me to think that before I got involved in animal rights, it never even occurred to me that there was something monumentally screwed up about keeping elephants (who walk up to 30 miles a day in the wild) in tiny enclosures in places like Philadelphia for people to gawk at. Anyway, awesome work The Philadelphia Zoo for figuring that out too. You can read the full story here.
The second elephant to find a home is a beautiful little anti-circus sculpture who goes by the name of "Ella PhantzPeril" (yeah, I know. Kill me.) Ella, a shackled, weeping pachyderm who wears a sign that reads, "Shackles, Bullhooks, Loneliness — All Under the Big Top" has been the subject of a few legal troubles over the past few years, even getting the ACLU involved when DC balked at displaying her as part of a citywide exhibit of elephant and donkey sculptures. Now, after a whole lot of back and forth with the New York City Parks Department, the New York Post has reported that the city has finally agreed to allow her a spot in Union Square Park this summer. So take that, circuses.
At the end of her recent show in Chicago, longtime PETA supporter Joan Jett took the opportunity to read out a statement to the crowd attacking Ringling Bros. Circus for their shocking abuse of elephants. She also urged the crowd to come out in support of a new ordinance in Chicago that will make it impossible for Ringling and other abusive animal circuses to use their standard training techniques of beating elephants with bullhooks and electric shock prods. Here’s what Joan said to the crowd:
Please don’t take your kids to the Ringling Bros. Circus while they are in Chicago; the elephants and other animals suffer from beatings and confinement. And be sure to ask your Chicago Alderman to support kindness to elephants by voting in favor of the pending elephant protection ordinance, which will ban cruel tools of the trade, like sharp metal bullhooks, electric shock prods, and leg shackles.
Joan Jett (for those of you who weren’t aware) is utterly amazing. Word has it that the crowd went absolutely nuts cheering and clapping after she made the statement. It was also, reportedly, a kickass show. Here's a little video to illustrate Joan's point.
If you have a general question for PETA and would like a response, please e-mail Info@peta.org. If you need to report cruelty to an animal, please click here. If you are reporting an animal in imminent danger and know where to find the animal and if the abuse is taking place right now, please call your local police department. If the police are unresponsive, please call PETA immediately at 757-622-7382 and press 2.
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