Factory farms will be looked back on with 10,000x more shame and horror than zoos. Zoos barely scratch the surface of the immense and unnecessary cruelty we inflict on animals. We torture 70 billion land animals to death every year and the poor things will never even understand why - they're just babies, mentally speaking.
It's objectively the greatest evil humans have ever committed, and for our own pleasure at that. We inflict pure hellish suffering because "tAsTe bUdS gO BRRR!"
It's hard to even comprehend something more comically, absurdly evil, both in terms of motive and sheer scale of suffering.
At least zoos do trigger an empathy response and get people to care about animals more.
False. 10-20% of the world population does not and we're just fine.
> So we need to kill animals for that.
No, you want to kill animals because you want tasty food. Not because you "need" meat. No one living in an industrialized country does. It's trivial to create a plant-based balanced diet (and a tasty one at that.)
> Zoos absolutely not required for humans to survive.
Neither are factory farms. They exist to satisfy "taste buds go brr." But that is not worth literally torturing[1] an animal to death.
I’m not sure that’s a fair statement to make categorically.
Many zoos provide homes, food, and veterinary care for animals that would not be able to survive in the wild. For example, the mountain lion at Arizona Sonora Desert Museum is blind, and many of their other animals had been kept illegally by their previous owners, were confiscated by Arizona Game & Fish, and needed a place to live so they wouldn’t die.
There is also the grim reality that most pets would run away and not come back if you were to open the "prison doors". Think of birds, reptiles, dogs etc.
Our interaction with other life on this planet is very human centric, some call this human supremacism. A line is drawn between us and other animals, and the justification is quite arbitrary in my opinion. A line that is used to justify a vast number of atrocities and systemic exploitation. I don't believe there is no meaningful difference between a human and a cricket. But between a human and a dog or pig? That's close enough that I'm willing to extrapolate.
My dogs that have escaped the yard go walkabout for a bit and then make their way home. My daughter's covid puppy has zero desire to be away from his human family- he's constantly looking for a human family member to hang out with and won't scamper away given the chance.
Now a bird/snake generally will be gone given the chance- but they truly are wild animals, while dogs are bred to be co-dependent with humans.
Indeed dogs have been genetically modified over millennia to the point many wouldn't even be able to survive in the wild, whether you think that justifies our actions is up to you.
In addition the chances they want to escape are smaller than for birds. I looked it up and found this source https://www.petlink.net/blog/chance-dogs-coming-back-run-awa... that says "The unfortunate reality is that 15% of dogs across the United States go missing.". For context that's not 15% of dogs want to leave and do so. What's the percentage of dogs that had the chance to leave? Let's say 50%, which would imply that given the chance 1 in 3 dogs left. Albeit not all of the because they disliked their home/prison.
Looking at the language used in that article exposes some mental gymnastics. They simultaneously state that dogs could find their way back if they wanted and compare it to loosing a child! No, the dog is not a child, and if the reasons you provide why they "go missing" are "Fear from loud noises, Easy escape routes, Boredom and Prey drive" I find it hard to ignore that these are adult conscious beings that may not want to live with us, and only do so when given no alternative.
> many wouldn't even be able to survive in the wild, whether you think that justifies our actions is up to you
I wouldn’t be able to survive in the wild.
Some dog breeding is nonsense. But for the most part, we adapted to each other. If you look at the most efficient land predators, it’s humans, cats and dogs. (Dogs are also the only fellow persistence hunting mammals and, apart from some lizards, the only animals to practice it period [1].)
Our domestication of herbivores is exploitative. Our domestication of dogs and acceptance of cats is far closer to an alliance.
> most pets would run away and not come back if you were to open the "prison doors"
This is not true of any pet I’ve had. The dog was always gunning for an open door. And the cat enjoys unsupervised time outdoors when weather permits. They both always came home.
Also, cats aren’t truly domesticated. If there is a creature that “chooses” to live with us, it’s cats.
Once had a cockatiel that escaped via a loose window, it flew around the neighbourhood for a few hours, then sat on a branch near the window waiting to be let back in.
All the primates and megafauna especially, it is a tragedy.
I'm certain they'll be looked back on with shame.
Even as zoos market videos of animals "eating birthday cake" on social media.
See also zoos' dark history entwined with ethnological expositions https://archive.is/xsuEU