Our appeal:
Stop the distribution of videos showing wild animals as pets!
In recent times, videos of wild animals interacting with humans have gone viral, reaching thousands or even millions of people. While these animals may appear cute, the sharing of these videos is bringing them closer to extinction.
Why´s that? Studies have shown that these videos incorrectly suggest to viewers that endangered species make good (and cool) pets. These videos substantially harm the efforts of nature conservation organisations to protect species in their natural habitats and fail to show that wild animals do not make good pets!
The case of the critically endangered slow loris highlights the problems with these videos especially well. It´s highly likely that you stumbled upon videos of a loris stretching its arm above its head and being tickled, eating a ball of sticky rice, or holding onto a tiny umbrella. Millions of people have seen those videos, but only a minority of these viewers will have been aware that these animals are incredibly distressed.
This will have been many peoples first exposure to this relatively unknown species, and for many of them, seeing a slow loris presented as a cute pet will have made them desire one of their own. With the increasing demand of this species as a pet, which was already critically endangered through habitat destruction and illegal capture, has increased to meet the demand for these animals as pets.
It’s not only Loris’s are at risk from the sharing of these viral videos, but a large list of animal species, including primates like bush babies, pygmy marmosets and even chimpanzees; big cats like ocelots, leopards and tigers, and further species like racoon dogs or meerkats. Many of these exotic pets have been illegally captured as babies from the wild – a traumatic process for them, during which their mothers and other group members are often killed.
But that´s not the only problem – many exotic animals that have been bred in captivity are not suitable as pets either. Owners are often unaware of the highly specific needs of these species, and animals displayed in these videos frequently show signs of stress, malnourishment, and illness or die early. Animals that reach adulthood may show signs of aggression towards their owners who then decide they no longer wish to care for them. However, as these pets may have only known the company of humans, they can no longer be kept together with other members of their own species, and thus live the rest of their lives caged and alone in a rescue centre or euthanised.
Please help us to stop this animal exploitation by signing our petition!
