Elephant suffering: Don't ride an elephant!
While I don't want to spoil anyone's holiday fun, it's good to think about some things. A life-size print of an elephant should inform tourists that there is a lot of animal suffering behind a ride on such a colossus.
Since the animal welfare organization World Animal Protection (formerly WSPA) launched the attack against the elephant rides, more and more travel companies are boycotting the rides and other entertainment at the expense of elephants. According to the organization's director, Pascal de Smit, animal-friendly elephant rides do not exist: 'Every elephant you can ride on has been seriously abused. Elephants are not born tame.'
Mentally broken
The elephants are caught illegally at a young age. The mothers, who try to save their offspring, are often killed. The young elephant is then isolated, starved and tortured until it 'breaks' mentally. And even after that life is no fun for the elephant: always tied up, without social contact with peers, walking on paved ground and waiting for hours in the blazing sun.
In addition, the back of an elephant is very vulnerable. Although an elephant can pull up to 1.000 kilograms, the animal's vertebrae are not built to carry one or more tourists. For an elephant, this is especially painful and harmful.
With elephant.worldanimalprotection.nl can everyone vow never to ride an elephant (again).
Very good that this is once again being paid attention to. If you are on vacation in the north and want to see elephants, visit the Elephant Nature Park (www.elephantnaturepark.org). There, old and abused elephants are taken care of. They can roam freely in the park for the most part and in self-formed groups. You can see and touch them up close. An overnight stay at the park is a special experience. It's not cheap, but you support the rescue program.
Henny, that camp is very familiar to me! Do you think you support the bailout program???
You support the capital of Khun Lek !!! Of course not cheap! You have to pay to be allowed to work there as a volunteer.
She also only works with Burmese, whom she treats like slaves, underpaid and NEVER leave to visit their families. Elephant Nature Park is all about a project based on lies, deceit and greed of the mistress.
Of course I have no insight into the finances of the park, but you can't doubt the good work that is being done there, can you? There is probably a lot of money coming in, but it is clear that the costs are also enormous: housing, food, medicines, freeing elephants, education projects ... Lek is of course the driving force behind the whole thing.
Where did you get the information? Have you been there? Have you spoken to staff? I'm curious, I couldn't find anything about this on the internet.
A rather harsh accusation from someone who apparently does not know what it costs per day to keep an elephant alive and also knows nothing about the further activities of Lek in its second, even larger elephant park. Of course, this kind of accusation lacks any source of truth.
And we are no longer allowed;
Swimming with dolphins;
eating meat;
Visit Tiger Temple;
To the GoGo;
Visit a temple or church;
Drinking coffee;
To the longneck tribes in northern Thailand;
And so on……..
Nowadays there is something behind everything that causes suffering or irreparable damage to nature!
What you do or don't do is up to you. But if animals are abused to entertain you, you can at least ask yourself if you want to maintain something like this by giving money for it. Something like moral sense? Empathy? Fill in yourself…
Moral sense, empathy… Or selective outrage? Cuddliness factor?
If animal suffering – of course there is, I do not deny – is involved to entertain or feed people, then it should be different.
But what is the difference between elephants, tigers and dolphins and circus lions with a certain cuddliness factor that people care about on the one hand and the crocodile farm, tilapia farms, chicken and pig fattening farms (where do you think all those tasty bbq chicken and pigs go? a stick come from Thailand?) ?
I see plenty of junk (t-shirts / towels / flags / etc) for sale in tourist areas referring to Nazi Germany. Including swasticas, SS symbols, whether or not connected to the German eagle… I worry a lot more about that here in Thailand! If the historical awareness is not even there about the death of millions of PEOPLE in camps then I don't think that not visiting an elephant farm changes anything about animal suffering!
You have a point there Eric. It always strikes me that many animal lovers just as easily buy the 'kilo-bangers' in the supermarket from the factory farms that involve a lot of animal suffering. Admittedly, organic products are much more expensive, but as a true animal lover who is concerned about the welfare of animals, you can still be expected to pay that price.
No, Eric with a "c," suffering is done to please us. There is nothing wrong with a GoGo because you are the direct (= paying) object there.
My wife and I have been coming to Thailand on holiday for years and sometimes we take an elephant ride. These elephants have Mahuts, a human who sits on the elephant as owner trainer. We notice that one time the elephant looks round and healthy and the other time it doesn't. Yesterday we went to see Siam Niramit in Bangkok and there you could also take a ride on the elephant. They looked healthy. These animals have been kept this way for hundreds of years, which means hundreds of years of 'animal suffering'. I sometimes tend to go too far in what we call animal cruelty. We do eat meat, have things made of leather.
I would rather have a list where the elephant is treated well and fed well and where it is not. As a layman I can already see that there are big differences between them. Please don't let us get more popish than the pope now! Now it seems that if one keeps an elephant, there is direct animal suffering. Didn't we also have such an idiotic discussion about Zwarte Pieten, which always means discrimination?!
Is the fact that elephants have been kept this way for hundreds of years a reason to continue? If you see a dog being beaten, will you join in because dogs are always beaten in that place? And you can't compare a mahout with a support structure plus two wealthy Westerners. Why sit on an elephant when you can walk next to it? The Elephant Nature Park is developing programs for other parks where walking next to the elephant is offered as an alternative to sitting on it. These parks are gradually becoming aware that things can be done differently.
Leaving aside the physical problems that come with an elephant ride, elephants may look good on the surface, but they are very intelligent and social animals, living in herds and forming lifelong friendships. They like to roam freely through the woods, wallow in the mud and take a dip in the river. And not to be put on a chain after their daily monotonous rides. And Mister BP, did you read the "mentally broken" part?
Go to the park in Chiang Mai that I mentioned. Then this discussion no longer needs to be had. Or at least like their Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/SaveElephantFoundation, then you really see what healthy elephants look like.
Dear people, don't let yourself be pinned too much on your sleeve.
Indeed it takes place what is said (illegal age capture and killing of the mother) here there are animals caught in the wild. There are plenty of elephant centers where this does not take place at all, the animals are often born in the centers and they do have a social elephant life, including going into the river together to be scrubbed and cleaned. These centers do benefit from the fact that tourists can make a tour because this, among other things, earns food for the animals, without income there is no life for the elephants and that is apparently what they want to achieve with this action.
Now you often see lonely animals walking with their “owner” to pass by the food stalls and there, selling bananas, so that people can give them to the elephant. That should definitely be stopped.
In short, look for the larger elephant centers, there are plenty of well-organized ones in Chiangmai and the surrounding area.
I once sat on it and took a ride of half an hour, I really didn't like it, the boredom on such a high back is really the last thing you want to experience. So for me it is not necessary, but if someone wants to experience it, go ahead, but please note that there are a large number of animals that are taken out into nature, so not on streets and commonly used roads and paths.
and that weight that an adult animal gets extra on its back is not in proportion to its weight, on a horse the ratio of load to the horse's own weight is many times smaller.
As so often with idealists in this world, it is too short, one has to work more selectively.
Dear Klaus,
I'm not an idealist, but we're still talking about wild animals in captivity. I can't imagine myself needing to sit on an elephant or pet tigers. In that respect, I belong to a different species.
Unfortunately, we live in an era where man has alienated himself quite a bit from the content of what is natural behaviour.
People are always looking for incentives to feel alive. They go very far in this. But if it has to be at the expense of…..(you name it) then it must be stated that the way someone is in life is a sad state.
In my perception I then see the egoism, greed and irrepressible need for power of man. The person who always talks about Respect for himself.
To those who downplay this.
Every year, the “shortages” in the tourist industry are still filled by about 100 baby elephants (many from Myanmar). Often the mothers and aunts have to be killed first, because they always want to protect the little one.
Try watching this video all the way through:
http://www.zuidoostaziemagazine.com/ritje-op-een-olifant-geen-goed-idee/
Not only elephants, go to the crocodile farm in bkk. Do you see tigers drinking milk from the baby bottle, yes yes half to adult tigers in mesh cages that are much too small 10 to 15 square meters.
Chimps in mesh cages that are much too small, crocodiles in a thick green water soup.
Crocodiles with deformed legs, tails, etc.
Please take a look at this as well.
Wouldn't it be more important and fruitful to focus on education and knowledge of elephant behaviour? When is there an “elephant whisperer” on it? I don't think there is anything wrong if humans and animals come to a cooperation, but it is important that this happens with respect! The training of a horse / dog here has changed a lot compared to 50 years ago. But despite all the good trainers, you still have culprits in between. Let's keep it positive and focus on a respectful treatment to the benefit of all parties.
If we put everything under the microscope that happens to animals, etc., you may wonder whether the breakfast egg is still allowed and eat herring, kibbeling, eel, gourmet, mussels, chicken satay. . . would I continue?
But OK, . I too am against riding on the back of an elephant. So I agree with the statement: stop exploiting and using animals for entertainment.
No wild beast is born tame. Shouting about dressage in Thailand, what a shame what is happening there. Well, let me ask you a question, have you ever been to a circus performance in the Netherlands? How do you think, for example, the lions and tigers are trained there? I know because in my very young years I spent a blue Monday working in Tony Boltini's circus. And the football ponies?