Morons of the Internet: The Tab (12/06/16)

This is the segment where I scour my favourite forums around the Internet and find some particularly interesting articles about current affairs told in the words of my favourite human beings.

In this edition we have some of the usual crap spewed out by those phony journalists at 'The Tab'. For once it's on the subject of animals and zoos, which I at least have some prior knowledge on. So trust me, this is a terrible, terrible article that only highlights what an ignorant writer we have here.
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http://thetab.com/2016/06/01/harambes-blood-hands-everyone-whos-zoo-91903?utm_source=nationalxpost&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=pages
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Oh here we go again. Another person on a little crusade against zoos because they value feelings over facts. This time though we have a writer who's putting the blame on everyone who's ever been to a zoo, which really isn't taking the tragic issue of a gorilla being shot out of context is it? Apparently everyone who visits zoos is at fault here, even innocent babies now have blood on their hands thanks to being taken by their own mother, and this somehow means they're responsible for the killing of two gorillas. This line of argument is a bit like saying that Formula One fans are responsible for the death of a racing driver because they support a sport with a history of poor driver safety. In any case I'm sure we're going to get a full list of the horrors that animals face in captivity; none of course backed up by any evidence, just simply anecdotal comments. But let's give this guy a chance anyway.

Bollocks, just absolute bollocks. If we're going to be making arguments revolving around feelings then let me add mine. As a zoology student who became fascinated with animals thanks in no small part to my local zoo, which does have animals at the forefront of the zoological experience and thus drives the business. I have little time to be patronised by a man who's giving definitions to words he found out about two minutes before writing the article. Your lack of knowledge on the management of zoos is clear, and this is reflected by your straw man argument that takes a singular case and applies it to a worldwide generalisation. There is actually some statistics provided to back up the arguments, albeit taken completely out of context. What you fail to mention is that the majority of animals live longer than their wild counterparts thanks to living in a controlled environment free from pressures of the natural world. Elephants are one example that still live shorter lives than their wild counterparts, but that's a trend that isn't predicted to stay true for long, as zoo conditions thankfully improve over time. Contrary to your belief zoological parks don't want to make their animals suffer, and in fact the majority of the employees are renowned professionals; unlike yourself.

When the argument finally gets round to the issue of gorillas it's just pure stupidity. You genuinely think that gorillas in a controlled environment are more likely to become diseased than their wild counterparts. You didn't even provide a source to refute that common biological knowledge; and that's because what you're saying is bollocks. What diseases are we talking about here anyway?  How can you be sure that the gorillas won't pick up a resistance to these diseases? The lack of any comprehension continues with yet another point that isn't sourced revolving around surplus killings, which surely would have been easy to source considering it's apparently a common occurrence. First of all they're surplus individuals, so why the hell would it matter? Surplus animals in the wild are also killed off, that's how populations reach equilibrium. Also why would a strictly herbivorous animal kill off others? Are you referring to intraspecific competition? Active predation? And you still haven't explained why this is an activity that is caused by the animals being captive? I think it's quite clear by the sketchy nature of your points that you clearly have no idea what you're talking about.

Oh I didn't realise this was written by Dr. Doolittle. I must find the secret to how this guy can possibly tell that the animals in question are bored, stressed and agitated, because amazingly he's just torn straight through the highly debatable subject of animal behaviour with purely anecdotal evidence. Flawless. His argument gets better as well because it turns out the only reason this guy brought up the tragic event were a gorilla was shot is to bring up his own gap year; the self centred asshat. I'm fucking glad you have the finances to go to one of the ten, and not countless, national parks in Uganda. You haven't quite cottoned on to the fact that you can get your family into a zoo to have an incredibly high chance of seeing many amazing animals from all over the world for under a hundred pounds, where as you can't even get a plane to Uganda for that price, and then you might not even get to see the damn things anyway. You only saw gorillas on your gap yah, which not that many people do, so please tell me again how the gap yah is a better conservation method that educates the paying public. You have the audacity to generalise all zoos into a 'bad' category based on one case, and then generalise all national parks into a 'good' category despite having been to only one. The final point is conclusive evidence that you're living on a different fucking planet. The one thing animals are not doing best at the moment is surviving. In actual fact they need all the help they can get, but your argument is that they should only be helped by privileged pieces of ignorant shit like yourself.

Oh for fuck sake, save this captivating tale for your fucking autobiography mate. I'm reading this article for a critical analysis, not a fucking vanity project. It shows you how much you give a shit about conservation as a whole when it has to revolve around you first. If it's not you it's about these fucking national parks, which really aren't as sustainable as you're making them out to be. I do agree with you that national parks are an often vital way to conserve wildlife, but does that instantly mean all zoos should be shut down? I've already written a post about the conservation efforts of zoos, so can't really be bothered to source through the various conservation efforts and actual purpose of the modern zoo, but I can assure you that at least my piece isn't hopelessly detracted from the real issue.
What irritates me the most about your piece is how you criticised zoos for promoting an anthropocentric attitude, yet that's exactly your whole argument revolves around. What a moronic hypocrite you are when you only look at animal behaviour from your own perspective, which by your own words is very much 'judging everything according to human values'. You actually think the animals in your care, which interestingly weren't specified despite brain structure being hugely varied across the animal kingdom, actually have the mental capacity of self worth. Just like throughout the rest of this article there is absolutely zero evidence provided to jump to such an unbelievably generalised conclusion like that.

Wait, how did we get to this conclusion when all you've done is talk about yourself for most of the article? Where's the evidence to show that zoo conservation is a ploy? I haven't seen any presented in this article, and the only evidence for animals being exploited comes from your shitty assumptive anecdotes. How fucking helpful are you in this situation? A tragic situation has occurred where a child nearly lost his life and a gorilla did, and your only solution is that the gorilla shouldn't even be there in the first place. Well guess what? That gorilla was being held in captivity, and so your retrospective analysis adds nothing to this argument; especially when that analysis revolves around unbelievable generalisations. Thanks for your worthless opinion; I honestly don't know why you bothered.