Here are some things to think about as you watch the video and reflect after:
What feelings do the pictures of the animals evoke? What could drive anyone to want to own upwards of 50 animals? Was it a good idea to shoot the animals rather than have them tranquilized? Finally, what do you believe can be done to prevent this from ever happening in Ohio again?
I think the saddest factor of the whole incident is that this man who claimed to care enough about animals to own 50 of them, released these animals intentionally out of spite. The cops did nothing wrong; tranquilizing the animals in the middle of the night was dangerous, because they could continue wandering away and hide in the night, and would be too likely to hide in small, dark places such as playgrounds and could have injured children in the following days. Truly, it's terrible they had to die, but even Jack Hannah agreed it was essential to protect human life. I don't really believe anything must be done to prevent this from happening again, it's such an unlikely and unpredictable incident that the chance of it ever occurring again is slim to none. And, for the sake of more conversation; https://fbcdn-sphotos-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/s720x720/315780_10150870470525094_786420093_21066061_74557803_n.jpg
ReplyDeleteI agree with daniel, "I don't really believe anything must be done to prevent this from happening again."
ReplyDeleteYet, I also know that that is not how our government works. Speaking from past laws and judgements, our government uses one situation to base a whole series of laws upon. (Ie. Jared's Law in the multi million dollar school safety act.) The legislation about exotic animals is probably being worked on right now to prevent people's wild animals from being let loose. The legislation will probably involve stricter permits and safety regulations for the housing of exotic animals. As well as some increase in money that will be used to regulate and in force the new laws.
The question is what type of exotic animals will be allowed and what type will not? For instance my family has 2 peacocks. exotic yes. dangerous no. but if legislation is passed will we be allowed to keep our peacocks?
So once again, we may all be punished by one thoughtless persons actions.
Katie took the words right out of my mouth.
ReplyDeleteEven though this is a terrible tragedy, it's tragedies like spur the most positive changes in the law. I'm excited that the conversation will at least be started in legislative bodies concerning the keeping of exotic animals.
With this in mind, I do have to disagree with Katie's last sentence. If animal activists and experts like Jack Hanna speak-up, it is my belief that a more strict idealized system of keeping exotic animals can be created.
I feel like I've heard a similar story before. Spending lots of time in Florida when I was younger, I remember hearing something along these lines. Animals broke out though they weren't released. Essentially the police did the exact same thing. They found all the animals and hunted them down.
ReplyDeleteI don't think there was anything else they could do except kill them. I understand that the loss of life always weighs on the mind(s) of whom ever has to make the choice. But in this case, and others like it, there is no better solution. Also having 50-60 exotic animals in Ohio, that's just crazy man.
I agree with everyone above in that the police could not do anything else in the situation. The clips of pictures of the multiple dead animals made me feel sad but also angry at the owner of these animals. I could see why some may have exotic animals in order to make money by having people visit to see these animals, but if the owner is just going to be cruel to them there really is no point. I think Ohio needs to make laws to limit the amount of animals kept by owners. Overall, I thought this clip was very interesting to watch because I had never seen or heard of something like this before.
ReplyDeleteAs stated by everybody I believe that the police had no other choice than to kill the animals in the situation. While viewing the images of the dead animals I became angry with the owner for his irresponsible actions. While I don't think that Ohio lawmakers should go overboard with restrictions of ownership of exotic animals, I do believe that more strict and clear cut laws should be made. For example, forbidding the ownership of jungle cats would probably be a good start. Overall the clip was interesting but rather depressing for a rainy day.
ReplyDeleteI actually heard a bit more about this. If the police would have tranquilized the animals at night time, the animals would not instantly go down. They would have ran off and hid somewhere and the police would not have been able to follow them. The animals would have ran and hid somewhere and if that somewhere had been under a porch of family's house, when the animal would have regained consciousness, many more problems would arise from there. There were still many more possibilities like a heavier dose of tranquilizers, darts with tracking devices, and or using a helicopter with night vision and body heat tracking.
ReplyDeleteThe images of the animals really killed me to watch. It was a horrible thing that happened to the animals. As everyone before me has stated, I feel anger towards the owner. There needs to be laws that are more strict dealing with what and how many animals can be owned by a single person.
I agree that the police in this situation did nothing wrong. They didn't have much of a choice than to shoot the animals.
ReplyDeleteI think the police did what was best at the time, but the fact that this man had already been in trouble before with the animals leaves me questioning the police. If the man had already done things wrong before why hadn't they cracked down on him them and really made him treat the animals with respect and take care of them. His actions caused all of these animals to die and luckily no one else was hurt. He should have been stopped earlier so it didn't get this far.
ReplyDeleteThis is just an awful tragedy. The only way it could have been prevented if they hadn't had the animals in the first place. The man himself was irresponsible and he should have been stopped before he let them out and this whole thing could have been prevented. There should be more regulations on owning wild animals that should prevent private citizens from owning these types of animals.
ReplyDeleteThis man has been cited for animal abuse and neglect, and he is still allowed to own exotic animals? That might be the problem there.
ReplyDeleteIt's sad hearing about this.I think the police has excuse for shooting the animals, because he will have to face is that many unknown and dangerous crisis if he does not take action.
ReplyDeleteI also agree that shooting the loose animals was a necessary action; tranquilizing these animals is not only dangerous to do in the middle of the night, but the residents and police in this town were probably fairly unfamiliar with tranquilizing animals, too. Tranquilizing these animals probably would have just caused more chaos.
ReplyDeleteAlthough, it is unfortunate that all of these animals had to die, and I do feel that we will see legislation prohibiting or limiting the ownership of exotic animals soon. This is sad, because I've heard of a few businesses throughout the US that have exotic animals, not only as a tourist attraction, but as a way to educate the public about said animals. With tragedies like the Zanesville animal escape, who know how long these exotic animal businesses will last.
I agree with what everyone is saying and that shooting these animals was really sad and probably very hard but it had to be done. Like Daniel said the tranquilizers were freaking out the animals and causing them to hide which could have cause even more problems. I also think that the positive outcome of things like this is that preventative laws are created to keep these things from happening again. I don't know why this guy thought it was important to own 50 exotic animals but people just do stupid things and there really is no good reason for it.
ReplyDeleteI think that this news brings a moral dilemma. While we always claim to care about animals, in emergencies, we still treat human being's lives more important.
ReplyDeleteWhen I see some of the pictures I would say that it was bad but it could have been worse. I think that they could have saved some of the animals but to tranquilize all of them I would say would be too unrealistic. That would take too much time and in the time it happens someone could be attacked. I think a more control of who is allowed to own a wild life permit and more surveillance of how people get these animals could be done to stop this from happening in the future.
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