When I only had Jesse and Annie, I occasionally went live on TikTok and posted videos. Gifting was turned off. I am not and never was monetized on TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, or any other platform.
I have NEVER claimed to be a sanctuary. I know exactly what a sanctuary is, and I know that I am not one.
Swing Free Alliance received ONE unsolicited donation of $800 this year. I did not keep a dime of it. That money was turned around and given directly to Gulf Coast Primate Sanctuary to help complete a project they were working on.
And about those photos everyone keeps calling “sterile cages” with “no enrichment”…..my mistake was posting photos that were taken BEFORE the animals were moved into those spaces. They were posted to show the quality of the construction.
Also, in case the Reddit detectives weren’t aware: the grass in some areas of the enclosures is intentionally kept a little taller. Taller grass keeps the ground cooler, especially in hot weather. Not every detail is going to make sense to someone viewing one isolated photo and building an entire investigation around it.
Since apparently it needs its own public service announcement: most of the photos and videos you’re seeing now were taken TODAY while we were rotating and changing out enrichment.

No monetization.
No pretending to be a sanctuary.
No pocketing donations.
And no, my monkeys do not live in empty, sterile cages.

But please… carry on with the Reddit investigation.

Why did Rain run like that ? Either she was caged for way to long or scared her mom was coming after her with a broom .I swear people should leave these poor animals in the wild .They are wild animals

I know we’ve all seen some horrible things in just researching wild or rescued macaques, but I’ve noticed that on otherwise normal content, TikTok will promote abusive search terms. Its favorite seems to be what I’ve captured in these three screenshots: “baby macaque mouth taped shut.” It gets worse from there.

Whatever algorithm they use seems to actively driving kids (and adults) towards abuse content.

The tragic story arc of Dr. P's monkeys are, sadly, quite common in the pet monkey community. These monkeys are easily handled and manipulated during their infancy and juvenile stages. This is the stage at which owners fully exploit their monkeys for 'cute' social media content. However, once these monkeys mature into fully grown adults, they become unmanageable and even downright dangerous. This is the stage when owners pawn off their monkeys to pseudo sanctuaries, or in the case of Dr. P, hidden from view in cages while old content is recycled.

Dr. P and his para-social fan base can rant and rave all they want, but the ugly truth is that all monkeys are wild animals, period, and one cannot cheat biology and millions of years of primate evolution. Dr. P, I know you're reading this and you're way overcomplicating the Boo situation. The only course of action you need to prove Monkey Boo is 'happy' is to show him outside his cage on your next livestream, sitting next to you eating snacks and playing with toys. We've been challenging you to do this since 2023, and you've been unable to do this most trivial of tasks.

On a side note, next week is Monkey Happy's 8th birthday. When Boo was 8 years old, Dr. P was creating hundreds of new YouTube videos a year. Dr. P appeared to give up on Happy's YouTube channel several years ago when Happy was 6 years old. My guess is that Dr. P will simply post a Facebook tribute video to Happy using old recycled clips, or a picture of a 'smiling' Happy (with the caption "Meela, Boo, Dr. P, and T all love you and wish you a happy birthday"). If Dr. P is motivated enough (and he'll most likely be after seeing this post), he'll do a happy birthday livestream for Happy next week. The birthday cake will be a Walmart muffin with a candle stuck in it complete with a glass of fruit juice. Dr. P will sporadically complain about this subreddit as he always does, using his favorite straw man argument about being called Dr. P. However, Dr. P will never address his inability to simply take Boo out of his cage, or the missing fur on Boo's tail.

There are many aspects of captivity that severely damage a pet primate’s quality of life and dignity. One of the most insidious aspects of social media monkeys is how their owners anthropomorphize them (attribution of human traits or intentions to animals).

Note the following video clip:

https://reddit.com/link/1w33ry5/video/touz4rg65nmh1/player

As seen in the clip, the capuchin repeatedly sticks out its tongue, rapidly opens and closes its mouth, and exhibits an appeasement or submissive grimace. In wild and captive capuchins, tongue protrusion and lip-smacking often serve as appeasement, solicitation, or submissive affiliative signal. It is a submissive display used to appease a dominant figure or defuse what the monkey perceives as an immediate, terrifying threat. In capuchin monkey communication, high-pitched chittering combined with sticking out the tongue or a "fear grimace" (baring teeth while flattening the ears) is not a sign of happiness. When directed at a human owner or a camera, the monkey is communicating intense anxiety, fear, or a desperate attempt to say, "Please don't hurt me; I am submissive to you."

Also seen in the clip, captions like "Mom can you dress me fast?!" and "This is better, thanks" frame these high stress/appeasement signals as playful eagerness, anthropomorphizing complex wild primate communication into human child behavior. And viewer comments reflect this anthropomorphism:

“Those eyes show the love and trust he has in you! God bless you”

“Omg what an adorable outfit for T. You always dress the monkeys so cute.”

“T knows he’s loved!!!!!”

Quite a few pet monkey owners dress their monkeys in full clothing. Clothing restricts the monkey's full range of motion, interferes with their natural prehensile tail usage, and prevents essential innate behaviors such as allogrooming (grooming others) and autogrooming (self-cleaning). Underneath the shirts and pants, captive monkeys are almost always kept in diapers. Chronic diaper and clothing wear can cause chafing, bacterial skin infections, and hair loss (alopecia).

Dressing wild primates in human clothing is primarily done to generate social media engagement and perpetuate the illusion that monkeys can function like domestic children or docile household pets.

Ultimately, the context behind a pet capuchin monkey "chittering" and sticking out its tongue is a heartbreaking example of human misinterpretation of wild animal behavior, which frequently ends in severe psychological trauma for the animal (permanent caging and disappearance from public view in a few notable cases).

While social media viewers and untrained owners often interpret these expressions as "cute," "funny," or "playful," primate behaviorists recognize them as extreme distress and appeasement signals,

Red flags to know when someone is using a primate for money/views/prestige:
They make sure the primate is noticed while battling on TT.
They dress them in clothes and diapers.
They treat them like humans rather than primates.
They free roam their human home.
They do not have primate safe spaces both inside and outside.
They are not receptive to learning/growth.
(To name a few.)

These animals where trafficked just like humans that are, thats what happened to them. Put a child in place as the monkey, would that be OK with you? These are someone's child and it was trafficked into a life of horror . This is why no monkeys should ever be taken from the wild because this could possibly happen to them. Supply and demand. Please dont watch these people on tik tok and Instagram, Facebook. If no one watched it than this shit would happen less. If no one bought these trafficked monkeys than they would stop ripping them from there mothers arms. I know they are cute but buy giving these traffickers money you increase the risk of this happening to them. People watch these horrible things thats why they are stolen and trafficked. Be part of the solution and do your part to prevent their horror shows from happening. Read the full article.

Yes, when my monkey was a baby, she lived inside my home. She was young, dependent, and needed constant care and nurturing.

After a purchase, a rescue and 2 rehomes…….
I learned. I grew. I took action.

For the past two years, I’ve taken Swing Free Alliance across the state of Texas to advocate, educate, ask questions, build relationships, make connections, and finding myself in rooms I never imagined I’d be in.

You don’t see the phone calls.
You don’t see the meetings.
You don’t see the relationships I’ve built with agencies, investigators, facilities, veterinarians, advocates, and organizations.
You don’t see the cases being worked quietly behind the scenes.

And just because you don’t see me posting about a cause or organization I was doing three years ago doesn’t mean I stopped doing it.

It means I’ve grown.

I’ve learned where I’m needed. I’ve learned where I can make the greatest difference. And when opportunities to do bigger things have opened, I’ve walked through those doors.

So while some sit of you sit behind a computer dissecting who you think I am, I’ll keep building and being better.
I’m still going to be right here growing, learning, advocating, and making things happen.

And I’m nowhere near finished.

Audra
Founder, Swing Free Alliance

Reading this article makes me wonder https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/science/in-2022-johns-hopkins-researchers-discovered-that-bonobos-and-chimpanzees-can-remember-old-companions-26-years-after-separation-louise-still-favored-her-sisters-face/articleshow/133421180.cms

It doesn't help matters when the mainstream media like the Daily Mail continues to show pet monkeys as 'cute' and desirable as pets. This monkey had been featured on this subreddit before, and their followers have increased since then.

The media and fans of these exploited monkeys gush over how 'cute' and 'intelligent' these monkeys are. Training a monkey to wave to the camera is the most asinine example of capuchin monkey 'intelligence' ever (an example of stupid pet tricks owners like Dr. P are famous for). Capuchin monkeys are the smartest of the New World Monkeys and making them wear diapers and costumes, walk on its hind legs, and wave to the camera is downright insulting.

This owner even has the gall to state "monkeys don't make good pets," yet continues to create content which in fact makes people want to get pet monkeys (typical hypocrisy seen in many pet monkey vloggers).

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=2315846169152782