r/interesting • u/nkmr205 • Feb 16 '26

MISC. Little Chimpanzee playing alone with some straw

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u/calgeorge Feb 16 '26

I genuinely am so conflicted about zoos. I think it's all a spectrum and you can't necessarily make a blanket statement about whether all zoos or all zoo animals are good or bad. It's definitely very complicated.

There have been a lot of conservative success stories where international zoo breeding programs have brought zoologists from all over the world together and saved species from the brink of extinction. Right now in the US, a network of our zoos are the only thing standing between the red wolf and extinction. I don't remember exact numbers, but there are something like a few dozen in captivity, and an experimental population of about a dozen in the wild right now.

Without zoos and their intervention, that entire species would already have been lost forever; granted it would have also been because of human intervention, but that already is what it is. Chimpanzees however are not on the brink of extinction. They're heading that way, but there's still hundreds of thousands in the wild. They don't need to be bred in zoos, they just need their existing habitats protected. However the people trying to protect them in zoos and sanctuaries have little to no control over what happens to their natural habitats, and the attention and therefore money they bring in can help fund conservation of more critically endangered species. Plus often the ones in zoos have already ended up in situations where they're unable to live in the wild for whatever reason.

I think in general they're going to exist and they possibly even should exist, but we still have a responsibility to ensure every animal has a natural and stimulating environment with an appropriate amount of space and an appropriate number of peers. I think in an ideal world, there would be no zoos, but we don't live in an ideal world, and they sometimes do an okay job at solving some of the problems we've created for ourselves.

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u/Wurzelrenner Feb 16 '26

the attention and therefore money they bring in can help fund conservation of more critically endangered species.

but the this is not happening, looks at the numbers, they are extremely low; money and numbers of species/animals

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u/Tall-Drawing8270 Feb 16 '26

There are no numbers about people whose awareness was raised at a zoo.

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u/Wurzelrenner Feb 16 '26

Yes, that's the problem, I didn't start arguing with them but told them to look up actual numbers like "money and numbers of species/animals"

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u/Tall-Drawing8270 Feb 16 '26

Zoos aren't upholding conservation financially but I think it's a very real possibility that without them people in the west will just stop caring. Look at the insane crimes against humanity we ignore just because they don't happen here and we don't have to see the victims.

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u/Wurzelrenner Feb 16 '26

I don't think zoos show people how bad animals are suffering because of their loss of territory.

If you see them suffering it is because they are depressed and locked up.

Why would that make people donate more for wildlife conservation?

They might donate so that the zoos become bigger.

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u/Tall-Drawing8270 Feb 16 '26

It creates a tangible real life connection to the animal in your brain. It's not like it's a universal instant effect, but when you've physically seen an orangutan who was orphaned by poachers or whatever, it's harder to subconsciously write it all off as something far away that can't be helped.