Explore Critical Thinking with Science and Technology
Elephants in the Room: It’s a zoo in here!
Non-fiction
Elephants are captured for use in zoos and for entertainment, hunted for their body parts, and poached for money and survival.
Elephant herd and behaviour
Elephants are intelligent herbivores and the largest mammals traversing land. They live in complex societies, form close family ties, and socialize within and beyond their herds.
As ‘Ecosystem Engineers’, elephants are considered keystone species, help maintain biodiversity and shape their natural habitats.
They are the only remaining members of the Proboscidea order of mammals, which also included the extinct wooly mammoth, a close pre-historic relative of elephants.
Native to Africa and Asia, three species of elephants still exist.
- African savannah elephants (Loxodonta africana), now endangered, are the largest, weighing ~ 6000 kgs, and roam through the savannahs in sub-Saharan Africa.
- African forest elephants (L. cyclotis) are critically endangered, the smallest and most elusive of the three. Their habitat is equatorial forests largely in the Congo River Basin in western central Africa.
- Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) are endangered and inhabit areas like shrubland, forests and grassland in countries like Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar, India and Sri Lanka. There are three subspecies: Indian, Sri Lankan, and Sumatran. The Bornean pygmy elephant is the smallest of them all by size, standing at less than 5 feet (1.5 meters) height and weighing up to 1,800 kilograms.
All elephants are wild animals, never domesticated although used by humans for thousands of years. They exude personalities. They form personal and family bonds that can last a lifetime, and over long distances — much like great friendships.
Elephant herds are led by matriarchs, especially in Africa. An authoritative figure, she is the largest, oldest or most experienced cow. Herd survival depends on her strengths and weaknesses. Some are born leaders and their herds thrive. Others struggle to keep everyone together.
Perhaps the strongest bond exists between an elephant mother and her calves. Juveniles share a strong bond with all their caregivers. Calves are not weaned till they turn three and may be traumatized when separated from their mother. Cows stay with the herd for life or form their own. Adult bulls drift away seeking suitable mates, living like bachelors. Related herds remain bonded.
Aunts babysit calves. Grandmothers guide the family. This social structure enables well-being and herd survival.
Why does the caged elephant sing?
Do you know about Happy the elephant? She is a self-aware elephant who passed the mirror test, challenging the limits of animal rights law and nonhuman personhood in the United States.
Happy is an Asian elephant, and long time Bronx Zoo resident. She may be next in line for legal personhood — leading the way for more animals, thanks to Nonhuman Rights Project.
Zoos, shortened from London Zoological Society, have been considered institutions of scientific research, public education and entertainment since the 19th century.
The standards of protection for a zoo elephant varies between countries. Although zoos are found everywhere, they are regulated by national or state-level laws that are based on considerations like animal welfare and conservation.
A lifetime of misery and trauma awaits elephants used for work and entertainment in zoos, circuses and tourism. Captured elephants are deprived of basic features for well-being and longevity — appropriate nutrition, space to move and socialize with other elephants.
This is true for all elephants that do tricks, go for rides and treks, paint, get a tourist bath — they have and probably still suffer at the hands of humans.
Some zoos use positive reinforcement and protected contact. A physical barrier separates the elephant from trainers and tourists to obviate brutal methods of control, and avoid damage/loss of life and property.
Prevented from accessing large forests, her natural habitat, the captured and fenced elephant lives in alienation with compromised well-being.
Zoos aren’t a natural sanctuary for an elephant. In the absence of any pressing scientific need or essential use, zoos cannot even be considered relevant anymore. Much like a member of human society, an individual elephant has a better life when valued as a living being — as a person.
Elephants depend on their herds for survival and socialization. Herds are comprised of individuals, each one playing an important role. By recognizing the value of individual animals, many more generations get to experience the wonder of wild beings in their natural habitats.
We are rapidly losing wildlife and natural habitats. Naturally, the rights of individual captured elephants become paramount.
Can they suffer?
What do elephants and kitchenware have in common?
Both are things according to law, including common law, as are all nonhuman beings.
Personhood has a strange history and hasn’t always been a privilege for all humans. Slaves were things and often treated worse. Women had to fight for legal personhood. Today, nonhuman personhood is an important issue for many.
Do animals deserve the same status as humans? Is an elephant a person?
Various legal systems already recognize nonhuman rights. For instance, animals have a Constitutional right to life and dignity in India. Even a corporation is a legal person with a limited set of rights in most countries.
The recognition of animal rights is derived from Jeremy Bentham’s (1748–1832) moral philosophy ‘utilitarianism’, a foundational theory of law in common law countries including India. Bentham propounded that:
- Nature has placed mankind under two sovereign masters — pain and pleasure.
- We are subject to the “empire” or state which determines what we ought to and shall do.
- We are governed by standards of right and wrong, and cause and effect.
- The object of reason and law is to “rear the fabric of felicity” i.e. happiness and pleasure.
He advocated for the recognition of animals as sentient beings who may one day “acquire those rights which never could have been withholden from them but by the hand of tyranny.”
In contrast, René Descartes (1596–1650) had argued that all non-human beings were merely automata, without self-awareness and incapable of feeling.
In the true spirit of Bentham’s utilitarianism, the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India directed as follows:
“Parliament, it is expected, would elevate rights of animals to that of constitutional rights, as done by many of the countries around the world, so as to protect their dignity and honour.”
(See Animal Welfare Board Of India vs A. Nagaraja, 2014).
While captive elephants across the world, such as in the US, fight for recognition of personhood, Indian elephants await Parliament to proceed with long-due rights owed to India’s iconic wildlife.
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