By now, it’s likely that the entire world has seen the tiny little monkey clutching tightly onto a stuffed orangutan toy. Punch, a baby monkey at the Ichikawa City Zoo, has captured the hearts of many due to his adorable stature, alongside his bittersweet journey finding monkey friends. Yet, this fascination over Punch hides the sad reality of captivity, and of thousands of animals being raised in areas of confinement, where they’re deprived of their natural state of freedom, their complex habitat left disrupted from their removal.
Recently, the director of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, Jason Baker, said in a statement that “What some are calling ‘cute’ is actually a glimpse into the trauma of a young, highly social primate coping with isolation and loss. Until facilities stop treating sentient beings as attractions, animals like Punch will continue to suffer in captivity.”
In Japan, thousands of fans are queuing for hours just to see Punch. Yet, as Baker points out, soon, the public fascination over Punch will end. Still, he will remain trapped in the zoo for the rest of his life. Punch won’t get a taste of the world his ancestors used to roam freely, and instead his fame may only perpetuate a cycle of animal captivity, especially for young.
Going to the zoo is one of the first, and maybe only, exposures many people get to exotic, fascinating species. While it’s an enjoyable experience on the spectator’s end, only the viewer benefits from this transaction, while the animals kept in zoos suffer in their perpetual captivity. According to In Defense of Animals (IDA), zoos utilize brutal, invasive methods to breed species. Oftentimes, animals kept in zoos face solitary confinement for extended periods of time, and thus refuse to mate in these settings of isolation. Thus, zoos often “sexually violate the bodies of animals and artificially impregnate” them. These are the methods which bring forth the babies we get to fawn over when we go to the zoos.
Within zoo captivity, many animals develop zoochosis, which manifests in obsessive, repetitive actions that include self-harming behaviors. These include pacing, bar-biting, hair-pulling, vomiting, eating disorders, and anorexia (IDA). From their movements and eating times to their behaviors and decision making, animals aren’t able to have autonomy over their livelihoods, denying them the opportunity to experience real life. Many animals are dying more quickly in zoos than in the wild. Even when they do reach an old age, zoos often either kill them or sell them to medical laboratories or inadequate zoo facilities because they feel the animals aren’t worth the expense.
Punch’s online fame has brought viewers together through a shared love for the cute little monkey. However, it’s important to remember that many zoos are businesses that prioritize profits over the care of their animals. It’s not acceptable that thousands of animals are taken from their homes, separated from their kin, and kept locked in small cages just for our entertainment. Punch deserves to grow up in his natural habitat, where perhaps he wouldn’t need to drag his orangutan toy around anymore.