There’s been a lot of controversy surrounding the decision to shoot and kill the gorilla Harambe when a child fell into his enclosure; I believe that in this case, the right decision was made. I took a senior seminar at my college—and I’m not claiming to be an expert—I'm just saying the major thing I learned was that decisions regarding animals should be met on a case by case basis. Sadly, not every gorilla encounter is going to turn out like the Brookfield zoo in 1996, where the gorilla Binti Jua protected and saved a three year old boy.
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There are many things people are arguing could have been different; the zoo could have used a tranquillizer, the gorilla could have not acted aggressively, the parents could have kept a closer eye on the kid—but these things didn’t happen. Harambe dragged the child around, and with a gorilla’s strength, he could have easily killed the kid. Even if the gorilla was playing and not being aggressive, when dragging the child around, he could have hit his head. There is an extended video of Harambe holding the boy’s hand. And honestly, so what? He also violently dragged the boy around like a rag doll. Being a 400 pound male gorilla, he probably could have snapped the boy in half. If Harambe had been another child who dragged the boy around and then held his hand, you wouldn’t be telling your kid to still play with him. If a teenage human did that, he would probably be arrested or faced with a restraining order.
A problem I hate is called anthropomorphism. It means that people project human feelings, emotions, and characteristics onto animals. People try to humanize the gorilla, imagining what could have been going on through his head. But the honest truth is that most people will never be face-to-face with a gorilla and will have no idea what’s going on in his head. We would like to think this would have a happy ending like Tarzan. We would like to think Harambe was just playing with the child. We would have liked for this unfortunate scenario to have a happy ending. But the sad fact of the matter is we don’t know what Harambe was thinking. The Cincinnati zoo made the decision to not take any risks and save a four year old boy.
I agree that the mother should have been keeping a closer eye on her son. I hate that Harambe had to die an untimely death and I hope he rests in peace. At least the boy will be alright. But this brings attention to bigger issues: Harambe was an endangered lowland gorilla and now his species is that much closer to extinction. Should we be keeping animals in captivity at all? A gorilla is not a cat or a dog, bred into domestication. Wild animals have the strength and the instincts to kill. People need to remember that wild animals are not cartoons; Gorillas are not Kerchak or Terk from Tarzan, orcas are not Free Willy, and elephants aren’t Dumbo.
