“And now, the moment you've all been waiting for..." Drum rolls sound from the band. One by one, a herd of elephants stroll out onto the stage. In a single file line, they stand up on their hind legs while their headdresses cast an elegant glow. The crowd shrieks of excitement as they know there are many more tricks to come.
This is what little I remember from the first time I went to The Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. I was only nine years old, and I never imagined being able to see my favorite animals in real life. Nor did I ever want to.
Ever since I was a young girl, using animals for entertainment purposes has left me feeling uneasy. As I have been getting older, I continue to question the unsettling reputation of circuses being subject to animal cruelty, despite what changes are being made.
Just because Feld Entertainment released the 12 Ringling elephants to their Center for Elephant Conservation, I do not believe that this has ended the ongoing dispute between whether or not circus animals are treated ethically. I do not believe that this should cast a shadow on more than 200 years worth of elephant abuse.
Elephants were not always taught tricks or cast as the main attraction of the American circus. In the 1800's, elephants were only displayed in exhibits.
It wasn't until P.T. Barnum bought Jumbo the African elephant from the London Zoological Gardens that circuses became well-known for their elephants. It wasn’t until he bought Jumbo that the elephants began to be mistreated.
While Jumbo was at the Gardens, he was tormented by his cramped enclosure. He most likely suffered from a degree of claustrophobia, and the rats constantly gnawing at his hooves only made it worse. Eventually, he entered musth — the equivalent to a flood of testosterone.
As a result, he became mildly dangerous. When he came to the United States, the only way to control him was with sledgehammers, spears, and hooks. Although elephant hide is two inches thick, these tools easily penetrate their sensitive skin — so sensitive that they can feel flies land on them.
Since Jumbo’s time, the circus and its elephants continued to grow in size. There was a greater need for more effective and less time-consuming techniques to guide and teach the elephants. The use of bullhooks became far more prominent and a normal occurrence.
In December of 1984, Glenn Ewell and James Stechcon quit working mid-tour because they witnessed regular elephant abuse and more than 12 extended beatings during three months alone. After one performance, Stechcon said:
"We left the show, brought the animals back to their area, and... We took the headpieces off, and as I was hanging them up, I heard the most horrible noise—just whack, whack, whack. I mean, really hard. It’s hard to describe the noise, like a baseball bat or something striking. Something not...not soft, and not hard. I turned around to look, and this guy was hitting her so fast and so hard [with the ankus]... Sometimes he would take both hands and just really knock her, and he was just doing that. And I was like, 'I couldn’t believe it.'"
With such treatment from the elephant’s trainer, it created continual stress and emotional trauma. This led to the elephant's inevitable death.
Ringling elephants not only suffered from bullhooks but also were forcibly removed from their mothers. This occurred when they were barely a year old.
Elephants enter puberty around the age of ten. One elephant, named Shirley, was impregnated before her seventh birthday and gave birth at the age of eight. During labor, she was chained by three legs and surrounded by handlers who poked her with bullhooks.
While Riccardo, her newborn, was still covered in blood, he was immediately taken away. His training began when he was three months old and still being bottle-fed. At six months old, he developed severe knee problems from having his trunk and feet tied by ropes in efforts to pull him onto 19-inch-high tubs.
He was taking painkillers for all four of his legs, yet they never stopped his training — not even when he was falling off of the tubs.
Two months later, Riccardo was euthanized after he broke two of his legs.
Philip K. Ensley, a retired veterinarian who worked at the San Diego Zoo for 29 years, stated that nearly 100 percent of Ringling elephants have had serious foot problems or musculoskeletal disorders. All their feet were misshapen, ulcerated and infected. An average of 12 in 16 young elephants suffered from various foot or limb maladies, such as stiffness, peg-legs, chronic left stifles, and sloughing toenails.
Yet, the conditions in their boxcars granted even worse conditions. In each boxcar, there were up to five elephants. The average elephant produces approximately 15 gallons of urine and 200-plus pounds of solid waste in a 24-hour period. Usually, the train conductor did not make any stops along the way. If he or she did, the circus attendants only refilled their food and water. They did not remove waste until they reached their destination.
Ringling elephants spent most of their long lives either wrapped in chains or caged on trains. They were under the constant threat of the bullhook. They were lame from balancing their 8,000-pound bodies on tiny tubs and from being confined in cramped spaces for days at a time. They were afflicted with tuberculosis and herpes, potentially deadly diseases that are rare in the wild — their natural environments.
If this is the case, then why do people still attend circuses? It's because circuses promote the ideology that animals perform exciting tricks out of their own will — their own enjoyment. A successful circus will make the most artificial and coerced performances appear natural.
Most of the time, these acts are sought to be educational. But, the only thing these performances are teaching is acts of injustice. They are pushing the concept of having animals as living toys and entertainers.
“There is a sea of change going on in our culture about animals, and we are coming to recognize the profound depth of animal emotion, thinking, and suffering,” said Barbara King, an anthropology professor at William & Mary and author of How Animals Grieve.
No one wants to see an animal be abused, yet this mistreatment is legal and overlooked by legislators. We need to work as an organized force — we need to have animal cruelty laws that reflect our values as a society.
