Animal Rights: The right to free movement. Social Sciences Paper

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Animal Rights: The right to free movement
Introduction
One aspect that each constitution around the world addresses is the free movement of people in their countries. Therefore, although they do not reason nor think like people, it is only fair that wild animal be treated with the same dignity as human beings. Animals confined in zoos lack sufficient environment to freely roam and play. Hence, imprisoning wild animals in zoos, aquariums and parks from birth to death for commercial purpose is an infringement of their right to free movement. Wild animals belong in the wild and not in zoos and sanctuaries, where their right to free movement is controlled and manipulated by human being. Consequently, this paper describes how human beings have sabotaged wild animals’ right to free movement. The paper also provides solutions that can be used to address the problem.
As a result of limited space in zoos, parks, and aquariums, tigers repeatedly run round the length of their confinements hoping to get a larger and more suitable environment. On the other hand, birds can barely spread their wings because they are forced to share small cages with other birds. In addition, bears are forced to stand on concrete floor. The few that are lucky leave marks of their paws in the dirt because they step there again and again. For Dolphins, rather than enjoying the whole ocean, they are forced to swim in endless circles in small tanks. Furthermore, due to boredom, many chimpanzees in cages decide to chew their own body parts such as fingers until they start bleeding. Hence, the lack of free movement among wild animals in confinements goes far beyond mere boredom (Hediger, 21).
It is evident that the limited movement that wild animals experience in zoos and parks threatens their physical and psychological state. This is particularly true for animals that are accustomed to larger territories such as fish, tigers, and elephants. While comparing zoos and parks to the wild, lions and tigers are approximated to have 18,000 times less space. On the other hand, Polar bears are estimated to have one million times less space (Van Tuyl, 68). Furthermore, between 1960 and 2005 in European zoos, African female elephants only lived for an average of 16.9 years compared to an average of 35.9 years when in their natural habitat (“Stress and lack of exercise are killing elephants, zoos warned”). Therefore, zoos and parks, which are human tools for limiting wild animals’ movement, are barbaric, if not outdated. It is important for human beings to realize that...