Historical Human Abuse of Elephants

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Historical Human Abuse of Elephants

By Mike Jaynes

Humanity has a long history of using elephants for various purposes from war to entertainment. Teaching humanities, students are often shocked about the usage of war elephants in Persia, Rome, and other places. The most famous being Hannibal's crossing of the Alps with them during the second Punic War between Rome and his Carthage in 218 BC. Students are shocked to learn that the Romans discovered they could cover pigs' backs with tar, set them on fire, and send them squealing toward the elephants. This would frighten the elephants, and in their rage their massive bulk and power would be useless and often work to Roman advantage as they crushed Carthaginian troops in their terror. The nervous laughter dies down when students then learn the Romans also discovered they could take swords and axes and hack away at the war elephants' feet and tendons and bring them down in sheer agony, terror, and pain.

After we discuss this in context as a precursor to studying Virgil's Aeneid, I always subtly turn toward a brief conversation about humanity's usage of animals for its various goals. Students are often horrified by the artist rendering of war elephants being brought down during ancient wars. However, they often fail to make the connection between that particular usage and the contemporary ivory trade and the use of performing elephants in circuses, zoos, magic shows, children's ride events and the like.

I have long pondered what it is that allows humans to acknowledge the negativity of forcing elephants to fight wars for them but they still patronize the circus. This definite disconnect between our professed beliefs and our actions is my current focus regarding elephants. This brief article will not answer it, but perhaps it will open some angles for further human examination.

Historically, elephants have played a large role in various human cultures, religions, and economies (see Bagheera). Some cultures have used the elephant from everything from trinkets to symbols of royalty to even being held up as gods. The largest land mammal has lumbered across this Earth for millions of years and it seems humans have been fascinated with it from their first introduction. Once roaming the entire African continent, the now endangered African elephant has been reduced to a mere fraction of its past numbers. The smaller eared Asian elephant once freely ranged from Northern China to Syria and the Indonesian Islands.

Presently, these once magnificent populations are loosely scattered in Sub Saharan areas and small areas in Southeast Asia, India, and Sri Lanka. In fact, elephants face many threats in the wild, but humans are by far their chief concern. We hunt them for their ivory and even though the live trade of elephants has been banned in many places, they are still sold to circuses and zoos and given as diplomatic gifts to other countries who are not equipped to care for them. As for African elephants, in 1930 there were up to an estimated 10 million wild individuals. About 600,000 remain; less than one percent of their one time population. As for the rarer Asian elephant, in 1900 there were around 200,000 and now there are only around 40,000 left. Many of them are worked mercilessly in illegal logging operations or used as street elephants to assist their impoverished mahouts in begging. If we don't decide to drastically change our view toward elephants, they will soon be gone. They will be lost to us forever and perhaps a skeleton or two will remain ala Wooly Mammoth in museums at which our grandchildren can gape and express dismay that such a huge peaceful creature ever lumbered over the Earth.

So, back to the classroom. I find an apathy and a disconnect in my students when we discuss circuses. War elephant use is horrendous, most of them agree. However, when Ringling comes to my university each year (amid a few strands of protestors) they love to go and watch the spangled elephants entertain them. They love elephants and are fascinated with them, and that is an interesting problem. Humans' long held fascination with elephants obviously extends to each passing generation. Therefore, it is this same sense of fondness that little children everywhere express for the elephant that makes people want to go to zoos, circuses, fairs, and magic shows to see them. We want to be around the elephant; we are fascinated. The public is also ignorant of the plight of the circus elephant. Plenty of sites and media outlets outline these abuses they silently endure. Sites such as Circuses.com, Born Free and The Elephant Sanctuary have complete information on these horrors elephants endure. Circuses do not foster appreciation of elephants because it is not educational to see elephants reduced to mere caricatures of the creatures they were intended to be. Watching a depressed and terrified animal perform demeaning tricks for human profit and entertainment is not a valid educational experience, nor does it spread awareness and foster interest.

The purpose of this article is to comment on the ethical disconnect most Americans seem to have between what they believe is right for an elephant and their practice of attending animal circuses. The purpose here is not to outline the various abuses heaped on elephants. Please see the above websites or Elephanatic for more info. Animal rights thinkers including Gary Francione have pointed out that most people believe in animals' rights to live free of pain and in the manner in which they have evolved. Nevertheless, there is a distinct divide between what we say and what we do. Elephants are vast creatures who live up to 60-70 years in the wild (they die much younger in captivity). They raise their families in social, loving, interacting family herds. They walk up to 50 miles a day some days apparently for the fun of it and require vast wide open spaces in which to fully live. What right do we have to gun down whole families from helicopters, who are running, bleeding, and dying in great confusion and pain, collect the terrified and traumatized infants, and put them in circuses? I hate, almost more than anything, to see a trained animal performing.

After they are trained utilizing negative reinforcement (fear and pain), they are often chained in small enclosures up to twenty hours a day with little chance of egress. Captive circus elephants soon begin swaying back and forth in confusion and boredom; this behavior is never observed in the wild. They often live alone as the solitary elephant in smaller circus outfits.

The only elephant still used in any circus in the UK, Anne. At 54 years of age she lives without any other elephants.

Then, as any animal would, after years and sometimes decades of this reduced and abusive life, they rampage and they kill humans, children, and other circus goers. They are shot down and die while in full grips of terror and confusion. They have gone from the forests in Asia or the huge areas of Africa where they live with their families (females, anyway. Male elephants often live their adult lives mostly alone) under the brilliant stars of the African or Asian sky. They have gone from that intended existence to one of cramped metal cages and giving human children rides. Often the only time a circus elephant gets to walk around is when he/she is performing during the show. And for what do these great individuals suffer such an inhumane and monotonous existence? Human greed. More specifically, mediocre profits at best. These elephants perform their unnatural tricks under threat of pain or penalty to half empty circuses across this country. They are intelligent (number three on the list behind primates and cetaceans), curious, long lived, beautiful, and they suffer silently in these cages and shows and rings of horror and neglect until they die well short of their life expectancy in the wild.

All animals forced to perform deserve support and help, but it seems these huge elephants suffer more. To have natural habitat reduced from hundreds of miles to a tiny fraction of that and to live a live devoid of any hope of change is not something these great creatures deserve. In captivity, elephants suffer reproductive issues begging a question if they are somehow keyed in to their unnatural lifestyle. The infant mortality rate of captive elephants is much higher than the wild. A huge increase in the amount of stillbirths is what captive elephant breeding programs (such as Ringling's and Zoos') produce. Thus, many captive elephants are in poor health, obese, and suffer ailments never acquired in the wild. These problems, according to elephantvoices.com, come from a lack of exercise and a lack of habitat. So why do we make them suffer? They suffer so apathetic half empty circus audiences can be entertained, perch their children atop a suffering ride elephant, look at the spangles, buy cotton candy, and tell their elephant activist humanities professor how much they love elephants. I love elephants almost more than anything on this planet, and I know the following fact is true: If we love elephants, we must be prepared to never see them again. They should be in the wild or in private elephant sanctuaries. Perhaps nonconsumptive ecotourism such as photographic safaris could let some of us lucky enough to be able to travel to Africa or Asia to see them. But for the rest of us, the live cameras in elephant sanctuaries such as The Elephant Sanctuary in Hohenwald, Tennessee, and documentaries will have to do. Perhaps some very few animal habitats may be suitable for elephants as well. Many feel zoos and circuses foster appreciation for elephants therefore raising elephant awareness resulting in better situations for the creatures. The truth is that seeing an elephant living an unacceptable life does not foster appreciation. It fosters oppression and propagates the current abusive reality of most elephants in America. It is not acceptable to allow animals suffer to garner appreciation, and children should never be allowed to ride atop them. This means parents will have to do the right thing and say no if they do happen to come upon an elephant ride at a fair or other locale.

The hard truth is this: if we love them, we have to leave them alone and this policy of ethics might very well mean we will never be able to again see a live elephant again in person. It is their right to live free from our corruption. It is their right to live as they have lived for millions of years. And it is definitely their right to survive and to flourish and to not fall into extinction for the sake of human entertainment or cultural tradition.

Rest assured it is not only the west that mistreats elephants.

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In India, for one of many possible examples, many temple elephants are currently undergoing relentless agony. Indian religious culture reveres the elephant as being sacred. Believed to be manifestations of Ganesh, the elephant-headed god of luck and prosperity, many Indian citizens believe the elephants are in fact gods. A terrible disconnect is also in play in India.

Most of the Indian public only sees these temple elephants during state festivals when they are drugged to listlessness and painted with the decorations of the gods. The public assumes these elephants have pampered, amazing lives when in fact they fare no better than the American captive circus elephant, and sometimes worse. Mahouts (elephant handlers who are often the only companion of the highly social elephant in their oft-inadequate care) are often among the lowest class of citizens and many of them simply cannot afford the expensive upkeep of elephants. As a result, many Indian temple elephants (and privately owned elephants) are malnourished and suffer ailments such as blindness from vitamin deficiencies. Many Indian temple elephants spend from 16 to 20 hours a day chained to a pole or are forced to walk down burning hot tar streets with little attention paid to their cares and biological needs.

Similar to elephants in Thailand, some Indian elephants are employed by the illegal logging trade. Thailand outlawed logging in 1989 and India followed suit in 1996; both countries feared their natural forests were being too quickly dispersed. As a result, illegal logging still brings heavy profits in both countries. Despite the availability of pulleys, chains, and other mechanical devices, elephants are forced to suffer the horrendous work of moving felled trees for Indian and Thai loggers. In Thailand, elephants are often forced to work at dark in hopes of evading authorities and as a result elephants often fall down steep embankments to their death or crippling disability.

The historical abuse of the elephant still exists everywhere they naturally occurs as well as everywhere they are used in circuses or kept in captivity. To be aware of these sentient individuals' suffering is the first step in finding ways to help the rapidly dwindling elephant population of the globe. I will continue my research into Thai and Indian Asian elephants and bring more articles such as these to readers in the future. For a thorough and well reasoned overview of the plight of the Indian temple elephant, see Gods in Chains by Rhea Ghosh, available from Foundation Books.

I leave the reader with a final horrible irony. Consider the ivory trade. Ivory is banned; however, entities such as EBAY continue to trade in "pre-ban" ivory. And, as of late, most items on EBAY are listed as "bone" and not ivory. Never buy any bone Asian or African artifact that might possibly be ivory. So now the promised irony. Tusks developed for defense and protection to fight off other male elephants and animals. Now elephants are disappearing because they are being killed for their tusks. More and more elephants are being born in the wild tusk-less. Historically, a small percentage of elephants are always born without tusks, and of course female Asian elephants never have tusks. However, as of late, the number of tusk-less African elephants has exploded exponentially. Matthew Scully in his book, Dominion: The Suffering of Animals, The Power of Man, and the Call to Mercy, does a thorough job of examining this biological facet of evolution.

The tusks that evolved as means or protection for elephants is now evolving out of existence for the very same reason: survival. It is getting rare for male elephants to live to their 65 year life expectancy due to poaching and ivory hunting in the wild. Now the tusks are disappearing because it is often only the tusk-less ones who live to procreate. So, I urge you to consider this disturbing fact: we are living in a world we have created where the very evolution of the elephant itself is changing and morphing due to human intrusion. Specifically, evolution itself is changing to combat our greed. Our greed.

As a teacher of humanities, it is this world we have created that makes me ashamed of what we are, or at least of what we've become. We simply cannot allow the elephant to continue to be used in circuses or any other "entertainment" capacity. We must not allow the elephant to disappear. From Hannibal's War Elephants to Indian temple elephants to Thai street elephants to the American circus elephant, too much has been taken from the elephant by humanity. The culling of herds for ivory must be stopped. It's up to us. The system won't change itself. Ringling Brothers will never end the use of animals in its financially failing circuses until it enters bankruptcy, and ignorant greedy poachers will not cease until demand is destroyed with activism, compassion, and education. With all the other facets of animal abuse getting so much airplay in the Animal Rights Community, the largest animal of them all is all but slipping through the cracks and not being noticed. Elephants are completely amazing and perfect creatures worthy of our respect and help.

Our world, if it is to survive, has to change and change begins with the individual. Respect all animals be they human or not, eat as much of a plant based diet as possible, expand your personal ideals of compassion to all living creatures, and please save the elephants.

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Thanks to Rhea Ghosh, the Visakha SPCA India, Elephantvoices.com, Gary Francione, The Elephant Sanctuary, Bagheera, and BornFree, and everyone everywhere who cares about elephants.

Mike Jaynes teaches English and Women's Studies at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. He is an animal ethics and animal advocacy writer and speaker focusing most closely on the topics of elephants in captivity and ocean life. His current book project examines the stories of performing elephants who have died in American captive environments and who have largely been forgotten.

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