Animal activists cheer Ringling Bros circus closure after 146 years

[C C]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/anim...s-closure/

EXCERPT: When Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus announced late Saturday that it would permanently end all of its performances this May after a 146-year run, there seemed to be a collective gasp online, along with a smattering of nostalgia for “The Greatest Show on Earth.” The show has been, after all, nearly synonymous with “the circus” in the United States since the 1800s, when showman Phineas Taylor Barnum partnered with ringmaster James A. Bailey to produce an exhibition of animals and human oddities. Meanwhile, five brothers from the Ringling family in Wisconsin had set up their own variety act. After they merged, the circus spent decades touring the U.S. by train, transporting its iconic spectacle — along with hundreds of animals, performers and big-top tents — from city to city.

However, in recent years, the circus had been facing mounting obstacles that even its most acrobatic members could not overcome: declining ticket sales, high operating costs and an increasingly negative public sentiment about forcing captive wild animals to perform as entertainment. “There isn’t any one thing,” Kenneth Feld, chairman and CEO of Feld Entertainment, told the Associated Press. “This has been a very difficult decision for me and for the entire family.”

[...] Among animal activist groups, news of its closure Saturday was met with a resounding cheer. [...] The animal rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals also welcomed the announcement Saturday night, calling it “the end of the saddest show on earth” and demanding that other acts follow suit...

[Zinjanthropos]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/anim...s-closure/

EXCERPT: When Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus announced late Saturday that it would permanently end all of its performances this May after a 146-year run, there seemed to be a collective gasp online, along with a smattering of nostalgia for “The Greatest Show on Earth.” The show has been, after all, nearly synonymous with “the circus” in the United States since the 1800s, when showman Phineas Taylor Barnum partnered with ringmaster James A. Bailey to produce an exhibition of animals and human oddities. Meanwhile, five brothers from the Ringling family in Wisconsin had set up their own variety act. After they merged, the circus spent decades touring the U.S. by train, transporting its iconic spectacle — along with hundreds of animals, performers and big-top tents — from city to city.

However, in recent years, the circus had been facing mounting obstacles that even its most acrobatic members could not overcome: declining ticket sales, high operating costs and an increasingly negative public sentiment about forcing captive wild animals to perform as entertainment. “There isn’t any one thing,” Kenneth Feld, chairman and CEO of Feld Entertainment, told the Associated Press. “This has been a very difficult decision for me and for the entire family.”

[...] Among animal activist groups, news of its closure Saturday was met with a resounding cheer. [...] The animal rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals also welcomed the announcement Saturday night, calling it “the end of the saddest show on earth” and demanding that other acts follow suit...

I'd rather watch a good documentary than go to the circus. Zoos/Aquariums, the next to go? Let's get rid of greenhouses too, poor plants, is isn't natural. 

I would imagine the circus animals will be put in some kind of protective area whether they can or can't be rehabilitated.

[Secular Sanity]

Let's get rid of greenhouses too, poor plants, it isn't natural. 

Well according to Jack C Schultz, plants are just very slow animals.

"Most of us regard plants as quite different from animals, and many of us think of them as furniture. But plants actually share a very large number of biological functions with the animal kingdom, including mechanisms for sensing and responding to enemies (e.g., immune responses), cellular and molecular organization, and even behaviors. Moreover, because they must interact with animals in diverse and intimate ways, plants possess many characteristics uniquely suited for influencing animals, including humans. These include the chemical bases for all of traditional and much of modern medicine. I will illustrate similarities between plants and animals, and convergences that make plants useful for research and development in comparative medicine."

https://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/X7HZSCPmVF0

"This is not a misunderstanding of basic biology. Schultz is a professor in the Division of Plant Sciences at the University of Missouri in Columbia, and has spent four decades investigating the interactions between plants and insects. He knows his stuff.

Instead, he is making a point about common perceptions of our leafy cousins, which he feels are too often dismissed as part of the furniture. Plants fight for territory, seek out food, evade predators and trap prey. They are as alive as any animal, and – like animals – they exhibit behavior."

Plants Can See, Hear, Smell, and Respond

[Zinjanthropos]

Activism is a two way street.....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plant_rights

According to the link in post #3, plants can feel and perceive things. Does that make them sentient? What will Vegans munch on if that's proven to be correct?