Animal welfare and conservation group calls on social media customers to take a stand in opposition to dangerous content material
WASHINGTON, Oct. 4, 2022 /PRNewswire/ — Leading animal welfare and conservation nonprofit Born Free USA has right now launched a brand new report exploring the abuse of wild animals on social media titled “Their Lives for Your Likes: The Exploitation of Wild Animals on Social Media.”
Social media is replete with movies and different content material that includes captive wild animals compelled into shut proximity to people, positioned in unnatural settings, and made to behave opposite to their pure instincts and behaviors. While this content material might sound cute and humorous on the floor, this can be very dangerous to each the particular person animals and to species as an entire.
Social media content material that exploits wild animals drives the demand for wild animals as pets. This, in flip, fuels species inhabitants declines in the wild; perpetuates animal cruelty and abuse; creates public security hazards together with lethal escapes, assaults, and illness unfold; and can endanger the ecosystems the place these non-native wild animals are saved as pets, as unique animal releases or escapes are fairly frequent. Without correct controls, social media retailers present an area that capabilities virtually like a digital circus or roadside zoo, usually depicting animals in inappropriate situations that considerably compromise their particular person welfare.
To higher perceive the nature of the most influential social media content material that includes wild animals at the moment circulating, Born Free USA analyzed 50 YouTube movies of 5 of some of the hottest unique pets in the United States in 2022: pythons, wolf-dogs, tigers, marmosets, and gray parrots.
We’re social: www.bornfreeusa.org, www.twitter.com/bornfreeusa, www.fb.com/bornfreeusa, www.instagram.com/bornfreeusaorg.
MEDIA CONTACT:
Heather Ripley
Orange Orchard
(865) 977-1973
[email protected]
SOURCE Born Free USA
