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Unlike Steve-O, animals who are abused and exploited by Ringling Bros. and other circuses are not willing participants. They are torn from their families, deprived of all that is natural and important to them, and forced to perform stupid tricks and stunts like riding bicycles, jumping through flaming hoops, and standing on their heads—things that you would never see them doing in the wild. They are kept in filthy, crowded trailers, boxcars, and cages and are dragged around the country for up to 50 weeks a year. Elephants in circuses are beaten, gouged with sharp metal “bullhooks,” and kept in chains, sometimes as much as 20 hours a day. Steve-O saw this abuse firsthand, and that’s why he hates Ringling Bros. and any other circus that profits from the abuse of animals.Children, who are naturally fond of animals, would have to be dragged kicking and screaming to the cirucus if they knew of the suffering that these animals endure for a fleeting moment of so-called amusement. In the wild, bears don't ride bicycles, tigers don't jump through fiery hoops, and elephants do not stand upright on their hind legs. Circuses portray a distorted view of wildlife.Animals in circuses live a dismal life of domination, confinement, and violent training. Would you want to live that way? Do you think they really do?There are many age-appropriate books available that are an answer to the unnatural and unrealistic images of "happy" cirucus animals that are so prevalent in children's books. Want to know them...just ask me.Huge eyes of desparation...trying to escape...shot dead....but, first she managed to kill her "trainer".Elephants in circuses aren’t volunteers. It is standard practice to hit, beat, shock, chain, and whip them to make them perform pointless and sometimes dangerous tricks. To break the spirits of newly captured baby elephants, they are tied down, beaten, and starved for up to a month. Elephants spend most of their lives in chains. They are often forced to sleep standing up in cramped, filthy trucks, must perform while ill, and are under constant threat of punishment with bullhooks, which are jabbed into the sensitive skin behind their ears, under their chins, and around their legs. Cruelty Is Not Entertainment Cruelty Is Not Entertainment •Circuses.com OUT OF AFRICA (AND ASIA),INTO CHAINS Most circus elephants were torn from their homelands and families. Elephants are highly social animals who, when roaming freely in their natural habitat, live in close-knit family units that travel up to 20 miles a day, stopping to snack on vegetation and bathe in watering holes. Baby elephants stay close by their mothers’ side until they are teenagers, other adult elephants “babysit,” and the dead are mourned, their bodies buried with leaves and sticks. BEATINGS UNDER THE BIG TOP Elephants don’t perform because they want to— they perform because they are afraid not to.The head elephant trainer at Carson & Barnes Circus was caught on tape attacking elephants with a bullhook and electric prod and instructing other trainers to hurt the elephants by ripping the hook through their flesh until they scream in pain. An animal handler with Sterling & Reid Bros. Circus was recently convicted on three counts of cruelty to animals for beating an elephant bloody during a performance in Norfolk,Va. The Clyde Beatty- Cole Bros. Circus paid $10,000 to settle federal charges of wounding its elephants with bullhooks. Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus’ animalcare record is riddled with tragic animal deaths and USDA investigations. In one case, a baby elephant drowned while fleeing from a handler prodding him with a bullhook. WHAT YOU CAN DO ,, Please patronize only animal-free circuses such as the Cirque du Soleil, Cirque Éloize, and the New Pickle Family Circus.Sharp, metal bullhooks are purposely cruel tools used by trainers to punish and control elephants and make them perform painful tricks. 01/03 “Hurt ‘em. … Make ‘em scream. … Sink that hook into ‘em ... When you hear that screaming, then you know you got their attention.” Tim Frisco, Carson & Barnes elephant trainer..
Sign Here to Stop Circus CrueltyHudley (a former Ringling employee) states, "The abuse was not once in a while; it occurred every day...the elephants, horses, and camels were hit, punched, beaten, whipped by everyone from the head of animal care down to inexperienced animal handlers hired out of homeless shelters." Hudley witnessed a Ringling head animal trainer beat an elephant with a bullhook for 30 minutes, sinking the sharp tip into the sensitive skin behind her ear canal and PULL THE HANDLE USING BOTH ARMS! THE ELEPHANT CRIED OUT IN AGONY AND WAS LEFT BLEEDING PROFUSELY FROM SEVERE WOUNDS. Hudley and other whistle blowers have seen elephants who were SO TERRIFIED OF THE TRAINERS THAT THEY BEGAN URINATING, DEFACATING, AND TRUMPETING IN FEAR AT THE SOUND OF THEIR VOICES.....the elephants are only unchained when the public is around, and topsoil is rubbed into bloody bullhook wounds to conceal them from the public. One of Ringling's previous dancers Jodey Eliseo syas she saw numerous incidents of abuse ...an elephant beaten for stumbling during a performance. She saw a handler beat a baby elephant for panicking and smashing through a wall. Tom Rider, and elephant caretaker with Ringling, says that he witnessed systematic daily abuse.Did you know there is an elephant sanctuary in Hoenwald, TN? Check out: www.elephants.com they always need donations & if you don't have any money....they have volunteer days to do work on their huge sanctuary! Their mission: The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee, founded in 1995, is the nation's largest natural habitat refuge developed specifically for endangered African and Asian elephants. It operates on 2,700 acres in Hohenwald, Tennessee - 85 miles southwest of Nashville.The Elephant Sanctuary exists for two reasons:To provide a haven for old, sick or needy elephants in a setting of green pastures, old-growth forests, spring-fed ponds and a heated barn for cold winter nights.To provide education about the crisis facing these social, sensitive, passionately intense, playful, complex, exceedingly intelligent and endangered creatures.