Anti-vaxxing forest nymph Jill Stein set a Google alert for the three-month anniversary of Harambe the Gorilla’s passing, specifically for the purpose of re-upping this opinion:
Which links, in case you were wondering, to this:
The killing of Harambe at the Cincinnati Zoo highlights the need to adopt stronger legal protections for the rights of animals.
Other countries, especially in Europe, have begun to provide legal rights and protected status to primates as living beings. Non human primates should have the legal right to live freely or, when necessary, in sanctuaries only for medical rehabilitation or ecological assistance for endangered species.
Harambe was killed by a zoo which raises revenues by selling tickets to see captive animals, including primates. While good emergency staff training might have prevented such a catastrophic outcome, the Green Party believes that captivity for such entertainment is ethically wrong and fundamentally exploitive and should be illegal.
Harambe, as you will recall, was brutally murdered at the hands of a cold-blooded child who spent nearly every day of his three years plotting the ape’s death. Now Harambe is gone, but proof of our flawed judicial system remains more robust than ever. The child continues to walk, or crawl or whatever, without having served so much as a day behind bars. Probably no time-out, either.
Stein’s decision to double down on her Harambe opinion was a wise move. Her national visibility has elevated considerably in the past three months, what with the Bernie Bros and Never Hillary folks having been forced to evacuate the SS Sanders. Stein wants to remind survivors that she’s the emergency life boat they’re looking for, and to reinforce the sense that her opinions are brave and good and pro-gorilla. Trump, it bears repeating, wanted the beast shot dead.
In times like these (uncertain, depressing, kind of muggy), I like to recall the words of the great primatologist Jane Gooddall, who so beautifully articulated what we were all thinking when Stein’s tweet broke: “Anyway, whatever.”