Among the serious efforts in which I believe every member of the responsible reptile and exotics keeping community need to be actively partaking in and rank with high importance, is the initiation of, and subsequently, the continual education of the general public (especially our elected officials at the local, state, and federal levels) as it relates to our hobby/industry and what it actually is that we do, and what it is that it is not. This is yet another topic in which I feel needs to be addressed by the herp and exotics community, for over many years now, I have noticed many (if not, an increase in) the number of uninformed members of the public posting largely uninformed, oftentimes outright incorrect comments/information on some Internet news article's comments sections, public forum or discussion board, or elsewhere. These individuals are likely those who might not fully understand our hobby, our animals, or the nature of their comments they are posting/stating.
In current times, and seemingly all too often, many members of the public seem to be taking very little to no time at all to research or verify the bits of information that they are exposed to before making a decision (or reaching a particular conclusion), which is, and should be, an important step in gaining the most informed opinion possible on any given subject matter. The reasons, or causes I believe for this have been discussed in further detail in a previous post of mine. Therefore, they will not be discussed in nearly as great of detail in this post. Nevertheless, due to the continued efforts of much of the sensationalistic and irresponsible news and "entertainment" media (Animal Rights Planet, anyone?), the extremist animal rights groups such as P.E.T.A and the Humane Society of the United States (H.S.U.S), or through simple ignorance, much of the public is largely being (mis)-educated, through the use and perpetuating of common misconceptions, or misnomers about the herpetoculture hobby. I am sure that most of us have heard the notion that if a lie is repeated often enough, it becomes truth.
Exotic Equates to Dangerous?
Using Princeton's definition of the word "exotic", the most applicable of their definitions states: "being or from or characteristic of another place or part of the world". Using that particular definition, and that definition only, any animal then that is found outside of your particular locality is "exotic". However, the use and nature of the word quite often has many negative connotations associated with it often due to various individuals or groups following underlying political agendas or ideologies. As a result, much of the public has been incorrectly led into believing that an "exotic" animal equates to being a "dangerous" animal from a foreign country recklessly imported into the United States that are all equally as dangerous and difficult to manage, often failing to realize that their own pet dog, cat, bird, hamster, gerbil, goldfish, or gecko can also be construed to be considered an "exotic" animal.
One case in point is the HSUS's "Exotic pets" campaign. Spending some time on HSUS's PR materials on "exotic pets", one sees quite a bit of mention of animals the public widely fears and misunderstands (and have been involved in rare yet extremely high profile cases) such as big cats, bears, venomous reptiles, and "large constricting snakes". And in a similar fashion to HSUS's TV ads showing abused puppies and kittens in animal shelters and implying that the majority of their donations are spent towards shelter animals depicted in their commercials, the implication here, whether explicitly or implicitly, is that these animals are therefore represent the most prevalent and widely held "exotic pets" in the United States. HSUS then regularly presents this list of animals to the public and to legislators as a "modest", and "reasonable" list of animals to outlaw, a technique which in of itself is among HSUS's well oiled, deceptive, and well funded PR measures, but one which still ignores the published facts and statistics demonstrating that the keeping of those animals presents NO significant threat to the public at large. Lest we not forget HSUS's stated agenda of "putting an end to the entire reptile trade" and to "ban the sale of reptiles as pets to the general public" in their 2001 publication, as
Seen Here.
Deadly Invasive Reptiles, Coming to a Northern Town Near You?
As most members of the reptile community and industry have long been aware of, there has also been an unprecedented amount of news and television media hysteria initiated and perpetuated over the last several years (especially in 2008-present) surrounding the Burmese pythons in the Florida Everglades as a result of Hurricane Andrew in the early 1990's. Adding even more kerosene to the already raging media bonfire was the tragic and unfortunate death of 2 year old Shauna Hare by an emaciated and improperly kept albino Burmese python in Florida 18 months ago. Even some so-called 'scientists" have participated in this media frenzy by publishing flawed climate maps in conjunction with the USGS projecting that Burmese pythons could inhabit the southern third of the United States in association with climate change. However, these reports have been widely criticized by the scientific community as "unsuitable for the basis of legislative or regulatory policy", and with no less than three independent and peer reviewed scientific papers disproving the USGS maps and report.
Unfortunately, though, widespread and reckless repetition and sensationalizing of this issue by the media has led many ill informed members of the public to believe that a similar "python problem" could occur in their area, since after all, it has occurred in south Florida, and irresponsible keepers could be dumping their pythons anywhere in the US, right?. The obvious flaw with that line of reasoning, however, is that it is largely ignorant of the natural history, biology, and temperature requirements of Burmese pythons, and pythons/boas in general. It is just one fundamental aspect of reptile biology and ecology, that we as responsible reptile keepers clearly need to more frequently explain/educate to the general public, for it otherwise appears to be lacking.
Are We All Now Animal "Hoarders"?
In recent years, the usage of the words "animal hoarding" has gained increasing popularity and exploitation among sensationalistic ratings driven television programming and news media. To quickly recap, the true definition who and what a "hoarder" should constitute as, is someone who habitually acquires and keeps
any number of animals WHILE subjecting both themselves and their animals to unsanitary living environments, neglect, and/or lack of appropriate veterinary/medical care and attention. Every reader of this posting should keep that word, "while" in mind. Numbers alone are not, and should not, be a sole indicator of a hording or neglect situation.
However, the term "animal hoarder" has largely become simply another inane media buzzword, exploited recklessly (and without accountability) by media and some television networks to simply generate ratings at the expense of truth, facts, and ethics. As an end result, dedicated and passionate reptile keepers, hobbyists, and breeders collectively have all been perceived, and inaccurately characterized as "mentally deficient animal hoarders" by some segments of the public, while the very responsibility and dedication many of us hold towards caring for our animals, collections, and to the hobby/industry itself is suddenly plagued with the negative stigma or connotation of "animal hoarding" as a result. Many likely do not realize or understand the true meaning of the word and/or how to properly distinguish a true "hoarder" from someone who is a responsible pet owner, hobbyist, or breeder. Nevertheless, if herp keeping and propagation now constitutes as "animal hoarding" of the 21st century, that may well then classify tens of thousands of individuals worldwide as such, therefore rendering researcher's estimates of the scope of this so called "epidemic" to be grossly underestimated!
Most Reptiles still wild caught?
A third and final mis-notion I believe much of the public our hobby and the animals we keep and offer for sale is that we are still harvesting, acquiring and importing most, if not all, of our them from the wild in some "cruel and abusive fashion resulting in widespread animal neglect and suffering as well as depletion of all of our natural resources" (as would the HSUS would have the public believe). Now, wild collection and importation does still occur, and cases of animal abuse or neglect can and do accompany it on occasion. However, I believe that responsible importation practices are still necessary to some degree in order to help continually maintain genetic and bloodline diversity in the animals we maintain in our collections provided all collection and importation regulations are abided by. However, more importantly and to the point at hand, in my opinion, we must also educate and stress to the public about the tremendous advancements we have made thus far (and the importance of) in providing healthy, well acclimated captive bred and born animals for numerous domestic industries and that the vast majority of animals we now offer are (or have been) domestically produced.
Walking the aisles at Tinley Park in IL at the NARBC/Summit show back in 2009 (which was the last time I was in attendance for the show), I was astonished to see how many color morphs of different species of snakes and other reptiles have now been produced, which species were now available as captive bred and born specimens, and the many different products and services now available for keeping reptiles and amphibians. Even at the smaller local shows we have here in Madison WI and Sturtevant WI, I have noticed many of these developments unfolding. Ten years ago, I would only have imagined more than half of the developments I noticed at these shows coming to reality.
Despite this, and in closing, I believe that much of the general public is still largely in the dark when it comes to most of these developments we have experienced and made within our hobby and industry thus far as well as our current scope; the increased prevalence and diversity of captive bred and born animals and color/pattern morphs, the large and small, national and local captive born only shows alike, and yes, Waterland Turtle Tubs (when aquariums or outdoor ponds have long been the only options for keeping aquatic turtles, for example).
Other Thoughts?
