TIGER KING: LET’S TALK ABOUT THE TIGERS
Scenes of deplorable conditions, a clear disregard for animal ethics, and the mind-blowing truth that most of what was shown in regards to the wildlife was legal, Tiger King focuses on the all-too-real personalities behind captive wildlife in America, but the unwritten next chapter is about the animals.
Photography by Simone Sbaraglia/WildScreen Exchange
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, most of us around the world and currently 95% of Americans are under stay-at-home orders, leaving many of us watching more television than normal. One show that has been on everyone’s lips and comes up in most Zoom conversations, podcasts, and late-night shows is Tiger King. The show became an instant hit after its release on Netflix with over 34 million viewers in just the first 10 days of streaming. If you haven’t seen it, the seven-part miniseries documents three key exotic animal zoo/sanctuary owners in America, revolving around the main character, Joe Exotic, a “mulleted, gun-toting polygamist” who calls himself the “Tiger King”.
While the captive tigers, lions, ligers, and other predators, and the clear deplorable treatment and exploitation of them is conspicuous across the series, the show is really focused on the jaw-dropping drama of the people involved. The bizarre and shocking exploits of the real-life characters include suspected murder, manipulation through drug addition, cult behavior, and sexual abuse to name just a few; not mentioning the illegal trade of big cats. The point is that while captive wildlife in America is the repugnant yet beguiling backdrop to the series, the show was not intended to investigate and expose the illegal wildlife trade and the backward policies of wildlife ownership in Florida. The few facts regarding the distressing status of tigers and lions held in private ownership in the United States and the heart-wrenching scenes of animal abuse missed their mark on an audience transfixed on sensationalism.
This perhaps parallels the plight of wildlife around the world, be it during a pandemic or not, that those of us in urban, first-world settings are too often distracted by the frenzy and dramas of everyday life to put a conscious and considerable effort into taking an active part in conservation. Despite the relentless barrage of ringing alarm bells from scientists, non-profits, and governmental organizations that our natural world is swiftly changing with now over one million species at risk of extinction, the day to day distractions of life keep many of us from making an actual difference. The Tiger Kings of both real-life and our television distractions prevent us from going beyond just listening to the upsetting facts and we stop short at doing anything to try to change them.
Large cat species and large carnivores, in general, are under extreme and ever-growing pressures in the wild. In the last 20 years, wild tiger populations have declined by 96.8%, leaving fewer than 3,500 individuals in 13 countries. Since the release of Disney’s, The Lion King in 1994, wild lion populations have declined by 42% and have disappeared from 95% of their historic range. Around the world 75% of large predators have declining populations, the most significant culprit of this decline being habitat loss. This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the fast-paced eradication of wildlife and the loss of wild places around the world.
Wild lion. Photograph by Axel Hunnicutt
In this time of peril, we’ve championed those working to reduce the decline of natural areas, stabilize or reverse population declines of endangered species, and help ensure the species that are here today might be here for future generations. Yet, as Tiger King has shown, in our own backyards many of these species occur in great numbers. While there are currently estimated to be less than 3,500 tigers in the wild, there are estimated to be as many as 10,000 tigers in the United States with less than 5% of these being in accredited zoos. Tigers, lions, bears, hyenas, and almost any other exotic species from all corners of the world can be kept and owned by private citizens in a large portion of the US.
Seven states allow for the legal ownership of exotic big cats without any permitting, an additional 10 states allow for them with permits. When it comes to non-human primates 12 states allow for legal ownership without permits and they are legal in another 11 with a permit. Even in states where licenses for captive wild animals are required from the US Department of Agriculture, they can be extremely easy to obtain and can cost less than $50. The containment and housing enclosures of wildlife kept by a private citizen is also a joke with limited to no inspections required in many states, bringing to light screaming questions about both safety and the ethical treatment of these animals.
We applaud the work of the many accredited and conservation education focused zoos across the world as crucial institutions in spreading conservation awareness and empathy to an ever increasingly urban world. However, the captive animals we are discussing here are not a part of the conservation solution. The Association of Zoos and Aquariums is the accrediting body in the US for captive species such as tigers and has strict standards regarding safety and ethical enclosures for the animals. Currently, there are less than 350 tigers in these facilities in the country.
The close to 10,000 tigers in the US outside of these accredited facilities do not benefit the dwindling wild tiger population in Asia. The same is true for all other large carnivores and their wild counterparts. Many are privately kept as pets at people’s homes or worse kept in places claiming to be zoos as seen in Tiger King. While the import of most large species has been stopped by the federal government many smaller species are still smuggled into the country alive, poached from their natural habitats around the world. Large cat species continue to be smuggled as cubs in suitcases internationally, however, within the US there is little need, due to the massive number of breeding captive animals.
This is where the problem lies: breeding. Many of these non-accredited facilities that have large cats on display pose themselves to the public as “sanctuaries”, places of refuge and safety from an otherwise sad demise. Joe Exotic constantly states it, even in his music videos, that he is protecting the lions and tigers from hunters and extinction. That they need him to be safe. The dark and sad paradox is that Joe Exotic is actively breeding these large felids, thus creating his own crisis to solve. It has absolutely nothing to do with saving the endangered and threatened species in the wild. The lions, tigers, leopards, jaguars, and other species that are being bred in these facilities cannot return to the wild to help bolster dwindling populations, instead, they are bred to be exploited for profit. Exploited for their natural beauty, their alluring and exotic nature, and exploited for the emotionally jarring stories of their endangered status in the wild.
This exploitation happens as circus-style exhibitions and often when the cats are young cubs, handled and photographed with paying visitors, sold to patrons as exotic experiences in the middle of small-town America and disguised as conservation-benefiting endeavors. As highlighted in the series, once these cats grow too large to safely be handled by tourists, they are there to breed or stay locked behind cages in large numbers with ever-growing expensive appetites. They are also an ever-growing and often unmanageable expense for owners, at which time they are either illegally sold, destroyed, or work their way deeper into the black market, contributing to the ever-growing captive population and the ever-growing need for real sanctuaries to actually give them a safe place to retire. All of this takes desperately needed funding and attention away from the plight of the real wild species and their endless march to extinction in their natural habitats.
Tiger chained in captivity at Tiger Temple Thailand. Photograph by Wendy Hapgood
The detrimental conservation impact of these captive cats does not stop at their death. Across Asia and Southern Africa, captive large cats, particularly tigers and lions, follow a similar path. As young cute cubs attract paying tourists for Facebook profile pictures, once too large and dangerous they are kept at great expense, sold to other facilities, or killed so that their body parts can be sold for profit in the traditional medicinal market. A major demand is in tiger bones which are used to create tiger bone wine. In recent years with the decline of tigers in Asia, captive lions in South Africa have supplemented the demand. Tiger skins and bones can go for $20,000 and $7,000 respectively, making them worth more dead than alive. As a result, the big cat trade is driven by the demand for these traditional Asian medicines.
The massive number of captive large cats in the United States is no exception to this. Due to the legal status of many of the big cats, the tracking of their leakage into the illegal system is challenging. However, there have been several reported cases of American captive-bred tigers and lions feeding the illegal Asian markets. It is completely reasonable to postulate that the potential endless supply of big cats in America is and will continue to drive the demand in Asia and the illegal local poaching of tigers; not to mention the secondary supply from lions in South Africa.
You may remember seeing an extremely large cat in the documentary that looked both like a tiger and a lion, a Frankenstein-like unnatural creature called a liger. A liger is a cross between a male lion and a female tiger, a ligon is the opposite. Ligers are usually significantly larger than a tiger and look exactly like what you might expect a cross of the two to be. One biological definition of a species is that it cannot successfully be bred with another or if it can the offspring will be sterile. This is the case for the ligers and tigons as all-male hybrids are sterile, however in this case 50% of the time the female is not. This allows even further cross-breeding till you get multi-generation “Ti-ligers” and “Li-Tigons” and the Frankenstein or “Frankencat” project continues. These hybrids are the epitome of everything that is wrong with captive wild cats in America. They highlight the lack of federal and state regulation in possession, medical treatment, and mostly the ethical treatment of the animals. The liger shows just how far down this rabbit hole almost anyone is legally allowed to go, to literally manipulate a species and then forcibly do it so many times until it is completely unrecognizable and yet the result provides sensational intrigue for profit.
The current system and policies for captive wildlife in the United States are to the detriment of those animals in captivity and those in the wild. They allow for the unethical treatment, husbandry, handling, and exploitation of large, potentially dangerous species. They also help promote and legitimize the illegal trade of big cat products used to quench the demand for traditional Asian medicines. Perhaps worst of all is that they have misled many Americans into falsely supporting pseudo-conservation, helping to promote organizations and businesses whose actions impair genuine in-situ conservation efforts. If large carnivores, most other species, and the habitats they live in are going to have any chance of avoiding extirpation then it’s going to take all of us. These sensational sideshows and conservation red herrings serve only to distract us from both truth and progress.
Tiger King has brought many of us together during these unprecedented times in an odd way. However, it is also the epitome of our distraction and narrowed focus. In so many ways the show was like a train wreck, where you just can’t look away despite the devastation and absurdity. Yet while we were watching the train crash, we completely missed the melting backdrop of large cats. Now that we have so much time, let’s refocus on what matters and not be distracted by the fleeting fireworks. Conservation needs our focus and there is no better time to do it than now.
HOW CAN YOU HELP TIGERS AND OTHER BIG CATS?
You can use your voice to protect big cats in America and put a stop to private breeding. Let's stop obsessing over whether or not Carol killed her husband. Let’s focus instead on The Big Cat Public Safety Act a federal law that would ban tiger breeding, pet tiger ownership, and public cub handling. There is a high chance that the bill, which has bipartisan support, will be voted on by the US Congress this year.Support Big Cat Rescue's mission to end the private ownership of big cats as pets and stop exploitative roadside zoos. https://bigcatrescue.org/big-cat-act/