this post was submitted on 04 Aug 2025
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Wow, I didn't think there would be so many crazy psychos in the comments.
I can get that people might not feel as much empathy with animals than humans (get, not approve) but most of the comments are kitten-drowning level.
You get a pet, which is supposed to be a companion and basically part of your family, and you don't mind them being torn to shreds?
Okay then, I guess if your kid has a terminal cancer we can also feed him to the tiger? After all in the end it's just a bunch of meat.
I dunno if they're psychos, exactly, I'm mostly seeing interesting takes, like the chicken coop that blew away or the fisherman. Varying degrees of "how close are you to this animal," especially since critters like mice could be a lovely pet or food for an equally lovely snake.
But yeah, couple people don't turn off their dark humor either, but that's just the internet. I don't mind it, I imagine only 1% are actually psychopaths (which is iirc the statistical average, except in business where it's 4%. And I guess politics, now).
Then again, my instance blocks certain other instances, too. Lol
Not my kid, but if I'm terminal I'm gonna add "killed by some food-safe means and then fed to tigers in front of zoo patrons" to my potential death plans.
"The funeral will be at the civic building at 10am, and the viewing at 12:00 by the tiger sanctuary in Edgewater Zoo"
it's probably a bad idea for everybody else, as now there's a captive tiger, that is one that will be around humans forever, that also already are human meat, which is a suboptimal combination
My comment was mostly a joke but that is a fair point. No tiger-pit for body disposal then
are vultures okay tho
If you have a terminal illness they won't take you as they only want "healthy animals".
Nobody's suggesting that beloved pets get donated just for the sake of feeding the animals. But if you have a pet you're planning to get rid of anyway, for whatever reason, some people would prefer to see the pet's death contribute a final something back. Put it in the same logic as organ donation. Nobody WANTS to see their loved one's corpse cut open and such, but knowing it helped somebody else in a small way can give some closure.
Getting rid of doesn't equate to killing unless you're incapable of planning and managing for the future.
If I'm dying, give me to the birds. But if I've, stopped entertaining you, then fuck you.
In many cases, getting rid of a pet does involve killing the pet, as there is only so much space in animal shelters and inflow is a lot more than adoptions. It's unfortunate, but that's how it is.
This is a fair way to feel about it, but if the question is only what is done with a body after it has been euthanized it seems more like a cultural consideration than an ethical one. Like there are cultures with strong feelings about treatment of human corpses to the point where organ donation is taboo, but that doesn't mean being ok with family members being organ donors is some awful thing.
There's a larger question about how pets and other animals are treated, and the thought of someone euthanizing a healthy pet for petty reasons is really disturbing (like stories you sometimes hear about this being done as a way to emotionally abuse someone), but that isn't exactly the fault of the zoo or its practices.
That's why it's back on the menu, boys! The circle of life is brutal. I think everyone in these comments is just externally processing horror at the idea of sending their own pets.
Right? Fucking bunch of irrational horror-filled replies.
That's a weird comparison, and it's honestly a sign that you are struggling with separating the two on an emotional level. Which is ironic based on your opening sentence.
Alternatively, you're too good at separating humans and animals on emotional level, to the extreme degree.
Well the animals are being euthenized then fed to the animals to diversify their diets. If assisted suicide was legal here and I elected for it, I would have no qualms with checking a box that said feed my meat sack to the tigers. Although they might not want to do that as it may encourage the idea that the handlers/vets look a lot like food.
I wish this was a "burial" option over making some creepy guy in a suit richer than he already is because you need just the right box for grandpa's meat sac.
The comparable situation would be if your family grew tired of you, and some day decide to euthanize you and feed to tigers.
To which your answer is probably "well, I'm a human, you can't do this to me, I don't want to be killed against my will", and we will be back to square one.
No, you're making this about a humans ability to kill the animal, not what should be done with the dead carcus. The animals fate is already sealed, it's dead whether or not it goes to the zoo. Just means it is either thrown in a furnace or processed some other way.
If you don't like that humans get to choose whar happens to the animals, I understand.. but that's something that should be protested or brought separately to your politicians.
This is more like saying people shouldn't be able to elect to donate organs.
Edit: or rather your family deciding to donate those organs to a someone who needs them after you're dead.
It's a bit less about what happens to the body - that I don't give a shit about - it's about what happens to the live creature. It's not about accepting your dead pets, it's about accepting your alive pets to be killed, and I fundamentally don't like that, no matter will they kill them and fed the corpses to tigers, or burn it like kill shelters do.
I agree with the other response - I don't care about my meat sack once it's no longer operational. Harvest my useful organs for donation, then feed the rest to the kitties.
The difference between humans and other animals is that we understand the concept of death and can make our post-life wishes known.
If my children told me they wanted to be fed to the tigers I'd probably still be horrified by the image of it but I wouldn't push back.
Our pets can't communicate their wishes to us, and in all likelihood they don't care what happens to them when they're dead. Putting their meat to some kind of use seems far more ethical to me than turning it into ash or sticking it in the ground.
It's not about what happens to the body, if it was "bring us your dead pets we will feed them to tigers", I wouldn't be against it. I fundamentally disagree with the idea of surrendering your pet to be killed, be it a kill-shelter, or a zoo.
Yeah some of these comments were just disgusting. Do better Lemmy
I'll agree that it's weird to say the least that they're askit for pets, pets should be worth more than just their money.
Having said that, predators need food too. Predators aren't evil, they just evolved to eat other animals, it's what they do, it's what they've done for a billion years or so.
I think Denmark should fund zoos better
Apparently nobody here bothered to read the article. It isn't about funding. Everybody's just putting their own emotional spin on it without even being aware of the details.
I'm aware of the details
Why don't they buy hamsters and what not themselves from providers so that there aren't emotional connections to the animals at least?
It's weird to ask for animals where there are inherently emotional connections
Then the question: don't they have the money?
They're making the offer available to those who want it, in other words those who don't see a problem with it emotionally. Some of whom even benefit emotionally from it. Is it very hard to comprehend that different people have different viewpoints on things?
Yeah but here is the thing: the entire idea of a pet is to get some emotional connection with it, making you want to care for it.
Anyone delivering their pet for this should maybe have a psychological evaluation if you ask me
Did you miss the part where this is IF YOU'RE PUTTING A PET TO SLEEP ANYWAY? Nobody's asking you to give up a pet you want to keep ffs.
Not gonna lie, I'm borderline getting used to extremism and antisocial behaviour on lemmy. This place feels like 4chan that hates 4chan. The wake-up call for me was when I was arguing against killing everyone on earth because of how shitty the people are, saying that some of us very much enjoy the life. Got downvoted.
I've also seen several calls for genocide against Jews. Pretty ironic for a platform that so loudly hates the current genocide.
You're painting everybody together with one brush. I'm against humanity ending, I'm against genocide, whoever it's practiced on. I also don't see a problem with this (what I do have a problem with is the number of commentors who didn't bother reading the article and are claiming it's because the zoo is broke).
That was not my goal. It's like me being a redditor and saying redditors are neckbeards. While it sounds like I'm shitting on every redditor, pretty sure everyone knows I'm talking about "those parts of the site"
Ah. It came across differently because you were replying to somebody complaining about the number of 'psychos' in the comments.
What did you expect from the platform that was created because reddit banned extremists? Fewer extremists than the place that banned them? Why?
I tend to hope for the best, but you actually hit the nail, I've had the exact same thought at the back of my mind about lemmy for quite some time. Much of the community is made up of people who have been banned or disliked elsewhere, so this is their refugee. The very first thing I noticed is how toxic users are with downvotes. It is no longer a community tool about moderating quality discussions, it's essentially used as a "fuck you", so I had to disable (hide) it and disregard vote system on this site, especially after seeing how easily it is for people to mass downvote lemmy profiles with multiple accounts (happened to me 2 times, even highly upvoted plain humor comments were suddenly downvoted). My guess is that we're getting downvoted here, but do you really care?
I've used reddit forever---stopped caring about downvotes long ago. You have to realized that the main demographic of any site like reddit or this, specifically the people with accounts, who vote, and comment, are like 50% autistic college age kids (at least on reddit). Those autistic college age kids are now 30+ here on lemmy since reddit has been banning for a while now (remember the ellen pao bans? the chapotraphouse ban? The Voat exodus that turned into lemmy users as well?). Yeah, people suck on the internet. They downvote for no reason. You just develop a thick skin and stop complaining about downvotes or you ban yourself.
No, because I know that the people who are downvoting me are probably autistic 20-somethings. I'm superior to them---I'm an autistic 30-something. I know they're probably stupid because they have yet to develop their frontal lobe enough to participate in normal society so they downvote on lemmy/reddit. I know this because I was that person 10 years ago on reddit---I made my account when I was 17 and I said a ton of stupid shit on there. Who cares.
Suggesting that the Palestinian side isn't an angel either and the Israelis are assholes too, will get you labelled as the world's most devout othrodox Jewish Zionist to the level of Theodore Hertzl himself.