That’s Knut. He’s a cutie, isn’t he! Knut is a 3 month old polar bear cub, the first to be born in captivity at the Berlin Zoo in thirty years. His mother abandoned him, and so he is being bottle-fed and hand-raised by the zoo keepers. Animal rights activists are outraged. It’s not natural! He’ll be humiliated! How would they like the problem of Knut’s mother being unwilling to take care of him? Why they want him to be killed, of course!

“In actual fact, the zoo needs to kill the bear cub.”
–Frank Albrecht

That’s rather a “we have to destroy the village to save the village” kind of mentality. Sorry, but I don’t care how unorthodox or “unnatural” any animal’s upbringing is, death is never better than life. As long as they are well-fed, well cared for, and kept active, healthy and happy, I don’t see how putting an animal to death, just because it has to be bottle-fed, would be in any way acceptable to anyone who loves animals and believes in animal rights or animal welfare.

And this activist’s concerns that he won’t be a “real polar” bear are totally unfounded. While I have never fostered any sort of bear, I have bottle-fed my share of furry wild babies (and a few feathered ones), and I can tell you from personal experience, wild animals do not forget or lose the “wild” aspects. Once they reach maturity, they have no problem turning on the person who used to hold the baby bottle for them. If it’s true for baby Cottontails, squirrels, and raccoons, I can’t imagine it would be any less true for bears.

Animal rights activists worldwide have been losing their minds the last few years. Really. I’m all for animal welfare, and you know I love animals much more than I do most humans, but killing a baby polar bear because it has to be bottled-fed. To me, that’s just insanity.

And when is my software going to get here! It’s been on a truck since 8:30 am!