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May 3·edited May 3

You do realize how many wild raptors die this way, correct? Would your solution be to put them all in tiny enclosures for entertainment of humans by the millions to gawk at and stress them all day to keep them "safe?" And did you ACTUALLY call that "comfortable?" Take like, I don't know, 5 seconds and imagine being in a prison cell your entire life while countless strangers stared at you and worse. Now add being a wild owl on top of that to magnify the stress (because if you know anything about wild owls, being hatched in captivity doesn't magically make them a domestic dog.)

Blaming people for being happy about his freedom (which you put in quotes for some reason that does not make sense) instead of blaming both the zoo for deliberately putting him in his situation and pesticides/windows/etc that you admit in the end are the real problems is ridiculous. I also don't think you know what anthropomorphism is. If anything, putting a non-native owl in a tiny zoo enclosure and calling that "safety" is more anthropomorphizing than any tales of freedom people tell. The idea that wildlife should be contained for our enjoyment, and the myth that they enjoy and benefit from that is our domestication projected onto them. Anthropomorphism is all of the cartoon animals at the zoo smiling to teach kids how "happy" everyone is to be there and treating them like toys for all to see as close as possible no matter the cost. Even calling it "conservation" despite most animals there not being endangered and most endangered animals being too stressed by the environment to breed.

Maybe reexamine if you really care about this owl as much as you care about your desire to control him and other animals in captivity for human entertainment.

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May 3·edited May 3Author

hmm… I don't think you're seriously engaging with what I actually wrote. oh well!

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Ok, you asked for it...

"Witness accounts and a preliminary necropsy suggest that he died on Feb. 23 after falling from an Upper West Side apartment building—something difficult to imagine happening to a healthy wild owl."

Wild owls and many other birds die from building collisions in massive numbers every year.

"The narratives spun around Flaco’s “freedom” were a result of people seeing what they wanted to see. Anthropomorphism, the ascribing of human traits to nonhumans, ran rampant."

How is wanting to see an owl spending their life in the wild instead of a shitty enclosure automatically anthropomorphism? That is not ascribing human traits. If anything, it is ascribing owl traits far more than the zoo.

"Flaco was hatched in captivity in 2010, the offspring of two parents who themselves had also been hatched in captivity. His life at the Central Park Zoo was unglamorous at best, perhaps even miserable. But at least he was comfortable."

Again... "comfortable." You actually used that word. What more can I engage with?

"Set that against the panic he must have experienced when he was “liberated” from the only roost he had ever known. Let loose into the city, Flaco was forced into a landscape he wasn’t built to understand."

It's interesting that you assigned all of these human traits to him when you actually don't know how he felt. Given that he did not seek out humans even once and quickly adapted to hunting and so on (as you admit later) how much of it was panic and how much of it became relief? Of course a change like this is jarring, just as it would be for you if you were imprisoned in a concrete cellar and someone let you out. You also use the word "forced" here, as if he was not forced into captivity. He could have stuck around the zoo. There are birds like peacocks that will. He didn't. Where is your agency you claim we should give him?

"Flaco was made of the bones, feathers, genes, and instincts of a wild animal. Neither he nor his forebears had ever been domesticated—and yes, there is something evocative about imagining wildness still ticking inside a caged beast. It’s tempting to see yourself in him."

What does this mean? That humans who cared about him saw ourselves as caged beasts with wildlife instincts? This makes no sense.

"It remains genuinely amazing that he was able to survive as long as he did. Flaco had never had to hunt for his own food before; survival rates during juvenile predatory birds’ first winter of independence can be dismally low. But he made it, relying on sheer instinct and his considerable power as a member of the world’s heftiest owl species..."

Exactly, which is yet another reason why your characterization of the story and Flaco having worse odds than other birds in the city is not accurate.

"Flaco, fortunately, didn’t mind the onlookers. On the occasions when I visited him at his Central Park roost, he was dozing away on a favorite tree branch. Though he occasionally half-opened an eye to squint at passers-by, he appeared unbothered, even tranquil."

Having observed many wild owls, this is the case with many of them as well especially when they are resting and is not a sign of domestication or inability to exist in the wild.

"Some accountability may be due for Barrett now that Flaco is dead because, in part, of the failed attempts to recapture him."

Not defending Barrett, but here is another example of your suggestion the recapture would have been great for this owl and not simply dragging him back to hell.

"These fans didn’t love Flaco, even if they thought they did. They loved the idea of Flaco, and those views were mediated through a cultural lens tuned by Disney movies and social-media stardom. "

I honestly don't understand how you could write this one paragraph after suggesting that capturing and putting this animal back in a shitty cage for a bunch of people to watch like a Disney movie to the owls detriment- probably even moreso after having a taste of freedom. The idea that people don't love an animal because they don't want him to be abused again is... certainly a hot take I guess.

"Perhaps, living a hectic life in a crowded city, you might feel confined in some way yourself. Seeing a noble creature uncaged might have inspired in you a vicarious thrill. You might have wanted him to feel the same way you’d feel in his situation.

That’s the anthropomorphism talking. Animals deserve compassion and respect—even rights—but on their terms, not ours. If we are to show them love, we must do so in ways that accommodate their experience of the world."

Again, I don't think you realize how much you are contradicting yourself nor do you fully understand anthropomorphism. Though there is a LOT of anthropocentrism in this text. Assuming other animals have emotions, desires, wants, needs, and inner lives outside of being kept in a box for human entertainment is not anthropomorphism. What exactly do you mean that animals deserve those things "on their terms, not ours" while you encourage recapturing him? How is any of this on his terms? STARTING WITH THE ZOO.

"For Flaco, the wild brought excitement through terror. The desperate struggle for survival known to every animal in the wild was tempered only by his captive-bred naivete. "

This is an incredibly reductive take on the lives of other animals which also shows anthropocentrism. Animals lives are more than just "struggle for survival." They think, feel, play, have relationships, explore, are curious, travel, have individual differences, interspecies relationships, and so on. It is a very anthropocentric story to tell of other animals (and also projected onto certain groups of humans) just running around miserable grasping at bits to survive and having no inner or outer lives otherwise.

"Instead of imposing a human story onto Flaco’s life, let him motivate you in whatever cause you feel drawn toward. Make windows safer for birds. Curtail the use of rat poison. Campaign for humane zoos, better wildlife sanctuaries, maybe even an end to captive breeding for exhibition."

This we can agree on. Except your wording of "humane zoos" next to "better wildlife sanctuaries" makes it seem like zoos are better and that zoos- for profit entertainment industries- can ever be humane. Turning zoos into the wildlife sanctuaries they lie about being is really the only solution for the animals already stuck there and no further captive breeding. This paragraph also conflicts with the rest of the article where you are railing against anyone wanting to see Flaco in the wild. I don't see you suggest even once that he should go to a sanctuary or be taken to his native land. You call for recapture by the zoo. Yet, you accuse others of anthropomorphism.

"But don’t let any that erase the bird himself. Take him on his own terms, because so many failed to do so when he was alive. That was part of what killed him."

You could start by taking him on his own terms. And no, people's love of seeing him free is not what killed him. Poison, disease, and mirrored glass killed him- all created by humans, just like they kill tons of owls every year who were never in captivity.

"Flaco deserved better than a life in a cage, but it’d be hard to argue that what he got was any better.

Once he was out, Flaco fans, acting out of a professed affection for him, endeavored to keep him there. There, he died."

And your solution is to return him to a cage to die a little slower. And you're still putting most of the blame in this entire article on people who loved this bird, people who were inspired by him to become birders, join conservation efforts, learn about pesticides and window collisions, etc, and some people who just liked this one particular bird. Not the zoo breeders/PR team/CEOs/etc, not the breeders, not the pesticide manufacturers, not the mirrored glass architectures, etc. No, it's the people who loved the bird that killed him. Ok.

"To take Flaco as an inspiration is to miss the point. His year of so-called freedom was tragic from the start."

So much for taking animals on their own terms, eh? He is an inspiration even with the tragedy he endured. He overcame so much and did the best he could with every deck stacked against him. If we revere someone for climbing everest or surviving a natural disaster or crash in the wilderness or any other trial and tribulation, why can we also not celebrate other animals for beating the odds for as long as they can? I am not trying to act like every single person thought or acted perfectly. But, it is so EXHAUSTING to see this argument about Flaco fans being the main reason he died coming from some birders. It is honestly astounding how anthropocentric this is. It is also a reminder of just how good zoo PR is, how good poison manufacturers are at redirecting attention, how good city governments and businesses are at avoiding accountability, and how some people who claim to care about other animals are completely unaware of their own bias. There is a long history of people calling things "anthropomorphism" in regards to other animals including even basic things like suggesting they feel pain. More research debunks these misconceptions every year. Yet, so many refuse to realize how blinded they are by anthropocentrism FAR MORE than anthropomorphism.

There. Now I have written the novella you never wanted in order to "seriously engage" with your article. Perhaps I am harsh and you are receiving the built up ire of seeing multiple articles like this. I am sure we both care a ton about birds. But, please reexamine why you place the blame where you do and what systemic structures have influenced your judgment.

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