First, I ask you to take a look at this website:
http://www.gwpark.org/Once you can get past the atrocious grammar, spelling, and hilariously defensive paragraphs in almost every section of the website (especially in the breeding program section), you'll hopefully see what my beef with this organization is. I'll separate it into parts.
1. They were once called a sanctuary, but since then have changed to an exotic animal park. They blame this on others except themselves. They have hundreds of animals, and not a single one of them is released. They breed their tigers (I'll get into this later). They used to do magic shows with the tigers, but apparently have stopped since then. They allow the public to play with cute, adorable baby tigers for a fee of $25. This organization has clearly moved away from being a sanctuary on their own, and have decided to make a profit off of these animals. How they're still a non-profit organization I'll never know.
2. The owner, Joe "Exotic" Schriebvogel, has been rumored to be a very prominent dealer in the exotic pet trade. He is extremely defensive when it comes to anything about his park, and especially PETA, who seems to have a huge problem with his park. I don't like PETA either, but he takes it to the extreme. As mentioned earlier, he breeds his tigers, which is obvious, or how else would he have baby tigers for his $25 tiger playing thing? What gets me is, how often is he breeding these tigers to have these adorable babies year round? He claims they're going to zoos around the world because cubs "ship easier" than adults. That's a lot of zoos to ship tigers around to several times throughout the year. I doubt tigers in zoos are that much of a demand. But let's look back at his exotic pet trade past. He's extremely pro-exotic pets. There is a 6 minute video or so on their website detailing the benefits to having exotic pets, and how he even prefers them to be in captivity instead of the wild because "a tiger will live 20 years in captivity but only 5 years in the wild!" while showing graphic images of the spoils of tiger hunts. He also claims on his website to be breeding "a new species. All natural with no interference of man." First of all, this sentence makes no sense whatsoever. Second of all, he's breeding Barbary lions, and he gives no reason for it, other than getting them registered. Registered for what? He doesn't mention release, just "so they don't become extinct." Registered so he can sell them? Clearly he thinks they belong in captivity (as pets!!) more than the wild, so it's obvious what his intentions are.
3. He's
anti-animal rights laws. Not only is he anti-PETA (I can live with that) he's anti Humane Society, and abhors animal rights laws. When horse meat production was made illegal, he posted a link on his website showing what happened to a horse because it was left to live (??) instead of die at the meat packing plant. Because he lived, whoever owned him neglected him and caused his skin to grow over his bridle, or whatever that thing horses wear on their faces is. That neglect has NOTHING to do with animal rights laws, if anything, animal rights laws would cause that owner to be fined for neglecting the horse!! ARGH I just wanna scream at this moron's logic.
4. If you're one of the malls who refuses to host his magic show or cute baby tiger display, he adds you to a video showing how awful you are for not allowing him. This scared many malls into being forced to allow him to be there, regardless of protests that may occur at the mall or before the visit. Several malls have been protested against, only to allow Joe Exotic to show up anyway. It's extortion and it's wrong.
In short, I highly recommend you do not support this pathetic excuse for an organization. Protest your local mall if they come a knocking. To exploit your animals for profit is wrong and selfish. Let them know it. I also accept any counter arguments if you're aware of this organization already, you might teach me a thing or two.
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