I’m going to start with a trigger warning: this blog contains the word “woke” – partly because I am genuinely “down wiv da kidz”, but also because this word, for me, sums up where we are with understanding the full extent of our responsibilities, both as an industry and as humans with regard to animal welfare.
In March 2019 the BVA released an open letter regarding the welfare of animals on the TV show I’m a Celebrity… Get me out of here! This is another step along the road of a movement to acknowledge that where we see an issue – be it with animals in our care or not – we can, and should, speak out and ask about the care of the animals you see are receiving.
That all sounds great, but I’m aware I haven’t done this every time I’ve seen potential compromises in welfare – and this is where being “woke” comes into this blog.
Adolescent naivety
I can recall as a teenager seeing pictures of the orca tanks at theme parks and my common sense telling me they were too small for those animals to live in safely. I assumed that these were the “show tanks” they swam to for part of the day, while there was an underwater tunnel to the “living tanks” the public didn’t see.
Looking back now I feel a bit naive thinking that, but my common sense about the living conditions was correct and my faith in humans to care properly for the animals in their charge was a bit misplaced. I was quite relieved when I revealed my naivety to a colleague who told me they had assumed the same thing.
It’s taken some years for welfare legislation to even start to catch up with our common sense and we’re seeing an increase in people “being woke“ and asking about the welfare of the animals they see. With the reach of TV and social media, this doesn’t mean it’s just the animals in their care they ask about either. They also want to ask about the animals they see everywhere – and, in the UK, we in the veterinary profession are in a unique position to advise and support the public.
Whenever, wherever
I’m sure some wonder about the use of time for the BVA to write about animals not under UK law – but welfare is welfare, wherever we are. If we are to continue to remain a positive force for animals in the public’s opinion, then letters like this one are very important.
The space in between the advice we give as professionals and that of “word of mouth” advice between clients is rapidly being filled by the (sometimes vacuous) opinions on social media, so we need to be a strong and identifiable voice that can be heard above the noise about animal welfare on social media.
This era of “being woke” isn’t underlining a time period where we have achieved the ideal welfare conditions for every animal, it’s part of a journey we are all on to be part of a world that knows our care for animals is better at this point in time than it was previously, yet is also evolving.
Asking the bigger questions
The use of multiple animals on TV shows is just one part of the journey where we should be asking the bigger questions about where and how these animals are cared for when not on our screens for five minutes. My teenage common sense was right all those years ago, your common sense is probably right now. As a human you should be asking for better, and, as a veterinary professional, you have the power to help others be better.
We can look to the past to see what we can do better, but we don’t need to beat ourselves up over the things we did before we knew better: our options for research and understanding improve with time; the equipment, medications and techniques we use are all improving too; we know more about behaviour, nutrition and environmental needs – and we continue to build on all this.
Being “woke” or motivated to be a voice for welfare shouldn’t be a way to berate others for not being as great as us (the word “woke” is sometimes used in this way); instead, let’s make our unique position in the UK a movement to include as many as possible in on the journey to greater welfare.
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