Mission: Urge Carson & Barnes Circus to Stop Using Animals!

Posted by Calvin on June 28, 2024

Carson & Barnes Circus has been cited for more than 100 violations of the federal Animal Welfare Act—including for failing to provide animals with basic necessities like adequate veterinary care, the minimum required space, shelter from the elements, and clean water. 😡 A vid of veteran trainer Tim Frisco shows him hitting elephants with a bullhook—a sharp steel-tipped weapon that looks like a fireplace poker—and shocking them with an electric prod. 🐘😨

The abuse doesn’t stop there. When not forced to perform uncomfortable and demeaning circus tricks, the elephants are confined at the Endangered Ark Foundation in Oklahoma. Frisco manages the training at this exploitative facility where elephants are bred and trained for the circus.

Elephant calves learn crucial social and behavioral skills from their mothers and other members of their fam, with whom they share intense emotional bonds. Instead of experiencing all these things in their natural homes, these animals are exploited—made to do meaningless circus tricks on the road or put in dangerous direct-contact encounters like bathing, feeding, and photo ops—at the Endangered Ark Foundation. 😭Using elephants in this manner is a form of speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. It’s also dangerous af: One woman was left disabled and disfigured after sustaining life-threatening injuries during an encounter with an elephant.

Please politely urge Carson & Barnes Circus to end its cruel animal acts, send the animals to reputable sanctuaries, and highlight its human talent instead. ❤️ Here’s how to earn points in our Rewards Program for completing this mission:

1. Send polite comments to Kristin Parra at [email protected]. You’re welcome to use our sample letter below, but putting your message in your own words will be more effective:

I was disturbed to learn that Carson & Barnes Circus decided to continue using elephants in direct-contact encounters despite reports that a woman was left disabled and disfigured after sustaining life-threatening injuries in one such encounter at your facility. Forcing elephants to interact with visitors is cruel and a public safety risk. These animals need to be retired from circus life.

Modern audiences are turning away from circuses with animals, and numerous cities and states across the country are enacting bans on wild-animal acts. After shutting down following 146 years of animal abuse, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus announced its return without animals, joining the many modern, humane circuses that dazzle audiences with only willing human performers.

Please recognize this shift in public sentiment by eliminating your animal acts, discontinuing dangerous public-contact encounters, sending the animals to reputable sanctuaries where they can live in peace, and highlighting your circus’s human talent instead.

Thank you for your consideration of this important matter.

2. Take a screenshot of your e-mail and submit it for 15 30 peta2 points. You’ll earn double the points all summer long for taking action to help animals on peta2.com! (Heads-up: You’ll only get points once for completing this mission.)