birkenstock nuttery.

More proof that the extreme fringe of the "animal rights" crowd is more about hating humans than they are about loving animals.

In a nutshell...a polar bear cub is being hand-raised by zoo personnel in Berlin, because its mother rejected it. Some animal rights activists now claim that the bear would be better off dead than raised by humans, as such a thing is not "species-appropriate", and they would like to see the zoo euthanise the cub.

While they have a point about the natural selection process, zoos ("animal penitentiaries") are already pretty far removed from natural surroundings, especially when it comes to predators.

Some times, it's necessary to humanely put down an animal to spare it further suffering. I've had to do so more than once in the past, and it's never a pleasant thing, but there are cases where there's no quality of life left, and the barbiturate overdose means an end to needless suffering.

In this case, however, it seems a bit ludicrous to argue that the animal needs to be killed merely because it gets its milk from a bottle rather than a momma bear.

I've long held the opinion that extreme "animal rights" advocacy merely constitutes a socially acceptable outlet for nutcases to inflict harm on their fellow hated humans, and stuff like this tends to reinforce that opinion.