{"id":119024,"date":"2021-10-08T16:13:05","date_gmt":"2021-10-08T23:13:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=119024"},"modified":"2021-10-11T16:21:04","modified_gmt":"2021-10-11T23:21:04","slug":"the-elephant-in-sri-lanka-part-14","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2021\/10\/08\/the-elephant-in-sri-lanka-part-14\/","title":{"rendered":"THE ELEPHANT IN SRI LANKA Part 14"},"content":{"rendered":"

KAMALIKA PIERIS<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

Elephant\nactivists in Sri Lanka say keeping elephants in captivity in private premises\nis a form of animal cruelty. What they have in mind is Buddhist temples and devales.\nThey plan to take legal action if elephants in custody are returned to temples.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

They point\nout that countries like the USA and UK are recognizing elephants as legal\npersons. Legal Person does not mean becoming an ordinary person. It is a\ncreated category which permits a court of law to discuss that category. An item\nmust be recognized as a legal entity before law courts can give orders about it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This notion\nof giving objects the status of a legal person is not new. U.S. courts have\ndetermined that corporations can be legal persons.New Zealand   has recognized the Wanganui River as a legal\nperson.  The Maori wanted it. Ships have\nalso   been recognized as legal persons.\nTwo animals have been recognized as legal persons. Argentina\u2019s Cecilia the Chimpanzee and\nColumbia\u2019s Chucho the Bear, were recognized as legal persons, to get them taken\nout of their cruel environments. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the USA\nthis emancipation movement is led by an advocacy group called the Nonhuman\nRights Project NhRP\u2019. This Project is working to change the\nlegal status of great apes, elephants, dolphins, and whales to legal persons, who will have\ncertain rights in court. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The selection\nof animals is significant. These four  \nanimals are important species of wildlife in the eco tourist trade in Africa\nand Asia. They are tropical animals, not temperate ones.  They have no place in the USA. The animals\nimportant to USA, those in the dairy and meat trade are not included in this\nlist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The NhRP Project\nstarted in 2013 with lawsuits on behalf of four captive chimpanzees in New York. They selected\nchimps because of the similarity of chimps to humans. The four chimps were\nHercules and Leo, two 8-year-old chimpanzees being studied by a researcher at Stony Brook University, Tommy,\nowned by a couple in Gloversville, near Albany and Kiki, from Primate Sanctuary\nin Niagara Falls. The group wanted to transfer these four chimpanzees to a\nsanctuary in southern Florida, where they would live on a five-acre island with\n25 to 30 other chimpanzees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The case went all the way to appeal court and lost.  Court decided that humans are persons because\nthey\u2019re humans, and that chimps aren\u2019t persons because they\u2019re not humans .also\nthat chimps were not able to bear responsibilities and carry out social duties. Journalists\ncalled this case the NhRP\u2019s first rodeo. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then NhRP\u2019 turned to elephants. Elephants might stand a\nbetter chance than chimps, they thought. Apes are so close to us that it\nmakes some people uncomfortable. Judges may\nview us in a different way when we\u2019re dealing with an animal that doesn\u2019t look anything\nlike us but has many of the same characteristics, the Project said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Project moved to Connecticut as the legal system there was\nmore hospitable and looked around for an elephant to defend there. The Project found\nthree elephants in a small traveling circus, an outfit which lacked the money\nto oppose them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Three elephants in Connecticut just got a lawyer though they did\nnot ask for one said one headline. The trio of elephants, Beulah, Karen, and\nMinnie, never asked for legal representation, but they got one all the same, it\nsaid. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Minnie, Beulah and Karen are elephants who for decades\nhave belonged to a family-owned, traveling zoo in Connecticut. The\nthree elephants, ranging in age from 45 to 50, were captured as wild animals\nwhen they were young and have been used for decades in traveling circuses,\nfairs, and even birthday parties. Over the years, they\u2019ve also been hired\nout for appearances in advertisements, movies and weddings. The indignant owners\nsaid the elephants were well looked after and were treated as family. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Project filed habeas corpus petition on behalf of the\nelephants, arguing that they are legal persons\u201d with a right to liberty and\nasking the Connecticut Superior Court to order their release to a sanctuary. The Project\nwishes to send them to Animal Welfare Society\u2019s ARK 2000 natural habitat\nsanctuary.  It was the\nfirst-ever nonhuman rights lawsuit filed on behalf of captive elephants .The\nProject lost that case too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then the Project decided to take on an elephant in a major zoo. They\npicked the elephant Happy in Bronx Zoo in New York. Happy\u2019s companion had died\nand Happy was all alone in the zoo. Happy, was the star of a landmark 2006 Science<\/em>study describing how elephants can recognize themselves in mirrors, which\nis considered a measure of human-like awareness. The Project went to court to obtain\nthe release of Happy who would be transferred to a sanctuary\nin California with more space and the company of other elephants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The argument presented was that elephants have many of the\nqualities of humans. To support their case, the NhRP collected affidavits from\nnearly a dozen prominent elephant experts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These affidavits\ncited the elephant\u2019s empathy, self-awareness and long-term memory, as well as the\nability to use calls and gestures to discuss, plan and execute a course of\naction. They engage\nin innovative problem-solving, as well as cooperative problem-solving, the\nProject said. They know their past, they know they\u2019re in the present, and they\ncan plan a future.\u201d Elephants are\nlot like humans, and are entitled to physical liberty just like humans. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Project did not win this case either. But their activities\naroused interest in the whole issue of animals as legal persons. In the United\nStates, animals are regarded as property.  If animals are granted personhood they will have\nnegative rights,\u201d which means the right to not<\/em> be subjected to certain actions like confinement\nat zoos and medical experimentation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the elephant was made a legal person, that could usher\nin profound changes in legal status for animals, said analysts in USA.   <\/strong>Animal advocates could then work\ntheir way through the animal kingdom, moving from elephants and chimpanzees to other\ncreatures. People might claim personhood for farm animals. We kill millions of\nanimals a day for food in the USA.\u201d  There was also fear that the human-animal\ndistinction will be broken.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 Rather than rights, lawyers\nsuggest better animal-welfare protections.  The\nappropriate way to deal with concerns about captive animals is through expanded\nanimal welfare laws. Animal welfare has already conferred legal\nrights on animals. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Regardless of how Happy\u2019s case is decided, the legal landscape for\nanimals is changing said analysts. in USA an Oregon court ruled that animals could\nlegally be considered victims of crimes. The Animal Legal Defense Fund has\npushed for animals to be covered by the Freedom of Information Act. Ethicists\nhave suggested property rights for wild animals threatened by development, labor\nrights for working animals, and the use of citizenship theory as a framework\nfor thinking about animal rights. Domestic animals might be treated as\nfull-blown citizens, wild animals to members of other nations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2014, Nonhuman Rights Project said it was expanding its work\ninto other countries, beginning in Switzerland, Argentina, England, Spain,\nPortugal, and Australia. It is only a matter of time before the Project    arrives in Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Befriending elephants in USA will be very different to championing\nelephants in Sri Lanka. Sri Lankans will point out that   there is a long standing elephant culture in\nAsia. Bones of Asian elephants excavated at Mohenjodaro in the Indus Valley\nindicate that elephants were tamed and used for work. Decorated elephants are\ndepicted on seals. Sri Lanka had its own thriving elephant culture, which\nincluded a symbiotic relationship between the population and elephants. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A law suit\nsaying the Sri Lanka   elephant is a\nlegal person will be coming soon to the law courts of Sri Lanka. It will focus\non the tusker Bhanu. There will be much trumpeting. (Concluded)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KAMALIKA PIERIS Elephant activists in Sri Lanka say keeping elephants in captivity in private premises is a form of animal cruelty. What they have in mind is Buddhist temples and devales. They plan to take legal action if elephants in custody are returned to temples. They point out that countries like the USA and UK […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-119024","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kamalika-pieris"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=119024"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/119024\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=119024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=119024"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=119024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}