Controversial Anti-Circus Billboards Welcome Ringling Bros. to Los Angeles

Animal Protection Institute
Monday, 16 July 2001

Los Angeles - When Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus arrives in Los Angeles later this week, they'll be greeted not by cheers and applause, but rather, by billboards in English -- and for the first time, also in Spanish -- showing elephants in chains with the headline, "The Cruelest Show on Earth." The billboards, sponsored by United Animal Nations (UAN) and the Animal Protection Institute (API), encourage people to, "Say NO to Animal Circuses." Locations and spokespersons are available upon request.

Ringling Bros. opens in Inglewood on July 18. We urge reporters to include the views of animal advocates in their coverage.

Facts about Ringling Bros. Circus:

- May 1999 -- Ringling Bros. was warned by the Animal Care Division of the USDA for using ropes to forcibly remove two young elephants, Doc and Angelica, from their mothers. Visible scars were left on the legs of the young elephants.

- July 1999 -- Benjamin, a four-year-old elephant mysteriously drowned while on a stopover from Houston to Dallas, TX.

- June 2000 -- A former Ringling Bros. employee testified before the U.S. Congress that elephants in the circus "live in confinement and ... are beaten all the time when they don't perform properly."

- July 2000 -- Ringling Bros. was cited by the USDA for failing to provide tigers with adequate water while traveling across the desert from Las Vegas to Fresno. Ringling was also cited for lack of proper ventilation in a tiger transportation vehicle which caused the temperature to rise to dangerous levels. One tiger injured an eye and broke off a tooth while attempting to escape from his overheated cage.

"When you buy a ticket to the circus, the animals pay the price," asserts Dena Jones, API Program Director. "Unnatural living conditions, brutal training methods, and a stressful life of travel are common to animals used in all circuses. These conditions can in no way compare to a life of freedom in their natural habitat. We're placing the billboards to remind people -- the only humane circuses are those that don't use animals."

"As advanced as humans are, we have not advanced to a state of compassion where we no longer want to see animals doing unnatural things in an unnatural environment," charges Jeane Westin, UAN President. "We want the message of 'The Cruelest Show on Earth' to bring people to that kind of new awareness."

For more information, or to contact Animal Protection Institute, see their website at: www.api4animals.org