Loving the wild to death — Athena Rhodes

I watched them get closer and closer. Their phones held out in front of them, armed and ready. The target a fur seal. Male. Sleeping on the rocks, as is customary to find a fur seal. But his nice little nap is rudely interrupted by a group of four eager to take their photos with him—in other words, the wildlife paparazzi have arrived. The seal gives chase to one member of the group as he gets too close. The man runs, precious phone held tightly in his hand as he scrambles over rocks trying to escape from the surprisingly swift fur seal. They may look a bit clumsy on land, but they sure can move when they want to.

I witnessed this spectacle more than once while visiting Kaikoura, the wildlife capital of New Zealand. Despite many signs warning people not to get close to the seals, the draw of obtaining a YOLO selfie with a seal to share online overrides common sense. And this spectacle was not just reserved for Kaikoura, at the Cape Palliser fur seal colony I spotted two elderly people trying to corner a seal for a photo on their iPad. Yes, they looked ridiculous, yes they were being disrespectful and no, they did not listen when I asked them to leave the seal alone.

The phenomenon of seeing an animal as a prop for a photo is unfortunately far from uncommon. In Yellowstone National Park, there is an annual tally of visitors who are gored or thrown in the air by angry bison after they venture too close. Last year, a 72-year-old woman was gored by a bison after she repeatedly got within 3 meters of the animal trying to get a photo. She sustained multiple gored injuries was airlifted to the hospital and was later released perhaps with a few more scars and greater respect for the wild's need for space. And just this month, a 25-year-old woman was gored and thrown 3m in the air by a female bison when she tried to approach the wild animal.

The bison were left unscathed in these altercations, but this is not always the case. Sometimes the animal suffers immensely because of humanity's selfie culture. In 2017, a baby dolphin washed ashore at a popular beach in Spain. A crowd converged around the animal and the dolphin was passed around for selfies. Afterwards, it was discarded on the beach, where it died of dehydration and stress. And this year, a dolphin died in Texas after being ridden by tourists after coming ashore. And believe it or not, it gets so much worse. Animals are bred, captured from the wild, tortured and beaten, and made into a tourist attraction for photos.

Smiling widely, a woman holds out a tiger's tail her hand possessively placed over his ribs. The tiger's mouth hanging open, his eyes unfocused and dazed. The photo seems tame compared to another where a woman proudly grabs onto a tiger's testicles while smiling at the camera. At Thailand’s Tiger Kingdom for 800 THB, around $36 NZD, you can pick a big cat and pose with them like an idiot. This is just one such place that promotes a service of tiger selfies in Thailand.

In South America, sloths are pulled out of the rainforest illegally, sold as cheap as 13USD in the exotic pet trade, or to be used as selfie props. According to World Animal Protection, they are among the most “selfied” animals on the planet. The organization analysed Instagram images and discovered that 70% of sloth selfies involved hugging or using them as a prop. A single sloth can be used for hundreds of photos a day.

One disturbing photo online shows a woman riding a turtle’s shell-like some kind of macabre surfing attempt. The turtle looks defeated. The woman looks elated. Another photo that tourists can add to their exploitative scrapbook is one of the rare pink dolphins. Only found in Brazil, they are baited and then surrounded by tourists as they all clamour to touch its rubbery skin. The touch from humans is highly stressful for the dolphin, a fact ignored with the promise of a ‘cool’ photo and story to tell people back home.

Photo by Nico Smith. Swimming with dolphins can cause them stress and we can also give them diseases

The markets of Morocco have Barbary Macaques chained up. For a small fee, you can pose next to one. The monkey is highly endangered, a fact largely unknown to visiting tourists, and rather than being respected and protected, they are made to dance and pose for a tourist's camera. A study was done that surveyed 200 tourists and asked whether they had or would take photos with the macaque. 88% said that they had not or never would take photos with the macaques in the market. The few who did say they did so because they wanted to interact with a wild animal. And sadly, only one in four knew that this species was endangered.

In Japan, you can stroll into an Owl Cafe and have a pat and snuggle with an owl that is kept up during the daylight hours and tied down to a branch, curbing two natural instincts of this animal, flight and nocturnal nature. Japan has a range of these novelty cafes that use cute wild animals as a drawcard to bring "animal-loving" tourists in to spend their yen while they poke and prod at animals who quite frankly have given up the will to live. As some reviewers share, these are some of the most depressing places they have ever visited. A sense of defeatism surrounds these animals. Living but not really.

The question must be asked - why. Why do people endanger an animal, themselves, or both for a photo?

One huge reason is social media klout. Likes, followers, and comments praising the poster's crazy cool life are a reason why people seek out cute or rare animals to pose next to or to stick a camera in their faces.

When we constantly consume content that is showing disrespectful people-animal interactions it becomes normalized. When we see someone go close for a seal photo, we think to ourselves it must be okay because they are doing it. Same with any kind of behaviour. When we witness it happen, especially on a public forum such as social media, then it is normalized and people are more likely to mimic said behaviour as they see these people doing it, it looks like fun or they are getting social media likes and there are no negative repercussions. The more people support exploitive animal tourism ventures or impinge on wild animals' space and rights without consequence, the more this behaviour will happen. And sometimes in the extreme, such as the dolphin being passed around until its death. Animals are being seen less and less as something individual and deserving of respect, and more as something that is in juxtaposition to humanity and is used as we please.

Instagram has attempted to curb these exploitive animal selfies by placing barriers to searches such as #tigerselfies. Rather than getting a page of smiling idiots with depressed-looking tigers, we get a popup that tells the user that searching for this hashtag is encouraging harmful behavior to animals or the environment.

And you may think you are not harming wildlife if you do not dip into your wallet and support any of these exploitive animal tourism ventures, but if you approach an animal in the wild for a selfie you are just as tone-deaf. Wild animals need space. Start appreciating them from afar. Get to know what an animal's stress response is. For example, many people will try and take a sloth selfie with a wild sloth, the sloth will often have its arm raised. This is not the sloth looking for a hug, high five, or doing a yoga pose, this is a stress response and the animal feels threatened. It is a good idea to learn what an animal’s behavior is like when they are stressed or agitated so you can identify when you are harassing or too close to an animal.

Even if it is not for the photo, humans are a collector of experiences. They want to know what it feels like to touch a sloth, feed an elephant or swim with a dolphin. This is a case of selfishness, where they place their need for fun and excitement over an animal's comfort. Even though it may look like a sloth is smiling while some clueless tourist cuddles them like their favourite plushie, they are far from having a good time. It has been found that the mere approach from a human causes a sloth’s blood pressure to spike. Often at a sloth selfie spot, the same sloth is pulled out time after time, to be used in hundreds of photos per day. Resulting in a lot of stress for that animal.

Humanity has a complicated and rather dysfunctional relationship with the wild. We love them, we call ourselves animal lovers. Yet we turn around and perpetuate animal cruelty by trying to take selfies with them and invading their space or supporting things like owl cafes. Even though we say we are animal lovers, we place ourselves first. For the pursuit of a second of internet fame, of discovering what an owl feels like beneath their fingertips, or being able to brag to a friend that they cuddled a baby tiger. It is all a little messed up. Our need for internet points and our own vanity and fear of FOMO is bleeding into and impacting other species. Let's do better by the wild.