Dancing Bears in India.

770 Words4 Pages
How do you treat your puppy? Imagine having a thick piercing forced through your nose with a large metal ring inserted. How would you feel if you were beaten and forced to “dance” all day. No matter how tired and hungry you felt? Most animals are intelligent and they certainly feel pain. Would you treat your puppy like this? Imagine being taken by poachers, (pause) having a golf ball sized hole drilled into your skull then having a rope tethered around your mouth. Then Imagine having the rope pulled and tugged and forced to dance, by walking over hot coals, as your master is beating your legs whilst pulling and tugging on the rope. Soon you will learn to associate music and the pulling of the rope with the pain of the soles of your feet, and so that you will begin to start dancing as soon as the music is heard. Imagine facing this harsh reality every day of your life. You would never expect this to happen in todays world would you? Well not in India, this horrendous outcome of events happens on a daily occurrence to Bears living in the mountains. The so called Dancing Bears are succumbed to being taken away from their families. Every captured cub must undergo the painful ordeal of having its sensitive muzzle pierced so that it can be controlled. (pause) It is held down without anesthetic while a crude iron needle is heated in a coal fire and plunged through the cub’s muzzle, with a group of men holding the squealing cub tight. The tug of this rope, along with an intense fear of the strike of a heavy stick, motivates the bear to lift its legs in turn and 'dance'. To prevent human injuries, the cubs’ canine teeth are filed down and broken off and often sold to tourists as lucky charms. This maims the bear for life and without these teeth a return to the wild is impossible. The tradition of “dancing” bears has existed in India for
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