SubscribeWe did it again. Penguins cancelled at Riverside
by Darren
Once again a great job was done by everyone to persuade Riverside to cancel their penguin stunt on Saturday 11 December 2010. As with the Hamleys posts, I’ve consolidated them (into just one post this time) to avoid having too many posts without pictures clogging up what is a photography site. They are posted in chronological order of when they appeared:
Here we go again. Penguins aren’t Christmas Decorations Riverside
A chance to meet real live penguins. We stopped that I hear you cry. 180,000 of us sent 2.9m tweets, we phoned and emailed, we contacted the Council and animal welfare organisations. And Hamleys listened. The pictures I took and more details are in a previous post.
Now it appears that Riverside shopping centre in Hemel Hempstead seem to think it’s a good idea to use penguins to bring in the customers this Christmas. They’re going to be having them outside of HMV on Saturday – THIS WEEKEND! There’s no time to lose. There is no place for live penguins in a hot busy shopping centre, outside of a music store. They are animals which get stressed very easily. They should not have to endure crowds of people and screaming children in the name of selling Christmas.
When Hamleys tried this we got it raised on the floor of the House of Commons, and Mark Pritchard, Secretary of the All Party Group on Conservation and Wildlife said “Penguins should not be used as festive merchandising.” We agree, and we’re going to try to work with Parliamentarians as soon as possible to get this cruel practice banned.
In the meantime, I need your help again. We need you to tweet and email and phone and do all the things you did the last time, but we only have 24 hours.
What you can do:
- Send twitter messages to get the same wonderful crowd of people involved as last time. Use the hashtag #riversnide – another great James Barisic invention.
- Email info@riversidehemel.com – the centre’s manager is Joanna Hall so mark it for her attention. Let them know all the reasons why this is wrong, but please remain polite.
- Phone Riverside – 01442 229350 and ask to speak to the manager to complain. Again remain polite. You can fax them too if you wish: 01442 229351.
- Contact Dacorum Borough Council and ask their Environment team to send welfare inspectors to inspect the shopping centre – 01442 228000 or email feedback@dacorum.gov.uk
- Leave your comments on the Riverside Facebook page. Even if you email or call it’s important to get the message across in every way possible.
I asked a lot of you last time and I’m sorry to do it again, but it really is just one day this time. One day in which we can change the world again. Hopefully one day soon we can stop this kind of thing permanently, but for now we need to campaign one day at a time.
FAO Joanna Hall – Email: Please cancel penguins at Riverside
To: info@riversidehemel.com
Subject: URGENT: FAO Joanna Hall – Penguin event
Dear Joanna
I was extremely disturbed to learn tonight that you are holding an event with live penguins this Saturday at your shopping centre. I have some experience of these situations, having recently started a social media campaign which resulted in Hamleys cancelling a similar event. 180,000 people posted 2.9m twitter messages, plus sent thousands of emails and phone calls telling them it was wrong. The situation was picked up by national press including The Sun, The Guardian, The London Evening Standard and in the media, BBC and Sky News.
It was also raised at question time on the floor of the House of Commons by Jo Swinson MP, and received support from Mark Pritchard MP, the Secretary of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Animal Welfare. Welfare concerns were expressed by respected animal charities such as the Born Free Foundation and Wildlife Aid. Even organisations such as London Zoo who, as you probably know, keep penguins themselves said they had welfare concerns.
Hamleys finally agreed that their store was no place for penguins, and listened to their customers. As you can see we have a broad cross section of support from the normally placid British Public, people who are naturally YOUR customers. Please listen.
Penguins come from the other end of our planet in the Southern Hemisphere. They belong in the wild. The environment you will offer them in your store is a different world to their natural habitat, and not even anywhere near the environment that a properly equipped zoo would offer. What you are doing to try to attract customers to your shopping centre this Christmas is wrong, and I hope you will recognise that tomorrow and cancel this event immediately. Do that, and even I’ll come and shop there on Saturday, and I might even manage to persuade a few of my 180,000 fellow campaigners to do so too!
Yours sincerely
Darren Hector
We did it again. Penguins cancelled at Riverside.
We did it again. Penguins have been cancelled at Riverside in the snottiest snidest statement possible, but they have cancelled and that’s the main thing.
Just to correct a few points:
- We were never going to demonstrate, never threatened to physically demonstrate, and went out of our way to explain to Riverside centre manager, Joanna Hall, that this is not what we are about. Unlike the shopping centre, we have concern for the welfare of the animals that are being used in this display and a demonstration would just cause additional stress.
- Yes, Hamleys told us the trainers were experienced keepers too – for 40 years. We later found out that the animals were being supplied by a company with strong links (by both marriage and sharing premises) to the Chipperfield Family. I wonder if Riverside were using the same ‘supplier’?
- We appreciate that the law has some gaps and that it hasn’t kept up with public opinion – indeed as I said last night we are hoping to work with legislators as soon as possible to outlaw this crazy cruel practice of using exotic animals to sell merchandise in shops.
- The event was for educational purposes? At least Riverside didn’t try to tell children that penguins are from the North Pole like Hamleys did, but it’s wrong to teach children that animals are playthings that they can cart about and exploit at will. Also, see my earlier point on the possible provenance of the penguins. Are these the people you want teaching your children?
- They weren’t doing it to attract business during the festive period? Pull the other one, it’s got sleigh bells on!
- “The safety and enjoyment of our customers shopping experience is our only interest.” Now we’re getting to the truth. Good job we were prepared to stand up for the welfare of the penguins, because this shows Riverside just didn’t care.
Thanks again for your superb support, and we’ll keep campaigning against these crazy stunts until hopefully we can get the law changed.
Have a great Christmas. I hope for most of us the rest of the season will be live penguin free …. that is those who aren’t going to visit them in the wild! And if you are, you lucky lucky thing. Send us a postcard!
When will they ever learn
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Comments left, email sent. Is anything being done to investigate the welfare of the animals under the “care” of Amazing Animals?
For a start they ain’t in a hot shopping centre riverside is an outdoor shopping centre so get your facts straight first secondly they have had many animals displays here all over the year so what’s your problems all of a sudden.
Outdoor animals are not toys, they are living beings, same as you and deserve our respect
Imagine for a moment that we only have so much energy, a bit like a car battery. Now imagine in our daily lives, we choose to expend energy on some things and not others however it is impossible to expend huge energy on every endeavour as we’d end up with a flat batter (nervous exhaustion). now, just for a moment wonder what might be possible if you had channelled all the energy you have used in this “campaign” into some other area of your life, like perhaps photography. i am absolutely certain that you’d have become the best photographer in the world. the world is often best viewed through a wide angle lens than a telephoto one.
What’s the difference between these human-friendly, english-raised penguins and our pet animals? Would you be so upset if that pen had a litter of puppies in it?
Actually Sally, if puppies were presented in the same way in a shopping centre, I would be upset. As for ‘human-friendly’, there is no such thing. Penguins never become accustomed to humans, and are animals that become stressed incredibly easily. I invite you to read this research: http://bit.ly/e182mm which explains the effect of stress and handling of penguins in captivity and the resulting increased mortality.
Mike, imagine for a moment there are people in this world who don’t just channel their energy towards self. People who have concerns about how we as a species behave towards other animals. Imagine there are people who get fulfilment from learning that the world is a tiny bit better because of the energy they expended. Over the last two weeks, there are 180,000 people who supported this campaign, and who woke up last Friday and this Saturday knowing they made a difference.
Sure, I could go to a zoo, or hire some privately owned big cats and go and get what I’m sure would be incredible pictures, but I do tend to go through life thinking that just because I can, doesn’t mean I should.
Darren: what makes you so convinced that you are an expert on animal welfare. Just accept that we live in a democracy and things that e all disagree with will happen. Exhibiting a couple of trained penguins in an outdoor shopping centre is hardly the most important issue in the world, UK or – dare I say it – Hemel Hempstead.
You might be better off focussing on – say – standards of welfare in slaughterhouses …. but that’s a lot less of a ‘sexy’ campaign than petitions about penguins.
Yo9u may well be well-intentioned, but your influence is unfair and asymmetric. Shopping centres fear what SHAC-like protestors would do …. and you trade on that.
Stay away, do something else – and just chill.
Mils.
Mils, we do live in a democracy, which means we all have the right to make our opinion known, to seek support for it, and to try and change things that we disagree with. And when a campaign attracts 180,000 very vocal people in just four days, I think that shows there’s quite a lot of support and quite a lot of will for change.
Now we may be doing something that you disapprove of …. but I’m afraid you’ll have to ‘chill’ too and just live with that.
Now Johann Hari sent me an interesting comment piece that he wrote, which I think Mils would do best to have a read, It is titled ‘How to spot a lame, lame argument’
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/johann-hari-how-to-spot-a-lame-lame-argument-1667373.html
Johann Hari article Published in the IOS on April 2009.
Sally – the difference between the wild captive bred penguins and domesticated pet animals – well you work it out!
A possible suggestion for Sally and Mils.
The bloke who dresses in red and has a white beard is coming very soon. Hopefully you have asked for a camera for Christmas this year. If so, then you too can get up and get out and explore the great flower and fauna that this country of ours has to offer and then you will hopefully learn exactly why people take to heart what the Riverside was proposing. Maybe you could take time out and volunteer at your local wildlife centre or even offer your services to the likes of Tiggywinkles etc.
Alternatively place yourself in the same room with all your family members for a few hours and see how stressed anyone gets and use that as a guide.
thankyou for your reply darren. i believe that before we seek to change the world we should always take a good look in the mirror (for it never lies) and ensure we are on top of our own game first. as we are all flawed in some way, that means take first, it is not a selfish act to focus on self it is in fact a selfless act as great thing happen in the world as a result of that change. i do find it odd though that you are ok with “pets” but not zoos?
Mike, if we wait until our own flaws are gone, then we’d wait forever!
Dear Darren,
If you are so concerned about the welfare of these animals then why do you not contact the zoo yourself? Talk to the owners and then make up you’re mind? Do you really have any knowledge yourself on these animals first hand? Have you ever worked with animals or seen the patience and love that these people put in to their work? Furthermore i am aware that this type of penguin are from a hot part of the world. Also if you have ever had the good fortune of meeting a penguin you would be aware that they are far noisier than any child you will find in hamleys.
Soph, it’s a bit bizarre that you ask if I have worked with animals. The title of this site and the hundreds of photographs should, I would think, make that clear. In addition to the obvious, I have also worked in a rescue centre tending to animals and returning them to the wild.
I’m sure these people do have patience and put effort into their work, but it doesn’t mean that bringing them to shopping centres and stores is compatible with their welfare.
So in short, no, you haven’t really got a working background with animals. Just photographs taken out in the wild. You rely on secondary information provided by groups that have a vested interest in stopping the wholesale usage of animals. Although I’m interested to know about the background of your photography with domestic pets? You may be aware that domestic animals can also suffer from stress in a working environment. What conditions were in place when you undertook these shoots? Can i ask did you use professional animal suppliers for the domestic animal photographs? Or where they owned by amateurs who are not answerable to any sort of governing body or under the supervision on a qualified veterinary practitioner?
Soph, clearly we aren’t going to agree on this, and I’m not going to debate here any further. You’ve made your thoughts known and so have I. I can confirm for you however, that I have never hired any animal in order to photograph it.
And as for my experience with wild animals, you have every right to question it and I have given you my answer. It’s not ‘just photographs in the wild’, and in any case if you ever looked into exactly how much work I do in terms of research, behavioural study and just watching wildlife before making photographs, you’d not make such sweeping statements.
Just because I haven’t worked in a circus doesn’t mean I’m not allowed an opinion on them. I don’t need to have physically abused animals to know that it’s wrong, do I?