Potoooooooo
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http://gizmodo.com/this-celebrity-studded-instagram-petting-zoo-is-a-disas-1750359929
Instagram’s most famous animal rescue foundation is beloved by celebrities and millions of fans, and completely and utterly terrifying. Scrolling through the Black Jaguar-White Tiger™ feed is like seeing the beginning of Grizzly Man play out on social media.
On this season of Keeping Up With the Kardashians, Khloe Kardashian and Kendall Jenner visit the Black Jaguar-White Tiger™ site on a quick getaway. They tussle on the floor with cubs, and one nibbles on Khloe’s shoe as she holds up her phone to document. Khloe accompanies the owner, Eduardo “Big Papa” Serio, into an enclosure filled with grown lions, where they briefly surround her. He calls her brave.
Paris Hilton, Kaley Cuoco, Lewis Black, Debra Messing, Kellan Lutz, the Backstreet Boys, and Kate Walsh have also visited Serio’s compound and played with the animals he owns.
Since launching in 2013, Black Jaguar-White Tiger™ has cultivated celebrity fans and 4.3 million Instagram followers with photos of Serio and his guests cuddling with a growing collection of over 200 lynxes, pumas, lions, leopards, jaguars, and tigers. Serio’s Mexico compound is becoming a buzzy destination, where the rich and famous can be photographed chilling with exotic animals without feeling guilty about it. These animals were rescued, after all. It’s raising awareness. It’s practically charity.
Except that Black Jaguar-White Tiger™ is not a sanctuary accredited by the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries, which is the standard-bearer in independent sanctuary accreditors. Getting an accreditation doesn’t mean a sanctuary is safe—fatal big cat attacks have occurred on sanctuaries with this recognition—but Serio’s heavily publicized cat compound stands out as particularly irresponsible because he allows untrained visitors to frolic with full-grown cats. That’s pretty much the opposite of what the GFAS recommends:
Serio, who calls these alpha predators his babies and angels, claims to rescue them from circuses, breeders, and other dismal circumstances. But most of their origins are not publicly documented, as blogger Jacalyn Beales recently pointed out. Serio also admits to buying some cubs from private breeders, and refuses to spay or neuter the animals on the grounds that it denies them “a natural life.”
As his followers continue to rise, the idea that it’s cool for people to interact with big cats as long as they’re rescued with love spreads. As though, somehow, human intention has an iota of sway over whether a cat decides to maul you or not.
Instagram’s most famous animal rescue foundation is beloved by celebrities and millions of fans, and completely and utterly terrifying. Scrolling through the Black Jaguar-White Tiger™ feed is like seeing the beginning of Grizzly Man play out on social media.
On this season of Keeping Up With the Kardashians, Khloe Kardashian and Kendall Jenner visit the Black Jaguar-White Tiger™ site on a quick getaway. They tussle on the floor with cubs, and one nibbles on Khloe’s shoe as she holds up her phone to document. Khloe accompanies the owner, Eduardo “Big Papa” Serio, into an enclosure filled with grown lions, where they briefly surround her. He calls her brave.
Paris Hilton, Kaley Cuoco, Lewis Black, Debra Messing, Kellan Lutz, the Backstreet Boys, and Kate Walsh have also visited Serio’s compound and played with the animals he owns.
Since launching in 2013, Black Jaguar-White Tiger™ has cultivated celebrity fans and 4.3 million Instagram followers with photos of Serio and his guests cuddling with a growing collection of over 200 lynxes, pumas, lions, leopards, jaguars, and tigers. Serio’s Mexico compound is becoming a buzzy destination, where the rich and famous can be photographed chilling with exotic animals without feeling guilty about it. These animals were rescued, after all. It’s raising awareness. It’s practically charity.
Except that Black Jaguar-White Tiger™ is not a sanctuary accredited by the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries, which is the standard-bearer in independent sanctuary accreditors. Getting an accreditation doesn’t mean a sanctuary is safe—fatal big cat attacks have occurred on sanctuaries with this recognition—but Serio’s heavily publicized cat compound stands out as particularly irresponsible because he allows untrained visitors to frolic with full-grown cats. That’s pretty much the opposite of what the GFAS recommends:
Serio, who calls these alpha predators his babies and angels, claims to rescue them from circuses, breeders, and other dismal circumstances. But most of their origins are not publicly documented, as blogger Jacalyn Beales recently pointed out. Serio also admits to buying some cubs from private breeders, and refuses to spay or neuter the animals on the grounds that it denies them “a natural life.”
As his followers continue to rise, the idea that it’s cool for people to interact with big cats as long as they’re rescued with love spreads. As though, somehow, human intention has an iota of sway over whether a cat decides to maul you or not.