Summary
A baby red panda named Roxie at the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland died from “stress caused by fireworks” after choking on her vomit, just days after her mother’s sudden death.
The incident, occurring around the U.K.’s Bonfire Night celebrations, has led to renewed calls for stricter fireworks regulations.
A petition with over a million signatures urging restrictions on public fireworks sales was submitted to the U.K. government.
Edinburgh recently implemented limited fireworks control zones, but animal welfare advocates argue for broader measures to prevent similar tragedies.
So the zoo loses 2 red pandas in a couple days and instead of investigating the conditions of their care, they blame it on the public being loud?
There are easy ways to protect your pets from fireworks noise so this stinks of scapegoating for their own terrible care.
Has the mother also died from early Fireworks? Since when do fireworks cause vomiting…
This is just sensational reporting. From the comments, it looks like it is working. Usesome of the critical thinking we ask trump supporters to use. Medical science isn’t at the point that it can know which source of stress caused a thing. And in this case the baby had also lost it’s mother, a source of comfort. And read the whole article. “We know that fireworks can cause stress to other animals in the zoo and we cannot rule out that they may have contributed to the untimely death of Roxie’s mother Ginger, just five days’ earlier.”
They don’t even know what killed the mother.
I am sure the fireworks were a contributing factor, but sounds like the baby was already in a weakened state.
We collectively need to get over this concept that media is accurately representing the truth with intent to inform. Media is a business. It’s intent is to make money. And with lot’s of competitors, it can only survive by making the stories it reports more sensational than they are (cause their competitors are doing it) to get the clicks. Some are better than others, but they all have to do it to survive.
You’re correct that people should apply critical thought, and using a cute baby animal for this message is manipulative and people should be aware of that, but it doesn’t make the message any less important. There are many reasons to ban them. They look somewhat pretty, but you can go to a show done by professionals that’ll be more impressive.
Fireworks not only cause stress for animals, but also humans. (A pet peeve of mine is memorial day/Veterans day fireworks shows. In what world is throwing explosives around good for former soldiers?) They are a not insignificant cause of fires. They’re just generally harmful and do very little good. We don’t need them.
If spreading a manipulative article works to change people’s minds towards something better, it’s probably worth it. You can be sure other people are doing it against good.
Hello JD Vance. If you need deception to change people’s minds, maybe it’s you who is wrong.
Nope. If you just lay down and let the bad guys win because you refuse to fight, that isn’t the moral option. Be honest and use reason where it’s valuable, but don’t refuse to use emotions when that’s useful too. People with bad intention will be using it and refusing to play the game is only empowering them.
I used to think fireworks were fun, but after getting a dog that is terrified of them, you start noticing all the little things.
People shoot then off randomly throughout the year. They leave behind garbage waste. Animals and even some humans seem to get PTSD from them.
I’m in favor of very limited fireworks in specific areas.
I’m a veteran and used to get worked up by them. It took a few years but I mostly got over it because they were predictable, the city put out notices as well as the local baseball team. And then they were legalized for a specific time frame for everybody. Any random asshole could buy and shoot off fireworks during a 3 day window.
Cool, I can hang with that. But then they shoot them off randomly for the 2 weeks surrounding the weekend that they’re allowed. That I can’t hang with. Especially during the day. Why the fuck are you shooting them off during the day anyways?!? You can’t see it! The thing that pisses me off the most? The motherfuckers shooting shit off at random times and days? Those assholes would happily suck my dick if I told them I’m a veteran and told them to do so. But then they’d fire off more fireworks to celebrate doing so.
I’m dubious. Mom dies suddenly, then baby dies suddenly after choking on it’s own vomit. Yeah, no, let’s blame the fireworks. Surely, nothing else could be the cause of Red Panda deaths at this zoo.
Maybe they should have called some vet experts to investigate. Oh wait that is exactly what they did but I am sure people on the internets know more about animals. Not a big fan of zoos but people who armchair are magnitudes worse.
And no medical professional has ever been found to be biased in their opinion. And no reporter ever misrepresented what someone said to make a more sensational article. Stress is not a well understood thing. There is no test for confirming the source of stress. And the vets aren’t saying their is. Did the fireworks contribute, sure I would trust a vet who says that, and it was probably what they actually said. But a babies Mom dieing, and not being there to comfort the baby from the stress of fireworks is probably a bigger contributor. Also read a little further down where the expert says we can’t rule out fireworks as the cause. That is totally different. Seems like the vets don’t agree.
right and random strangers on the internet are completely unbiased and generally reasonable? It does not give one enough reason to completely disregard experts’opinions. vets are saying that it probably is a contributing factor whereas people in this thread are claiming that it is the zoo who is trying to cover up for bad conditions and negligence in the zoo. tell me which one sounds more reasonable?
Neither one has to be correct. One experts opinion is that they couldn’t rule it out. That sounds reasonable. I do think that the zoo bares some responsibility for bringing such a fragile species into a city. Zoo’s do a lot of good too. But they knew there would be fireworks. Where were they? Why wasn’t someone there to take the baby to it’s enclosure. Or sedate it during the fireworks. People do more for their adult dogs than the zoo did for this baby. I don’t think it’s a cover up or anything. They have lot’s of experts. They quoted the one that said the most sensational thing. I am not saying disregard the experts, I am saying a hand picked (by people with an agenda) sample size of one is not evidence of anything. I am willing to bet if you took a poll of all of the experts at that zoo, you would get a much less confident opinion, more like the “can’t rule it out” than the “fireworks killed the baby” person.
People do more for their adult dogs than the zoo did for this baby
The fact of the matter is that you or I don’t really have any information what the zoo did for this baby or did not. Most everything in this topic is pure speculation and has to do with more how people see the world through their eyes than any evidence or fact. The only piece of evidence we have is what the vet experts have said. Anything else is a huge “maybe”.
One experts opinion is that they couldn’t rule it out
That is a much stronger statement that, “fireworks was probably not the cause of this”. They could also have just gone with “stress due to loss of the mother” easily and no one would really think twice about it. But they did choose to make this statement. Experienced vet surgeons/nurses etc who have had the opportunity to experience how animals behave under these conditions many many times. Also mind you this one way the news has been reported, I have seen multiple instance where the wording is more stronger such as:
"Very sadly, she choked on her vomit on Bonfire Night and our vets believe this was probably a reaction to fireworks,” said Ben Supple, RZSS’s deputy chief executive. Roxie had access to her den but the frightening noises seem to have been too much for her. We are also concerned that fireworks cause stress to other animals in the zoo.”
I have seen remarks in this topic ranging from “their vets are just the zookepers” to “animals don’t vomit because of fireworks”. It is just ridiculous. Even these vet experts have not made their statements in such certainty as the people in this topic.
“But they did choose to make this statement” they answered a question honestly. They didn’t choose the question. And I agree we don’t know what the vets are actually saying. We know only what the media reports. Which is my point. People are putting words into the vets mouths that maybe one vet might say, but others clearly disagree with. The article doesn’t represent the vets (collective) point of view. So anyone saying the vets are wrong is mistaken because they don’t even know what the vets really think. And similar for saying the vets are right.
