This is really sad: the “zebra” in the impoverished Gaza zoo is a shaved donkey painted with stripes.
Fig. 1. Faux zebra
The Gaza “zebra”
July 26, 2009 • 6:17 am
Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
Why do places like that even bother to have a zoo when they have other more pressing issues to deal with? If they are trying to educate the public, a museum would probably do a better job & no animals will suffer.
The zookeepers think it is OK to be deceptive to school children. Pathetic.
The economy is tough all over. Boston is cutting its zoo funding and the two zoos may close.
Um, the schoolchildren can sort themselves out. The donkey has been shaved and painted. I don’t care about the children so much, and I don’t think it’s appropriate to invoke “the children” here.
I’m not standing up for the donkey owner, but animals can preserve the sanity of children brought up during wars. I was going to add, “Look at me, I’m proof!”, but then, I’m here, on this blog, on a Sunday….
I’m saddened all around, but I’m in no position to criticize or advise anyone in such a desperate society. Just mute and sorrowful.
Faking up animals to look real, and to deceive children no less, is the most despicable thing I can think of. Any culture that would do that is worthy of condemnation. Sorry, I can’t stay to write more on this. Got to run the kids to a movie right now (it’s a double feature – Jurassic Park & 10,000 BC).
Well no, you don’t condemn an entire society or culture for the actions of one or a few people.
“Faking up animals to look real, and to deceive children no less, is the most despicable thing I can think of.”
Barry you really need to get out more if that’s the most despicable thing you can think of.
I thought Barry’s reference to Jurassic Park and 10,000 BC would make his sarcasm obvious, but perhaps not.
Critical Rationalist, I, for one, have not seen either movie.
And one of the picture captions in their gallery says that a lion was killed by shrapnel.
Lovely.
I have to agree with AdamK and withhold critisism.
Maybe if Gaza’s citizens wouldn’t have devoted themselves to their neighbour’s destruction they would be able to afford a normal donkey.
I’ll assume you’re talking about the Israelis living or stationed there who make the Palestinians’ lives a living hell, and perpetrate about 100x the amount of violence and terrorism as the Palestinians do…
o.k. we are NOT going to respond to this trolling attempt and get into a big discussion of the Palestianian situation, ARE WE?????? It’s a ZEBRA (well, a donkey), folks!
We’re not? 🙂
The painter apparently isn’t familiar with how various zebras are striped either.
Even with the poor quality photo the head and ears say “donkey” and the pattern of stripes (which is just wrong for a zebra) say that there’s something funny going on.
@Aydin: there could be any number of reasons for a zoo – someone thought it might be profitable, or the community thinks it would be a good idea to keep the kids busy and they can forget about the constant threat of violence for a while, or any number of other reasons and combinations.
Perhaps they are going to use it as a “Zebra Crossing” point?
It’s the Middle East. Donkeys are everywhere. They aren’t fooling any kids.
You’re assuming the children are at least somewhat educated.
Hey, it’s another photo for Harun Yahya’s next book. 🙂
Who’s Harun Yahya?
Adnan Oktar (born Ankara, February 2, 1956)–also known by his pen name, Harun Yahya–is a prominent advocate of Islamic creationism in the creation-evolution debate and, more particularly, supports Old Earth creationism…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adnan_Oktar
Its a good idea. when you dont have money to buy a real thing you can buy a copy of that.
this is one of TRIZ (Theory of inventive problem solving)principles.
Principle No:26/40