Taking responsibility for ourselves and our children

The death of Harambe, a western lowland gorilla living at the Cincinnati Zoo, has sparked many discussions and debates regarding both parental responsibility and animal captivity.

Harambe was fatally shot on Saturday after a four-year-old boy climbed through several barriers and fell into the moat of the "Gorilla World" exhibit at the Cincinnati Zoo.

According to the World Wildlife Fund, Harambe was part of a critically endangered species. Being critically endangered is one of the most dire scenarios for an animal species. It is essentially the last level of endangerment before becoming extinct in the wild or totally extinct. Thus, the death of even one gorilla - especially a male expected to father future generations of the species - is a huge loss.

The boy who fell into the exhibit had to go through several barriers before falling the ten to twelve feet into the moat below. The incident, after the boy fell into the moat, lasted approximately ten minutes before zoo officials made the difficult decision to shoot the gorilla. I understand that zoo officials did what they felt was best in order to save the boy's life. However, my biggest question, is what was the boy's mother doing while her child climbed through all of the barriers into the exhibit?

If you watch the video, you see the boy inside the exhibit with Harambe standing over him. Harambe does not appear to be hurting the boy at all, but rather holding his hand. When people begin screaming, Harambe does grab the boy and drag him several feet through the moat, injuring the boy to some extent. This sequence of events reoccurs several times before the final decision was made to shoot Harambe.

The boy's mother seems all too calm during the incident, saying, "Stay calm, I love you" to the boy. She also suggests calling the zoo, almost thirty seconds after the boy falls into the moat. I would imagine most mothers would have called immediately upon seeing their child on the opposite side of the first barrier. Rather, most mothers would have seen their children trying to get inside the exhibit and stopped it from happening.

I do believe Harambe had to be killed to save the boy's life in this incident. Even if Harambe was not trying to hurt the boy, he definitely could have killed him accidentally. I believe the Cincinnati Zoo made the right decision, however, I also believe none of this had to happen.

Humans need to take personal responsibility for their actions. We have already taken animals into captivity and disrupted the natural order of things. The least we can do is watch our children and prevent the loss of an already critically endangered species. Part of the reason the species is critically endangered to begin with is due to human activity such as deforestation, according to National Geographic.

What we can do from here is simply to take responsibility for ourselves and for our children. We must not be so selfish as to consider other species as less important. When we take our children to zoos or aquariums or even National Parks, we should explain to them the importance of not disturbing the animals - to merely observe the beauty that is nature. We cannot pet gorillas in zoos nor bison in Yellowstone. We must remember that what we do does affect others - even other species.