IN RECENT UNDERCOVER NEWS REPORT
http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/news/1064804/detail.html
Ringling Brother's Barnum & Bailey Circus has received yet another huge blow. Undercover footage and testimonies from Ringling's past employees were aired on November 8 by WTAE-TV (Channel 4) in Pittsburgh, PA as a three-part undercover investigation.
Countless TV stations air fluff pieces on circuses. They always serve as free advertisements or promotional pieces. Not this time... The station included footage of elephants being struck with hooks. The footage was accompanied by reporter Jim Parson's voiceover: "Circus employees beating, chaining and teasing one of the most majestic creatures on earth -- the elephant-- are painful images to watch."
Activist Joe Taksel was given a platform. "Here you have the most despicable form of animal cruelty going on for no other reason than to turn a buck. Make a profit -- that's what the circus is. And we're devoted to stopping it."
Jim Rider, an ex Ringling Brothers employee who quit because of elephant abuse was interviewed. Parson's reported: "Rider urged Team 4 to watch the Ringling Brothers (locomotive) train arrive in Pittsburgh earlier this week. We did. Sure enough, we saw a handler using his bullhook aggressively, hitting an elephant in the trunk, then the leg. He's the same handler who got a bullhook caught in an elephant's mouth in Tulsa, Okla., last June."
Parsons then said, when WTAE-TV spoke to Ringling Brothers, we were told that "what we just saw, doesn't happen."
Please thank Team 4 for airing this footage. Channel 4 takes feedback at newsroom@thepittsburghchannel.com
Keep Fighting,
Shelley Reagin, shell_1600@yahoo.com
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