Tribune. While Barbara Pompili, Minister of Ecological Transition, announced in September 2020 the gradual end of the presence of wild animals in traveling shows, some circus owners still refuse to face the facts and tirelessly repeat unsupported arguments to try to justify what is no longer.
This political decision, far from having been taken in haste, is the conclusion of interministerial committees in the presence of various stakeholders, owners of circuses and animal rights associations, (including the Animal Code association as an expert for over ten years on issues related to the keeping of wild animals used in entertainment).
It took hours of work, consultations, reading scientific reports and investigations for the minister to give the first conclusions of a work, of which no less than three other ministers before her will have been in charge.
A vast nebula
In fact, the public has not been there for a long time for this kind of shows. The Pinder and Amar brands were placed in liquidation long before the health crisis, the Cirque d’Hiver Bouglione had also stopped its tours, the festivals of Tours and Lille were only held on condition that there have no number with wild animals, more than four hundred cities signed the symbolic vow of the Animal Code association to show their disapproval of the installation of such shows in their municipalities.
However the owners of circus with animals continue to state a figure of 14 million spectators, without this figure corresponding to any reality, the government itself is not able to give details, the world of the animal circus being, by its own admission, a vast nebula, a socio-economic sector which until now seems to have escaped the classic circuit of other companies.
The professions change with the evolution of societies and the needs of populations, the circus is no exception to this rule, it is led like the others to evolve or to disappear. Some people have understood this several years ago and have been able to advance their art by abandoning the use of animals such as the Medrano and Arlette Gruss circuses.
If, in colonial times, it was conceivable to present wild “beasts” to show the “supremacy” of humans, the advances in science, the change in mentalities, the existence of so many other sources. of entertainment accessible to the greatest number, make these shows obsolete and no longer have the approval of the majority of the public.
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