Put me in the Waco? Zoo

Here is an honest account of my thought process when deciding which zoo to go to tomorrow. Are flashy websites worth it? Are people so easily swayed? Are zoos all concrete and evil? Can pandas really do kung foo if they can’t mate? All of these answers and less below.

If you’ve read the Robert Lopshire story about the leopard who can change his spots and wants to be put in the zoo, you’ll remember that the circus is the place for you. The cat wants to be in the zoo after he sees the animals being brushed, fed and watered, and I can’t help but think that this an allegory for committing crime specifically for incarceration.

I have a friend with no healthcare who needs surgery. If she stabs a grandma (hopefully in a non-vital organ), then presumably she’d get brushed, fed and watered, and also have her cataracts taken care of. I’m not saying that living in a correctional facility is all gravy (in fact it probably is all gravy, but not the kind that you want your biscuits in), all I’m saying is that a deeply buried part of me thinks that zoos are evil cruel places where hetero lions are forced into gay sex just for the healthcare.

That part of me stays buried though when I see the joy on my daughter’s face when she sees a cage full of monkeys. What’s a bit of animal torture between friends if it makes the kids smile, or keeps fur and / or cosmetics on the backs and faces of supermodels? Feel free to answer that one in the comments below.

Having sidestepped the animal penal colony issues (heck, my dad and his wife went to Australia just last month and didn’t have to call Snake Plissken to get out again, so these things can work out over time) the new dilemma is Dallas Zoo or Waco Zoo – both ostensibly on the way home to Austin tomorrow.

I can’t imagine anything great happening in Waco – I don’t know why I have that preconceived notion, but life is too short to be well-researched and right about everything all the time, so I’ll let the source of this dubious opinion slide for now. So I’m leaning toward Dallas.

I visit the Waco Zoo website first. Not too shabby. They claim to be part of several organizations which allegedly uphold highest standards for the treatment of animals. If I was a demon barber wanting to cover up my murderous intentions, I’d probably set up and chair the Society for Keeping Throats Unslit, just to cover my tracks, so I treat such organizations with some suspicion. They’ve also got orangutans, to which I’m quite partial.

So now the pendulum has swung to Waco, and I consider the Dallas Zoo website, which serves a local population over 10 times the size of Waco Zoo. The website has a flash animation on the front page which features drumming, the silhouettes of galloping giraffe and promises big animals from Africa. The kind of thing I’d expect from Dallas – the stress on animal size not their geographic origins.

So now I’m all over Dallas. Until I realize that the flash animation is the only flash part in an otherwise drab website which mentions the height of the iconic giraffe sculpture as one thing that sets it apart. 67.5 feet – size again. I’m tempted to dismiss the site when I see “Our park covers 95 developed acres! In terms of landmass, it’s the largest zoological park in Texas.” which appeals to me. I like the fact that they don’t willy nilly claim to be “the biggest in Texas” – they qualify their statement with some accuracy. Only the largest in terms of landmass, not in some of the other key metrics that people judge zoos upon – perhaps

  • size of the cafeteria
  • number of smoking areas
  • number of electric wheelchairs
  • fence height
  • number of days since last fatality

So now I like the honesty behind the marketing. And I’m torn. Do I think I’m unusual in the way I decide to do things? Not really.

I think about some of the websites I’ve put up. Some with absolutely no spit, polish, or shine that have generated interactions with like-minded people as I rabbit on and on with some expertise about a certain topic. I think about the flashy ones that impress but have no substance. I wonder how superficial people really are in their research into things, and whether I am easily swayed by a flashy home page. And then I think of infomercials. They shouldn’t work, people should know better or do third party research but they don’t.

And yes, I did order one of those electric ab-zappers to get my six pack when I was staying at a hotel in Stockholm once. After watching an infomercial. And I thought I was of above average intelligence.

I actually searched for “reviews of ____ zoo” as I wanted to look at what other people are saying about them. I realize that manufacturing trust is possible on review sites where opportunities to earn affiliate dollars are one motivator. If the stakes are high enough, I’m sure people do hire teams of orangutans to type great reviews of their products online and give them two thumbs up and five stars all over the place. And zoos do have all of those monkeys who aren’t making license plates just sitting there in cages with nothing to do when the pooh stops flying.

So if your audience is people who do research into reviews hire reviewers. If your audience is people who are superficial and should really be better off parting with their money to your product or service rather than buying the dream of washboard abs, then make a flashy one page site with a big button saying “buy now” on it.

Me, I’m going to Waco Zoo. It’s got meerkats, lions and rhinos, and I can go to Dallas Zoo another year.

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