'Harry Potter' actress urges no more sloth selfies following grim undercover footage
Warning: Some people may find the above video distressing.
The "Harry Potter" actress Evanna Lynch, who played Luna Lovegood in the film series, has appealed to people to think twice before sharing selfies with cute animals.
And more specifically, selfies with sloths, as today is International Sloth Day.
The actress is speaking out in support of the animal welfare organisation World Animal Protection, who've released a video highlighting the plight of wild sloths being captured and sold as props for tourists to take pictures with.
Lynch told Mashable it is "up to us, the consumers" to stop this trade by staunching the demand for selfie tourism.
"We're just trying to get people to say no to these things and to remind others, their friends and their families that it isn't cool," Lynch told us.
Following their recent report 'A close up on cruelty: The harmful impact of wildlife selfies in the Amazon' World Animal Protection has released undercover footage of loggers capturing and selling a wild sloth. The sloth is minding its business, chilling on top of a tree, when the loggers fell it and proceed to toss the animal into a black bag before taking it away to sell.
The sloth in the video was sold for the equivalent of £9. Its capture was opportunistic; the loggers in this video did not go out looking for sloths, they just happened to find one.
Part of the problem with sloths, as World Animal Protecion notes in the report, is that it can be hard for us humans to tell when they are suffering.
"Sloths’ faces may appear to humans to be smiling, no matter what environment they are in," says the report. "To the untrained eye these animals can appear happy, when in fact this is simply a result of their facial structure, and gives absolutely no indication whatsoever of their level of anxiety, stress and pain."
The report also says sloths captured for selfie tourism suffer enormously. Many don't even survive six months after being captured due to the stress they endure. With this in mind, World Animal Protection are hoping the undercover footage will convey how much trauma these animals go to through just for the sake of an Instagram selfie.
World Animal Protection has set up a Wildlife Selfie Code which you can pledge to, with a list of things that can indicate an animal is being abused.
A good rule of thumb: take pictures of animals in the wild at a safe distance. It may be less adorbs, but it's less likely to fuel a cycle of abuse.
Topics Activism Animals Social Good
