Animal captivity is okay in terms of ethnics.

Hello, ldellova. Thanks for accepting the challenge. Sorry about the typo in the title. When I said "ethnics," I meant "ethics": I had misheard the word in science class.Anyway, on to the arguments.---ARGUMENTS---ANIMAL SAFETYAuthor Stephen Budiansky points out that captivity is a natural process and can be beneficial to both the animals and human beings. He mentions how some endangered species escaped extinction through domestication.The most obvious benefit for animal captivity is animal safety. In the outside world where death, disease, predators, natural disasters, struggles for the social hierarchy, thirst, and starvation amongst other dangers are around, keeping endangered species in zoos and farms can rebuild a species's population and increase the health of the animals. After all, food and drink are given on a daily basis in zoos, while animals must spend days or sometimes weeks hunting for it in the wild.DOMESTICATIONCats, dogs, horses, and goldfish are all animals that have been domesticated by humans. Most of these species are housebroken, and it has been proved that keeping a pet has its benefits.http://www.petcareclub.com...First off, service animals are animals that help people with disabilities. You can often see blind people being led by guide dogs. Also, owning pets has been proved to lower cholesterol and blood pressure, sometimes in a better fashion than medication. Spending time with animals can prevent allergies as well.The playful nature of animals make pet owners less likely to become depressed, anxious, or stressed. This fact is prominent especially amongst children: studies show that young pet owners tend to make higher grades than those who do not own a dog or cat.---REBUTTALS---Congratulations to Con, who has made some pretty interesting points that I have not thought about before.Con's main points are "cash-crop" farming, animals losing their "wilderness," and the issue with poorly-kept fish at carnivals.CASH-CROPPINGSure, I agree that livestock can be found in some food products. However, who says that animal domestication is completely responsible? If animal captivity somehow became illegal, other animals such as flies, mosquitoes, birds, etc. can still be picked from corn fields, even though those animals are still non-domesticated wild animal. Banning animal captivity will not solve this issue at all, and therefore is a very small drawback. Soon, the voters will understand that animal captivity has more advantages than disadvantages.THE "ORIGINAL SETTING"The "original setting" is "what Mother Nature intended". In other words, it is the state that animals would be in if humans never occupied the planet. Con argues that the "original setting" is preferable and should be maintained. He claims captivity ruins this notion.In Yann Martel's novel Life of Pi, Pi Patel, the main character who loves zoos, explains that he has heard "... much nonsense about zoos." I find some of his explanations intriguing, so I shall include them in my own words here.Sure, when animals are domesticated, they have lost their original settings, but does this harm the animals? Not really. In most cases, it benefits them.Animals tend to be conservative. They stick to traditions and patterns and don't enjoy changes. They tend to stay in the same environments, whether its the grassy fields or a zoo cage, as penguins and deer do.Many people believe animals are "happy" because they are "free" in the wild. They imagine large tigers running freely through the sun-lit fields. They also imagine a mean-spirited human capturing one in a cage and bringing it to the zoo, where it lives the rest of its life in captivity.However, putting an animal in a cage is simply a change in environment. Soon, the monkey, as we'll call it, will adapt to its environment and will most likely stay in it. As mentioned before, animals are territorial. They keep to where they think they belong. Even if the cage accidentally opens, the monkey will probably stay.The definition of "territory" for monkeys is a place for resting, eating, drinking, bathing, grooming, hunting, looking around, etc, and that's exactly what the cage is. In a few weeks, a monkey will take possession of its cage in the same way it takes possession of a new territory in the wild. The monkey is neither happy nor sad about its new environment. After all, the cage fulfills all the basic needs.What would you think if someone ran into your house, destroyed the door, and said, "You're free, friends! Free! You can run around outside as much as you want!" Would you like it? Of course not, and neither do the animals. Again, animals keep to their territory, regardless if that environment is natural or artificial.You may think that animals should prefer the natural environment, as it is where they came from. However, many animals are emotionless. They are incapable of having such preferences or opinions. They act in similar ways in the wild as in captivity. Animals, within their natural limits, make do with what they have.LIVING SPACEI believe Con may mention that the space in cages in zoos is very small and that, in contrast, the wilderness is a large place to live. After all, what could be better than a whale swimming in the vastness of the ocean? However, space in the wild is present because it is necessary: many animals are living together in one place. Cages simply divide this space up into manageable parts, each part containing one or two animals. Look at what humanity has done with houses. They are simply divisions of a large tract of land that was originally made for multiple beings to thrive in at the same time.CARNIVALSI'm not sure if this rebuttal helps, but any job done poorly should not have been done at all. Carnivals, as far as I see, are the only drawback to captivity. The poor conditions of the environment for the fish is the fault of the carnival-keeper. Still, I think carnivals are a pretty special case. The majority of cages in farms and zoos are good for the species.---CONCLUSION AND SOURCES---The readers should now see how animal captivity has more advantages than drawbacks. I look forward to Con's rebuttal and conclude my section of this round.(1) http://www.petcareclub.com...(2) Life of Pi by Yann Martel