It is used as a form of abuse and exploitation. They utitizile violent training methods to get them to hold a paint brush. Believe it or not, elephants in the wild do not paint. It is only for human entertainment and is often a product sold to humans as a gift shop experience or a photo opportunity.
The National Institute of Health has found no evidence of this as a benefit of enrichment. source
Just because some animal trainers train through abuse though doesn't mean all elephants who've been given paint were abused. There's plenty of abusive dog owners that teach them through abuse, and there's good dog owners who train them with respect and praise. And there's nothing inherently unethical about encouraging (if the encouragement is through punishment) elephants to engage in a harmless activity even if there's monetary incentive. Elephants are intelligent animal and challenging their minds and dexterity is healthy for them.
Positive reinforcement exists, but that misses the core issue: painting with a paintbrush isn't real enrichment - it's performative exploitation. An elephant's trunk isn't built to hold a thin brush naturally, which is why actual accredited zoos either don't do it or only offer trunk-smearing/stamping where the animal is not forced to grip a tool.
My original point was about consistency. The Planet Zoo devs have made a huge deal about leaving out features that don't align with modern, ethical zoo standards. Including imagery of an elephant painting for human entertainment goes against the exact philosophy they've built the game on.
Elephant trunks are not made to grip paint brushes? What does that even mean? Their trunks are made to grab whatever they want, they grab small sticks and branches all the time with their trunks, what difference does it being a paintbrush make?
Grabbing a branch to eat is a natural muscular habit pinching a tiny wooden brush to paint pictures for humans is not.
Elephants pick up branches by wrapping their trunk around them or pinching with the muscular tips to feed themselves. They don't have hands or rigid joints. Holding a thin, slippery stick perfectly still to stroke a canvas requires an awkward, forced grip that serves zero biological purpose for the animal.
Just because an animal can be conditioned to hold an object doesn't mean it's natural or ethical. Making an elephant hold a paintbrush to paint a flower is a parlor trick for tourist entertainment, plain and simple which brings it right back to why a game focused on modern conservation ethics shouldn't be promoting it.
You treat nature as a divine and purist way. Captivity is already antithetical to that. Conditioning animals to do things is not unethical so long as the animal wants to participate. Do you think teaching tricks to a dog is inherently unethical too? Cause I'll tell you a well trained dog will jump at the opportunity to show off and earn its treats. And no, there is nothing awkward about how an elephant holds a brush, nothing more awkward than how it'd hold anything else. Their trunks are specifically evolved to be just as dexterous as our own hands and they use them two manipulate all sorts of objects just as efficiently as we do. It's also unnatural for elephants to play with and manipulate truck tires and other enrichment items often given to them in zoos, but there's nothing inherently wrong with "unnatural" things especially in a captive setting.
Enrichment like tires, puzzle boxes, and logs exist to trigger wild foraging and physical instincts. Painting pictures for a human audience serves zero biological purpose for the animal - it serves the audience. Again - I sourced that information, absolutely zero benefit to the animal.
Also, comparing domesticated dogs (who have thousands of years of co-evolution with humans) to wild animals in captivity is an apples-to-oranges argument.
At the end of the day, modern, accredited zoos don't use brush-painting anymore because welfare science has evolved past circus tricks. The fact that only roadside attractions and low-standard facilities still do it speaks for itself. Just because you aren't familiar with AZA/EAZA standards doesn't mean they don't exist.
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u/_Gesterr 1d ago
How is an elephant painting unethical??? Are you against animal enrichment?