Argumentative Essay: Should Animals Be Exotic Pets?

July 2009, Jaren Hare and boyfriend, Charles Darnell, are sentenced to 12 years in jail after their pet python broke free from his cage only to strangle their two year old daughter, Shaianna, to her death. This story is only one of the dozens and dozens exotic pet attacks. Exotic animals should not be pets because they can be dangerous, and wild animals will always be wild animals, even in captivity. With over 70 exotic pet attacks within the last 20 years, exotic pets are known to grow up and be very dangerous. Line 31 of “Do You Really Want a Baby Tiger?” reads, “Many exotic animals are strong enough to be dangerous even without meaning to cause harm”(Lewis). This is a very good point to make because although the exotic animal may not mean to hurt you, it may hurt you without even realizing. For example, a male tiger can grow up to be 670 lb. Having said this, when this animal grows up, which it will, it could crush you with a single paw. Line 58 states, “While it is true that dogs and cats can injure their owners or other people, they do not have the same unpredictable potential for serious or even deadly attacks that many exotic pets do. It's not just big cats, and poisonous chimpanzees that can be harmful - even smaller exotic …show more content…
“In the last 10-16 years. 1.5 people on average gets killed yearly by captive reptile, 1 by big cat, 0.81 by captive elephant, 0.125 by captive bear and 0 by nonhuman primate… As a comparison, 45,000 people die each year in traffic accidents, 47 from lightning and 1,600 by falling down stairs”(REXANO Proves that Politicians...). However, this is not the point, this is not a childish game to see which cause of death produces the greater number. But this is a situation in which we need to do everything we can to produce lower death tolls. Therefore, enforcing exotic pet laws have the potential to save at least 1,610 lives