Video of elephant stealing woman's hat and then returning it divides the internet

Virgin Radio

15 Dec 2021, 14:28

If you’ve been on social media lately, there’s a good chance you’ll have seen a clip of a cheeky elephant swiping a lady’s hat from her head and then giving it back to her.

However, whilst the clip has gone viral, not everybody thinks it is as cute and hilarious as it first appears.

The video previously appeared online earlier this year, when American basketball player Rex Chapman shared it with his 1.1 million followers. 

Retweeting a since deleted tweet containing the video, he said: “Timeline cleanser: An elephant playing a joke on a lady. They're so brilliant....”

In the short clip, a woman is seen standing in front of an elephant, seemingly posing with the magnificent animal for a photo. However, the elephant then grabs the lady’s hat with its trunk and pops it in its mouth. The woman then says: “Please give my hat back,” to which the animal does indeed remove it from it’s mouth and returns it to her.

You can see the video here: 

Cute, right? 

Well, maybe not, actually. 

While thousands of people liked the clip, many took to the comments section to express their concern about it. 

One person wrote: “Training elephants to do tricks for photo ops is not a timeline cleanser. This is gross.”

Somebody else agreed, simply writing: “This is unethical.”

Another wrote: “Can you stop posting these types of videos.”

Whilst the full story behind this particular clip is not clear, elephants are routinely exploited by places claiming to be sanctuaries to perform tricks for humans. Although tourists are unsuspecting, often the elephants’ training and conditioning involves serious cruelty behind the scenes.

In 2018, Vicki Brown, editor at Responsible Travel, spoke to The Guardian about elephant sanctuaries. She said: “Captive elephants should be allowed to live as naturally as possible, so if they are forced to display unnatural behaviours – such as dancing, painting or playing football – this is being done for the tourists’ benefit, not the elephants’. Don’t visit these places.”

This is definitely something to think about next time we see a wild animal doing something cute online.