The Museum of Science in Boston, MA is planning to open a chick
hatchery exhibit in the next few months. Please write to the museum
director, David Ellis, and urge that the chick hatchery exhibit plans
be permanently canceled. Thanks you! Contact:
November 2, 2000
David Ellis, Director
Museum of Science
Science Park
Boston, MA 02114-1099
Dear Mr. Ellis:
On behalf of our 10,000 members nationwide, I am writing to request
that you do not open a chick hatchery as part of your program. A
chick hatchery exhibit teaches people nothing about the natural
family and social life of chickens such as the bond that is
established between a hen and her young long before the young birds
hatch. It teaches nothing about the careful nurturing that a hen
provides for her chicks, which they need. A chick hatchery exhibit
misleads children and others to think that chickens come from
machines with no need of a mother or of an environment in which to
forage and explore.
A chick hatchery exhibit encourages youngsters and others to repeat
the experience of producing baby animals that conveniently disappear
after the "miracle of birth" is over, adding to the tremendous burden
already born by society and by animal shelters, but most of all by
the animal victims. I speak to you as the director of a national
shelter for chickens and other domestic fowl in its eleventh year of
operation. It is not remotely possible to place the thousands of
chicks, chickens, ducks and ducklings that need homes every year. Why
would the Museum of Science encourage the attitude and behavior that
have produced what we idlely refer to as the "pet overpopulation
problem"? If children and others get excited over artificial
incubators and little wet, naked birds struggling out of shells in a
barren environment unassisted by the hen and deprived of the warmth
and nurturing she provides-nurturing and needs that should be
respected, not violated-this is because they do not understand the
meaning of what they are witnessing.
Mr. Ellis, I beg you not to install a chick hatchery exhibit. I and
others have visited the hatchery exhibit at the Carnegie Science
Center where in the midst of fun and games you see this pitiful sight
that THE VISITORS LOOK AT AND PASS BY WITHOUT INTEREST OR
UNDERSTANDING BECAUSE IT IS PASSIVE AND PATHETIC. The kids and their
parents rush on to the activities that invite interaction and the
lives that have been forced into existence for a moment of barren
entertainment mean nothing to them. Please do not create this
"experience" at the Museum of Science.
I respectfully urge you, please, to cancel plans for this exhibit and
to use video and computer technology that, I can assure you, will
entice people much more eagerly and significantly than a plastic
incubator with broken shells, eggs and motherless birds flopped down
on a grid and stumbling about inside sterile machinery. It is an
ugly, desolate sight. Please do not do this.
Please do not teach children to think that motherless babies are cute
or natural. Our society does not need more motherless infants of any
species. We need to provide homes for those who are already here.
This is the lesson that should be practiced and taught. Please show
and teach respect for the family life of birds and other creatures
who share this world with us. I look forward to a response from you
as soon as possible. Thank you for your attention.
Sincerely,
Karen Davis, PhD
President
Karen@upc-online.org
Ph: 757-678-7875
Fax: 757-678-5070