What is captivity?

What Does captivity Mean

The notion of captivity refers to the lack of freedom . The concept can refer to the seclusion , confinement or kidnapping of a person or an animal. For example: “The kidnappers kept the businessman in captivity for eight days” , “I can't stand captivity anymore, I need to go out for air” , “The authorities rescued a puma that was in captivity” .

In the case of humans , the idea of ​​captivity or captivity is often used with respect to the loss of freedom by the action of an enemy or a kidnapper. A group of terrorists, to cite one case, can hold hundreds of people in captivity in an enclosed area. Even an entire town can be in captivity from an invasion.

Sometimes captivity mentions an individual's time in prison . In this framework, it can be indicated that a man spent ten years in captivity if he was sentenced to spend a decade in prison.
Regarding animals , it is said that they are in captivity when they do not live freely in their natural habitat . The specimens that are in a zoo are in captivity: they do not have the possibility to move freely or to procure food for themselves. In some cases, the species are kept in a semi-captivity regime since they enjoy a certain margin of action without the intervention of man.
The life of animals in captivity is often the subject of discussion and controversy between animal lovers (also known as "animalistas") and people who are dedicated to animal exploitation, such as ranchers and businessmen dedicated to the manufacture of products based on natural leather. One thing is clear: the happiness of these animals only matters to the first group, since the rest focus only on the economic benefit that they can obtain thanks to them.
Precisely, when human beings forcibly remove an animal from its natural habitat, regardless of the objective of such action, they interfere with the balance of nature and this generates consequences for everyone. No animal is born with the aim of living in a city, much less in a zoo or a livestock farm, so the type of relationship they have with people is not enough to counteract uprooting .
If we take into account that even human beings have difficulty adapting to life in the city , especially when they do not have a large house with green spaces and must do monotonous and stressful work, let's imagine how much harder it is for other species to be deprived of the earth, of the grass, of the trees and, most important of all, of the activities that they wish to carry out.

We have reached a point of denial that when the word " horse " is mentioned to us we think of "horsemanship" or "horseback riding", instead of remembering that it is a living being that should enjoy the same freedom as us and that it did not decide on its own becoming a tool of the human being.
Horses that are fortunate enough to live in their natural habitat demonstrate much more complex behaviors and an infinitely greater degree of happiness than those who are forced to perform abusive tasks day after day, and even those who lead a supposedly privileged life in company from people who treat them like pets; Ultimately, life in captivity is not much different from slavery , even for the animals we claim to love.
Finally, “Happy Captivity” is the title by which a book by Francisco Núñez de Pineda y Bascuñán is known , a Spanish military man who, in 1629 , was held captive by the Mapuches in current Chilean territory for more than six months.

Go up