The Astounding Reality of “Human Zoos” in Nineteenth-Century Europe : One of the most shameful part of Human history………

I was utterly astonished and overwhelmed with guilt and sorrow when I first came across this information. It took me a long contemplation regarding whether to write about it, and finally I came to the conclusion that this needs to be shared in order to take a second look at ourselves about how much ‘human’ we’ve actually managed to become. Hope, it’ll help us to be more kind and empathetic, and more careful of our behavior towards others.   

source

Believe it or not, it hasn’t been long from when people of Germany, France, Belgium, and some other European countries came to visit living humans locked in cages like animals in zoos! The exhibited humans mostly included Africans; however, native Australians, Americans and Asians were part of that shameful practice sometimes. Often, they were locked with the animals to be treated with even more disrespect. They were exhibited in front of a large ‘white’ audience just like today the animals are exhibited in front of us.  

Back then, those so-called zoos were largely popular among the people of Europe. In the 1889’s ‘World Fair’ held in paris, the number of audience reached the mark of 18million! In front of this large crowd, over 400 Africans and Aboriginals (A dark-skinned race of people living in Australia at the time of the arrival of the Europeans in the continent) were exhibited, bared half-naked; trapped into cages. At the same event of 1931, the audience number reached to 34 million!   

[A little African child being treated as a monkey] - source

Those “Human-Zoos” were largely popular among the Europeans from the late-1800s to the mid-1900s.     

The Bronx Zoo arranged an “exclusive show” in the early 1900s which involved a Congolese woman. The woman’s name was Benga. They threw her into cages along with some animals and forced her to carry and even wrestle with apes! They also made her weaving twine and shooting things with bow and arrow for the amusement of the audience.   

Unlike today, people back then didn’t oppose this horrifying racism strongly enough. In London, during the 1900s, a human exhibit was reduplicated involving chained up black people, but was shut down In a short time due to the activity of the anti-racism activists . 

This shameful practice went on in a large scale until before the 2nd world war. It may seem Ironic to some people, Adolf Hitler was the first ruler who took the first attempt to ban this horrible practice.   

After the 2nd world war, those human exhibits started to die down. The last one of those was held on 1958 at Belgium circa.   

  Here are some more pictures for you to see:      

    

[the Congolese pygmy Benga with a monkey] - source

[there were even posters to promote those brutalities] - source

[another poster] - source

[there were even glass cages in order for the audience to see things more naturally] - source

[a native American tribe] - source

[nothing can be more shameful and painful than this] - source

[a mother and her child on 'display'] - source

[dogs and humans were treated with no difference in mind] - source

[...................... shame] - source

[with a "civilized" (??!!!) man (i hope he's burning in hell right now)] - source

[@ paris world fair of 1931] - source

[these women were held in paris zoo because of their protuberant buttocks - the so-called civilized men loved to stare at their curves] - source

- The last but not the least thing that i want to say is that, as you can see, it hasn't been long since the last 'show' of this kind - and who knows, those might still happens in secret (i'm quite sure about that) - racism is one of the biggest shames of humanity - let's never stop hating and protesting it. Let's not let anyone even try to take us back to those dark days. May there be nothing but love and peace. 

May Allah bless you all.

Have a nice day.

Keep living and keep loving .......... 

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courtesy:wikipedia , exposingtruth.com