Fan Bingbing (Photo : Weibo)
Animal cruelty is one accusation easy to hurl on China, a country which recently marked its 10-day dog meat festival in Yulin.
But even if an animal is not physically harmed, it could still generate controversy among animal rights groups. It recently happened to Chinese actress Fan Bingbing who visited an aquarium in June. She had photos taken kissing a beluga whale for a reality TV show, reported China.org.
After the photos were posted on social media, the China Cetacean Alliance, however, accused the aquarium which Fan Bingbing visited as being cruel to the whale for keeping it in captivity. The actress was a contestant of "Challenger Alliance 2" in which she was supposed to be an aquarium keeper.
As soon as Fan Bingbing posted the photos on her Weibo account, the pictures became viral with 500,000 likes, reported Shanghaiist.
There were a lot of positive comments from fans of the actress who found the images cute, but the alliance did not approve the idea of an aquarium. It commented, “These beluga whales are trafficked from Russia after being taken from the wild. They should be given the freedom to dive, explore, frolic and communicate in the Arctic waters.”
The alliance added, “Now they have lost that freedom and will never see the light again, they are imprisoned to do performances and get photographed while being held and kissed by stars. At the same time, this just gives more greedy businessmen a glamorous excuse to buy them.”
