Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/08/21/new-panda-mom-doesnt-know-sh.html
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I suspect that Lee Lee knows but doesn’t care.
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So let’s get this straight: Pandas have bizarre dietary requirements, where they’ll starve to death rather than eat if their bamboo smells/tastes funny; Have crap immune systems; Won’t breed in captivity, or if the weather is wrong, or if the bamboo has been untasty recently; and refuse to raise more than one cub at a time.
Why are we keeping these things alive, again? If your answer is “cuteness”, go watch otters. They’re awesome at surviving, and much cuter. Or trash pandas.
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That momma with her cub was about the cutest thing ever.
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Maybe for species diversification? Maybe because humans should help other species instead of destroying them? Maybe because much of the habitat pandas originally lived in is gone? Maybe to offset the extinction of polar bears because of our human greed and ignorance? They did quite well until humans intervened in their ecosystem.
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Let’s see those caretakers take that popcorn away. I’ll wager a hand will be lost.
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…and then they’ll be raised in separate households, until the day they just happen to enroll in the same summer camp!
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Have you ever had the feeling you once had a twin? Maybe your mom pulled a panda and picked you…
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I guess… to gaslight them for our own entertainment? Sort of like an interspecies VC Andrews novel?
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They move a lot of plush toys and sweatshirts at the zoo gift shop.
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Don’t forget that they are startled too easily. 
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Sorry, Pandas. Rats win. They clearly just wanted it more.
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Mostly, I think this about the human hypochondriacs/Picky Eaters/Whole Foods devotees.
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And how did they survive as a species so long in the first place?
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A lot of species just kind of hit a sophomore slump after the first two or three million years.
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Yeah, there was a video from nearly a decade ago, about this practice of panda twin swapping, and I have to confess, it turned me off the whole notion of panda preservation completely.
Granted, it’s probably only my own worst behaviors, reflected in the panda, leaving me jealous of all the expense laid out to keep these lazy bums going…
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So here the zookeepers are thinking “hey, what’s a few million years of evolution know that we don’t? Let’s trick mom into dividing her milk and energy between two cubs”
I mean, I hope they’re supplementing with formula for both cubs. But it does seem like a bit of a risk bet…
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“I felt like putting a bullet between the
eyes of every Panda that wouldn’t screw to save its
species.”
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Maybe someone should try feeding them some meat too.
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