Ricky Gervais speaks out against fake animal rescue videos on YouTube

British comedian and actor Ricky Gervais has called out social media giant YouTube for allowing videos enabling animal cruelty to be uploaded onto the platform.

The videos are part of a sickening new trend where animals are placed in extremely dangerous situations so that the creator of the videos can appear to ‘rescue’ them.

Many of these fake animal rescue videos include setting a large predator on a small prey animal such as a dog or monkey and recording an intervention and rescue, purely for entertainment.

World Animal Protection (WAP) stated: “In these clips you can hear the terrified cries of the animals as they fear for their lives … they face visible distress and trauma, and shouldn’t have been in such a terrifying situation in the first place.

“This cruelty is set-up and inflicted for entertainment.”

The organisation has been investigating the upsetting new craze. They found over 180 sickening videos on the platform, some of which have racked up millions of views.

Ben Williamson, Programs Director at WAP explained: “Filming will likely require many takes, meaning long periods of suffering.“

“No doubt many of these setups even go wrong, meaning that both animals – prey and predator, are having their lives risked. Who knows how many fatalities happen behind the scenes? Even those filming it are potentially putting themselves in harm’s way.”

Gervais, a passionate animal advocate also commented: “Just when you think you’ve heard it all, humans think of another way to be cruel to animals.”

“Social media giants like YouTube should be on the front foot when it comes to banning this disgusting content from their platforms.”

He added: “We can and should protect animals, but we can’t do this without serious action from the companies that enable their abuse.”

Article written by Martha Moody- United Kingdom