back to article Government rejects elephants for pets e-petition

We're very sorry to announce that Her Maj's government has decided to reject the following e-petition which attracted a creditable 655 signatures: We believe that every child in the UK would benefit from owning an elephant. It was my dream as a child to care for these magnificent creatures but at the age of twelve I find that …

COMMENTS

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  1. Ralph B
    Thumb Up

    Miniature elephants as pets

    The winning idea on the second episode of BBC Radio 4's splendid "Genius" show was for the breeding of miniature elephants as pets. HMG are rejecting this idea too soon. They would do better to pass it on to the chaps in white coats at the genetics lab.

  2. David Davies

    Back Yard?

    Surely in the UK it is a Back Garden rather than a yard. With all due respect to our merkin cousins the government really shouldn't be 'Americanising' (should that be Americanizing) the language any more than we already do ourselves.

    Yes I'm a pedant.

  3. Tom

    Yes!

    Miniature elephants is the way forward. Personally, I want one that will fit in my palm and can compete with my tortoise in sporting events.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    bloody nanny state

    If a responsible pet owner makes provisions to care for an elephant then what right has the government to stop them?

    Elephants have been kept as domestic animals for thousands of years, they can be trained to work in the building industry and in agricultural. I think this is all part of a bigger conspiracy backed by the manufactures of farm machinery and lifting equipment. If I where Jack Smithies I would be keeping one eye out for the Black Helicopters.

  5. Sweep

    @ Ralph

    Wasn't there a genetically-engineered miniature elephant in Jurassic Park?

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Jeez ...

    *This* gets a reasonable answer out of these gobshites. Although true to form it had absolutely no effect on policy. Why do people still bother with these e-petition things anyway? They're almost as pointless as voting.

  7. Kevin Crisp
    Go

    @Tom

    Surely 4 tiny elephants to walk on the back of your tortoise - and a side plate to act as a discworld?

  8. Anonymous John
    Happy

    Wait until the Chinese start breeding

    glow-in-the-dark elephants. Park one in the back garden and leave the curtains open.

    No more need for electric lighting, and CO2 emissions would be reduced at a stroke.

  9. Ferry Boat

    The future is elephants

    This could be our way out the energy crisis. Elephant based transport, machinery and heating. I see school wagons pulled by elephants taking children to school, I see goods being hauled by elephant, I see lifting work done by elephant, I see sales execs speeding down the M5 on elephant back and I see no congestion charge being applied to elephants. Bring them into the house in the evening and they'll provide heat with their mighty bodies. When they get old you can kill them and eat them, lots of meat there. Oh yes, elephants are the future all right. Just a shame the government is too dumb to even see the start of it. Now, where is that elephant icon?

  10. John Young

    Re: Back Yard?

    No David, millions of UK houses have a back yard - most terraced houses have one. I had one until I moved to a house with a back garden.

    An elephant in my old back yard would've been cool - it could have kept next doors ever-growing vegitation in order.

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    It's grim up north

    @Back Yard

    No shortage of back yards here, lad.

    meta: I see your pedant and raise you a prolier-than-thou.

  12. Vaughan

    @David Davies

    We working class English types have always had back yards.

  13. Anonymous Cowherd

    The Chinese have been breeding

    There are billions of them already.

  14. Tawakalna
    Paris Hilton

    Planet of The Elephants?

    they may start off as ordinary family pets, well, as ordinary as an elephant could be, but give them a few years and there'll be an underground army of discontented elephants ready to rise up against their human keepers in a plethora of pachyderm proletarian protest.

    Thankfully the Broon govt has had the foresight to avert a terrible future dominated by brutal elephants forcing humans to haul heavy logs through forests and to slave in peanut mines.

    Paris as my icon 'cos she said that mine was like an elephant's trunk. In the dream I had at 7 this morning.

  15. Nige
    Stop

    Davva

    re: Annonymous John

    > glow-in-the-dark elephants. Park one in the back garden and leave the curtains open.

    > No more need for electric lighting, and CO2 emissions would be reduced at a stroke.

    Not sure this would apply. I remember reading somewhere that the major contibutor to greenhouse gasses are cows farting. Imagine how much worse a country full of elephants farting would be!

  16. Gianni Straniero
    Thumb Up

    e-petitions

    The PM's petition website is a rich source of entertainment. Browsing the "rejected" pile is almost as hilarious as some of the signatories' names. See, for example, these gems:

    http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Antismokingwatch/

  17. Rob
    Boffin

    Bonsai Pachyderm?

    There's a website there, i'm sure of it...

  18. P. Lee
    Coat

    back yard or back garden?

    According to The Now Show, the bit of green behind your house is (in ascending social-class order):

    1) t' yard (from north of the Watford Gap)

    2) the back garden

    3) Devon

  19. TeeCee Gold badge
    Coat

    @Ferry Boat

    There's a problem with that idea though. Quoting News At Ten:

    DUNG!!!!!

  20. Anonymous John
    Unhappy

    Re Miniature elephants as pets

    Dan Dare featured an alien one. http://www.dandare.org.uk/JPEGs/Who-Flamer-Spry-and-Stripey.jpg

    I really wanted one as a child.

  21. Colin Millar
    Thumb Up

    Back yard - luxury

    In Edinburgh tenement land we had to share our back yard - it was called a back green as I recall.

  22. Wyrmhole

    Not used to

    "They are very large animals that are not used to being kept as pets [...]"

    As opposed to, say, cats who are born pre-accustomed to being kept as pets? From their previous lives?

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    Better Than That Dear

    Personally I've always thought that miniature genetically modified Mammoths, GM-ammoths if you will, would be the way forward.

    Not only do they have the same entertainment potential as elephants and produce the same amount of quality manure for your veggies you could also shave them and use their hair for clothes, carpet, rope...

    The possibilites are endless. Well nearly.

  24. Herby

    But Hanry Mancini would be proud!

    We could all listen to his "Baby Elephant Walk" (which is a really good score by the way!).

    Then again, if you have to ask about the food bill you probably can't afford it. When the elephant starts wanting more food, lots will be devoured!!

  25. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Elephants kill mahouts

    during must male elephants can't be worked with and will suddenly take it into their heads to step on a mahout and tear him in half among other charming things I like elephants but they aren't pets, sometimes psychotic heavy equipment is more like it. It doesn't take must to do it either females have been known to get fed up with being pushed around by humans and crushed them. All in all it's more a commentary on just how hard it is to earn a living in India than how well behaved Elephants are.

  26. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    Re Miniature elephants as pets

    That would be nice. A small talking and singing one, about as tall as a normal chair, that one could ride on would provide countless hours of fun and entertainment to bored geeks everywhere. Apart of serving as a man-transport-slave, it could also hold conversations and let you cuddle up with it on cold, dark nights.

  27. Smallbrainfield

    Elephants like a drop of the sauce, too.

    I've heard tell of elephants getting drunk on fermening sugar cane and running amok. I'm sure I once read (possibly in Fortean Times) about a herd of elephants attacking a beer wagon in India.

    I don't know whether they were wearing hoodies.

  28. Pete
    Thumb Down

    It's thanks to petitions like these..

    ...real petitions about important issues like climate change or global poverty or fighting AIDs get swept under the carpet - it's depressing that 'Elephants as Pets' or the Sun's 'we want the red arrows at the olympics' get all the attention.

  29. Rune Moberg
    Coat

    CO2

    Anyone care to guess as to how much CO2 emissions are caused by yer average elephant?

    Me, I love elephants. Uhm, I mean I like them as pets, not sex-toys like all those sheeps in New Foundland. And I bet they are very convenient pets as well. It takes a brave parking attendant to attempt collecting parking fees from one of them things.

  30. Jonathan McColl
    Stop

    An elephant is for life...

    ...not for Christmas. We already have donkey and dog sanctuaries; if these animals became the new must-have we'd need someting like they have in Tennessee: www.elephants.com, a home for neglected elephants.

  31. mike amidon

    well then...

    As an american raised in the uk i am appalled.

    You can be sure me and my elephant shall go elsewhere on vacation!

    Pachyderm haters!

  32. Alex Witherspoon
    Coat

    Just Imagine.

    Lustful Herd Of Pachyderms. No need for a taxi, I'll grab my car.

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