Concerning Big Brother Snake Scene

[royalreilly]

This week on the popular game show Big Brother there was a scene that used snakes for shock value. In a mini game players had to match up pairs of identical snakes, but the way the snakes were being handled and kept was so concerning to me as a snake lover!

Here is a clip of the game: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5VL7LEJYaU

The snakes are in big containers. I count over a dozen snakes of completely different species in each container. I'm bad at guessing numbers but I'd guess there's at LEAST 100 snakes total. The snakes are obviously stressed out. They are confined in small spaces with multiple other snakes. Many of them look to be frantically slithering around while others are balled up, being covered completely by other snakes. There appear to be kingsnakes, you know, the snakes that eat other snakes, in with the mix. This has to be so unsafe for the snakes in every way. I just can't even imagine what business(?) would allow their animals to be used that way. I have no idea where they came from, but they had to be rented or something from somewhere, right??

At around the 3:00 minute mark in the video I linked, you can see a snake bite another snake, which is not treated as a serious issue, but is once again shown for shock value.

Many of the contestants themselves handle the snakes very poorly, dropping or shoving them into their containers.

I don't know why I haven't seen any other people talking about this... when I look at the comments on the video and places like that it's just fans of the show talking about the players. This scene was just very disheartening to me. How do you guys feel about this situation? Am I just too empathetic for the snakes? Or is this really as bad as I feel it is? Is there anything that can really be done about this?

[Skyrivers]

The real question is, Why are they now under investigation for animal abuse?

[royalreilly]

The real question is, Why are they now under investigation for animal abuse?

Are they? I didn't see anything about that, but I'll admit I didn't dig much past the first page of Google because I was tired of just seeing people talking about the gameplay, lol. The only other thing I saw about the problems with this scene was on a reddit thread where someone brought it up. Apparently the show has used other animals, including more snakes, like this in the past, too.

[Skyrivers]

Are they? I didn't see anything about that, but I'll admit I didn't dig much past the first page of Google because I was tired of just seeing people talking about the gameplay, lol. The only other thing I saw about the problems with this scene was on a reddit thread where someone brought it up. Apparently the show has used other animals, including more snakes, like this in the past, too.

Was a typo... NOT. not now.

[royalreilly]

Was a typo... NOT. not now.

Oops lol. You got me excited for a second there!

[Reinz]

To me it was obvious that they were coached on snake handling and maybe practiced before the competition. Because they were not snake people and some were terrified; they moved with confidence and actually handled the snakes pretty gentle considering their experience.

I thought it was funny that the Carpet Python was usually the least cooperative about going in the box- so typical.

I was surprised that the show/trainers trusted a Green Tree Python as one of the picks. That one was pretty chill.

[Craiga 01453]

I couldn't get more than a minute in...but it had nothing to do with the snakes...
I couldn't stand that commentator's voice!!! It sounded like a cheesy kids show my niece would make me watch... Oh well, thanks for sharing! Now that I'm typing this I realize I could have just turned the volume off, ugggh silly me.

[Danger noodles]

I was at my moms house and she was watching it. I was so mad that they treat them like that. And the green tree python! I thought for sure it would bite

[dr del]

Video no longer available for me.

[Bogertophis]

How dumb... I do think all contestants had been pretty well coached about handling gently, it's just the overall experience that was very stressful for the snakes,
especially because the same ones were grabbed each time, multiple times overall. Terrible to pile them together, mixed species...and milk snakes are similar to
kings...they do eat other snakes, & those from the same area would know them as predators. That's why you saw one bite another too. What won't "Hollywood"
do for the camera? Ugh... As far as why the snakes were so mellow, I have a feeling they were kept cooler than is optimal too.