"It's inhumane to the animals. If I give you a steamed stuffed bun and pull it back while you are eating it, would you mind that? Confined animals in the zoos are not supposed to entertain people like that."

Guo Geng, an animal protection expert, talking in a Beijing Youth Daily report about a zoo's practice of arranging a "tug-of-war" between several people and a tiger, with the tiger holding food in a bag and the people pulling a rope tied to the bag. The zoo, in Changsha, Hunan province, said the practice aims to help the animals return to a wild state.