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Tuesday November 16, 2010

Red Heads And Faces At Dublin Zoo

Pictured is Sibu a 32-year-old male Orangutan at Dublin Zoo this weekend to celebrate Orangutan Awareness Week (Photocall)

An offer of free entry to children with red hair at Dublin Zoo has led to an unexpected and unintended debate - whether or not it was offensive!

Dublin Zoo came up with the marketing idea as part of a campaign to raise awareness of orang-utans as an endangered species in the wild.

It gave free admission last weekend to all ginger-haired children, or any child who dressed up as orang-utans.

It seemed like a harmless stunt - but within hours the debate was raging on the internet - was it politically incorrect?

On Twitter, one person asked: "I'm sorry, but are Dublin Zoo really giving free entry to redheads for Orangutan week? Seriously? Seriously?"

Another wrote: "Apes and Redheads? Connection?"

In 2008, a similar campaign in Australia had to be abandoned after an Adelaide zoo was inundated with complaints.

And some parents groups also expressed concern that red-haired children would be open to taunting at Dublin Zoo because of their natural hair colour.

But Dublin Zoo operations manager Gerry Creighton - himself a redhead - defended the stunt as fun and quirky.

"The real story is about orang-utans," he said, "It's tough economic times and if children turn up with red on them, they get in for free, and the money given by the adults goes towards saving a bit of forest for the orang-utans.

"Orangutans could be the first of the large apes to go extinct."

Dublin Zoo has four organutans: 32-year-old Sibu; his partner Leonie (27), Rhiona (14) and Mujur (5).

The animals, which are one of the closest relatives to man in the animal world, live in the wild in Malaysia and Indonesia

But much of their habitat is being destroyed to make way for Palm oil plantations. Animal conservationists believe they could be wiped out in 10 years in the wild unless awareness is raised.

And that's something else they have in common with redheads - scientists say just 4 per cent of the European population have red hair, and predict the rarest hair colour will die out altogether in the future due to global intermingling.

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