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Carol definitely fed her husband to the tigers!!!

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Carol definitely fed her husband to the tigers!!!

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Started watching it but couldn't get into it...

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Started watching it but couldn't get into it...

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I knew some (or most?) parts of America housed some interesting people...but this actually blew my mind. I was less interested in the feud between the 3 and more interested in exactly how we've made it to this point. Also, we would have more tigers in zoos than in the wild... only in America. Gah.  I also *kind* of felt bad for Joe at the end. lol

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I knew some (or most?) parts of America housed some interesting people...but this actually blew my mind. I was less interested in the feud between the 3 and more interested in exactly how we've made it to this point. Also, we would have more tigers in zoos than in the wild... only in America. Gah.  I also *kind* of felt bad for Joe at the end. lol

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Agreeing with Tori, it honestly restarted my fear for the beliefs and actions of some people in other parts of our country (a similar feeling I have for how voters can support a certain someone). These people are crazy. So happy to live in NY.

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Agreeing with Tori, it honestly restarted my fear for the beliefs and actions of some people in other parts of our country (a similar feeling I have for how voters can support a certain someone). These people are crazy. So happy to live in NY.

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I feel bad for the animals and I am still wondering what all the hype is about

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I feel bad for the animals and I am still wondering what all the hype is about

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It left me wondering what’ll happen to the other tiger handlers. Hopefully there’s some form of justice

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It left me wondering what’ll happen to the other tiger handlers. Hopefully there’s some form of justice

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I have not watched the show. Good morning!

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I have not watched the show. Good morning!

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It left me (after the first two episodes, I couldn't watch anymore) sad, more stressed for these animals and wondering about gov't regs on anything.

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It left me (after the first two episodes, I couldn't watch anymore) sad, more stressed for these animals and wondering about gov't regs on anything.

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Also, don't know what I would've done without it!! Sooo riveting!! haha

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I saw clips... didn’t look like a show I would be into.

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I thought it was an insane trash fire, but I couldn't look away. Agreed with Scott's opinion, and I also thought it kind of plateaued in the middle? Like I wanted there to be more of a twist at the end or something. Overall, definitely served its purpose as escapism for me.

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I thought it was an insane trash fire, but I couldn't look away. Agreed with Scott's opinion, and I also thought it kind of plateaued in the middle? Like I wanted there to be more of a twist at the end or something. Overall, definitely served its purpose as escapism for me.

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I had listened to the podcast months ago, but I did get wrapped up in the show. I agree with Scott that it's disappointing to see some attempts to portray Joe as someone who got framed.

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I had listened to the podcast months ago, but I did get wrapped up in the show. I agree with Scott that it's disappointing to see some attempts to portray Joe as someone who got framed.

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The social psych that surrounds all three of the major players interestingly reflects the hallmarks of a cult, but with much different ends for the followers.

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The social psych that surrounds all three of the major players interestingly reflects the hallmarks of a cult, but with much different ends for the followers.

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There’s a doctoral thesis in there somewhere.

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I'll admit I watched and it was a spectacle! But a little disappointed how many people have rallied around Joe Exotic as if he's some sort of "good guy." There are podcasts and articles about this that tell a different story than these filmmakers did. 

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I'll admit I watched and it was a spectacle! But a little disappointed how many people have rallied around Joe Exotic as if he's some sort of "good guy." There are podcasts and articles about this that tell a different story than these filmmakers did. 

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Why would someone benefit and earn a lot of money by exploiting poor animals? 

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Why would someone benefit and earn a lot of money by exploiting poor animals? 

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I watched, agree with all opinions here, can't say anymore then what has already been said. Carol totally killed her husband. 

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I watched, agree with all opinions here, can't say anymore then what has already been said. Carol totally killed her husband. 

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Money Heist is the show people should be watching next.

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I watched a few minutes of the first episode...waste of time.

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I watched a few minutes of the first episode...waste of time.

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As empty is Joe Exotic felt when carol was trying to take away his tigers because no one in my life will support me getting a dog 

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As empty is Joe Exotic felt when carol was trying to take away his tigers because no one in my life will support me getting a dog 

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Insane. Everything Lia said in her post is correct.

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Insane. Everything Lia said in her post is correct.

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Joe definitely needed to do jail time but everyone else should be there too and longer.

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can't watch more because of form not content

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you ain't got nothin on us Russians. We are BEAR EMPERORS! 

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you ain't got nothin on us Russians. We are BEAR EMPERORS! 

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Russians Feeding Bears. Bears in the Streets of Russia and inside of Houses

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Before "Tiger King," there was New York's infamous Tiger Man.

After the police shot him with a tranquilizer dart, Ming the tiger lunged at the window. Credit... John Roca/NY Daily News Archive, via Getty Images

So, did Tiger Man enjoy "Tiger King?"

"I was turned off by it," said Antoine Yates, who became known as New York City's Tiger Man long before the wild popularity of Netflix's documentary mini-series. "It just shows how ignorant these so-called exotic animal lovers can be."

Mr. Yates also got momentarily famous for keeping a full-grown tiger, this one named Ming. But rather than the more rural settings favored by Joe Exotic and the show's other big-cat enthusiasts, he kept Ming in his Harlem apartment, for more than two years.

In 2001, Mr. Yates, then a 31-year-old construction worker, brought the 8-week-old cub to his sprawling home in a Harlem housing project.

Ming quickly went from bottle feeding to consuming 20 pounds of chicken thighs a day, which Mr. Yates would heft home each morning from a local supermarket. And in less than three years, the Siberian-Bengal mix grew into a 425-pound behemoth.

The authorities eventually discovered Ming in 2003. They subdued and removed him, along with a five-foot-long alligator named Al that Mr. Yates kept in a fiberglass tank in the apartment.

Both animals were relocated to an Ohio sanctuary, where Ming died from natural causes in February 2019. Mr. Yates was arrested and served a brief stint in jail for illegally keeping an animal.

I was a reporter on The New York Times metro desk when the story was playing out, a time when the city seemed a bit wilder.

Nevertheless, even seasoned editors and reporters were flabbergasted that a man had kept a tiger in his public housing apartment in such a dense urban setting.

City authorities were also puzzled as to how the presence of a tiger in Apartment 5E of the Drew Hamilton public housing complex had remained an open secret among some neighbors. Ming certainly escaped the notice of city Housing Authority officials who said they fielded complaints from neighbors about urine smells from Mr. Yates's apartment, but never any mention of a tiger.

Nor did they know about the other exotic animals Mr. Yates might have kept in the apartment.

At the time, neighbors claimed to reporters and to law enforcement officials that Mr. Yates had bear cubs, Rottweilers, rabbits, hyenas, monkeys, snakes, a llama, a tarantula and even a young lion.

Asked about this recently, Mr. Yates, who lives with his mother in the Philadelphia area, would not elaborate past saying, "I did have a lot of exotics in there."

He gamely revealed the rest of the story, though, from his pet-keeping obsessions that began at age 3 with teddy bear hamsters to later escapades with more exotic critters.

He said he bought Ming - the name came from Mr. Yates's interest in the Chinese dynasty - from an exotic animal breeder for "a couple thousand."

The tiger became central to a utopian plan for an animal sanctuary that he envisioned as "a new concept of animals living together," Mr. Yates said in a phone interview.

He built a sandbox in Ming's room and used pieces of carpeting and dolls as part of a regimen of play and training. This included hide-and-seek with items sprayed with cologne, and freezing slabs of liver that Ming would play with as they melted, "things to stimulate his mind," Mr. Yates said.

"I didn't want to domesticate him," he added. "I did a lot of enrichment with him to feed his instinct. I was like a drill sergeant."

Ming would loll around with Mr. Yates as he read or watched videos.

At the time, Mr. Yates variously called Ming his best friend, a brother figure and "my calling in life."

"Consciously I knew I had a tiger, but the physical interaction and bonding, it was so natural," he said in the interview. "It wasn't no different than raising a monkey or a snake."

He had put a down payment on a parcel north of New York City, he recalled, to create a haven of harmonious interaction between animals and people - a "Garden of Eden," was how he described it at the time.

"It was all carefully thought-through - I was a matter of months from securing the property," he said. "My whole intention was to keep Ming low-key for a little bit of time before moving him, but it was interrupted."

The interruption came in October 2003, after Mr. Yates took in an abandoned kitten he named Shadow. One day, Ming lunged at Shadow and gashed Mr. Yates in the leg as he tried to intervene.

Mr. Yates went to Harlem Hospital, claiming he had been attacked by a pit bull. Because of the size of the bite radius, doctors were skeptical. The authorities were alerted and the police arrived at Mr. Yates's building. They were able to stick a miniature camera into the apartment to confirm that, yes, there really was a tiger inside.

In a commando-style operation, an officer rappelling down the building's exterior was able to shoot a tranquilizer dart through a window to subdue Ming, who was then carried out on a tarp to a truck by a half-dozen responders.

The tranquilized Ming being removed from a Harlem apartment building. Credit... John Marshall Mantel for The New York Times

Antoine Yates, his arm injured by the tiger attack, sitting outside criminal court in Manhattan after being arraigned on Oct. 7, 2003. Credit... John Marshall Mantel for The New York Times

The police were alerted that Mr. Yates had then gone to a Philadelphia hospital. He was arrested there and the story became front-page news, with Mr. Yates becoming known in the tabloids as "Tiger Man."

He wound up pleading guilty to reckless endangerment and possessing a wild animal.

As part of the plea, prosecutors dropped charges against Mr. Yates's mother, Martha, then 68, who had been charged with endangering the welfare of eight young relatives and foster children by raising them for a period in the apartment while Ming was present.

"For a tiger to go unnoticed for that long, that couldn't happen today," recalled Jeremy Saland, the prosecuting attorney in the case. "Today, someone in the hallway would record it roaring, and it would be all over Instagram or Twitter."

Mr. Saland, now a criminal lawyer in Manhattan, said during pretrial preparations that he had tried unsuccessfully to get Ming housed at the Bronx Zoo so he could be presented as evidence and visited by jurors.

Mr. Yates served three months on Rikers Island, after which he was put on probation for five years and barred from having animals.

He still considers the prosecution a sham. Ming had been declawed, he said, and the children were only in the apartment while Ming was a smaller cat, and were never in danger.

"Most of the time it was just me there, no family, no friends, no girlfriends," he said. "I never put the public or another soul in harm's way. I'm not a hard-core criminal. I'm just a person with a passion for animals."

Ming's cremated remains were interred a year ago at the Hartsdale Pet Cemetery in Westchester County. The stone monument - "Ming, Tiger of Harlem" - lies about 17 miles north of the apartment of his pent-up childhood.

Mr. Yates said he plans to visit the grave, and has not given up on his dream of creating a utopian sanctuary.

"I'll always love animals till I leave this planet - I'm not going to just give up because of the judicial system," he said. "I loved the experience. I would do it again."

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A 425-Pound Tiger Living in a Harlem Apartment? Yes, It Happened

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Before "Tiger King," there was New York's infamous Tiger Man. So, did Tiger Man enjoy "Tiger King?" "I was turned off by it," said Antoine Yates, who became known as New York City's Tiger Man long before the wild popularity of Netflix's documentary mini-series. "It just shows how ignorant these so-called exotic animal lovers can be."

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I haven’t seen it yet
But I’ve seen my share of tigers from my trip to Thailand...

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Knowing that even house cats are evil, why would anyone spend time with a GIANT cat?

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Knowing that even house cats are evil, why would anyone spend time with a GIANT cat?

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Looking at you Diana.

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America is a weird place and I'm glad I live in NYC

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America is a weird place and I'm glad I live in NYC

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Also that these people have this weird group and they all seem to know each other...

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Sorry, I haven’t watched it

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The only Tiger King I know is Sir Tom "Tiger" Jones.

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The only Tiger King I know is Sir Tom "Tiger" Jones.

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I don't have any

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There are a lot of sick weirdos here. I am sure these people aren’t the only ones.

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Have you been to Tampa? Not surprised at all :) 

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Have you been to Tampa? Not surprised at all :) 

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Carole killed her husband, Joe was set up, and Jeff Lowe is a creepy weirdo.

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Carole killed her husband, Joe was set up, and Jeff Lowe is a creepy weirdo.

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Animal print was coming back, thinking this might kill that.

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Animal print was coming back, thinking this might kill that.

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I can’t get into it. Lol over tv and Netflix’s #week5problems

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I can’t get into it. Lol over tv and Netflix’s #week5problems

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-Evaluna

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watching Tiger King made me hold my cat so much closer

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watching Tiger King made me hold my cat so much closer

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The glorification of Joe Exotic drives me crazy.

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GM this is Mindy

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I have not seen the Tiger King, but I have seen the Lion King.  My children are almost old enough to watch it with me.

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I have not seen the Tiger King, but I have seen the Lion King.  My children are almost old enough to watch it with me.