you are not immune to propaganda

first off. they are NOT animatronics. uniquegeese has explicitly said that himself on streams, and this is added on by the fact that mollie literally gets decapitated and dies, blood spurting out of her disembodied head. lloyd and mollie also just, generally look a lot more like living, breathing creatures than just some mascot suits or robots with their fur, feathers. as well as being able to blink and emote.

so that begs the question: how do these exist, if they aren't just robots and are in fact flesh and blood? well... judging by some of the context clues we've gotten so far, i think i can make a guess:

Indigo Park created the mascots through animal experimentation and genetic remodelling.

first off, the mascots themselves. at least, in the state they appear in. they are far more reminiscent of wild, feral animals than killer animatronics or toys or what-not from most other mascot horror games. lloyd in particular stands out in this.

when we first find him, he's all curled up asleep on the theatre stage. again, another point to these being living breathing things if they require sleep. only to then run off on all fours as soon as he wakes up and notices ed, then proceeds to stalk them within the backstage. keeping to the shadows and retreating when he's spotted or isn't in position to properly attack, again, like a real lion stalking its prey until it's within striking distance.

lloyd DOES walk on two feet properly, though. primarily when he trots away after first being sighted in the backstage, and later after ed grabs the key, lloyd does physically walk around even though it isn't visible to the player and he despawns after they leave the room with the key until it's time to do the jumpscare.

(credit to horrorscoped's "what indigo park hides in rambley's railroad and theater areas" video for the screenshots)

second, and what i think is most important to answering this question: mollie macaw. it's established in her death screen that she can mimic things that she's heard, including voices, which macaws in real life can also do. and while it's hard to hear them during her chase sequence, she has SEVERAL voice lines that play. most of them are taken from the rambley's railroad ride from earlier in the chapter, but there are several others that seem to be taken from employees or guests before the park's closure. i'll link a video to them here, but the lines i'm referring to in particular are:

"Stay in your seat!"

"I wanna play with the birdie!"

"Don't touch that thing, son..."

"Get up, you stupid freak."

"Get back in your cage, bird."

"The customer is always right."

the two i'm focused on mainly are fourth and fifth ones, which are undoubtedly park employees. calling her a freak, telling her to back into HER cage... paints a very, very unpleasant picture of what's going on. one that is confirmed even more by an easter egg in rambley rush, where if you fall into the fourth pit while moving to the left, you can find a second mollie inside a cage.

verbally abused and caged up... like a mistreated animal.

so... why? why create these "mascots" instead of having employees dress up in costumes like other parks? they clearly intended to at one point, as they had at least produced a costume for rambley before the mascots entered the picture... simple, really. money.

if you were a business and wanted to maximize profits with little morals, why not try and turn animals into your company's characters for your theme park so you can avoid paying your employees a little extra for going around in costume? if companies are willing to replace writers and artists with AI, why not put in a little more effort to create something else to do that job for you instead of having to pay someone else to do it?

but, something happened. maybe one of the mascots finally had enough and attacked an employee or guest? who knows... whatever the case, the park was suddenly and quickly evacuated with the events being covered up.

and the mascots were left to rot. with no humans to supervise them and keep the instructions and training and company-mandated rules drilled into them, combined with the isolation and likely mental toll it took... they regressed. they slowly lost what made them "mascots" in all but appearance, and now? they're animals again. wild, feral animals. ones that don't see a random person as a guest to greet, but as a smaller, weaker animal. a prey.