The average lion is dead. Starvation is an extremely common cause of death in the wild. Nearly every animal dies either directly from starvation, injury in an attempt at gaining food, or predation (which of course is something else trying to gain food). 50% of lion cubs die due to starvation in their first year alone. When you see healthy lions in their prime, you're only seeing the winners.

Similarly in hunter gatherer societies you don't see many malnourished individuals, you see graves.

Comparing the average life span of wild animals and their brethren living lives at Zoos, pets or otherwise protected enviroments allowing them to die of old age, I'd say yes.

animals living in zoos actually tend to die younger than their counterparts in the wild so you have basically made their point for them

it also suggests that we in modern society are basically domesticated/in a zoo compared with our hunter-gatherer ancestors, which doesn't really sound like the better option to me

> Is “constant malnutrition” the norm for animals living in the wild?

No, but struggle is.

I suspect it's people confusing individuals with the species. The individual suffered, the species survived and evolved... eventually, we still have a long way to go.