Fanfare for the Common Man: Man vs. Wild | Columnist | Berkeley Independent

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Fanfare for the Common Man: Man vs. Wild

Published Tuesday, March 02, 2010 9:43 AM

By Dan Brown
Berkeley Independent

I’m sure you saw the recent story about the woman trainer, a USC alumni who was killed by a Killer Whale at Orlando’s Sea World.

We have all made the comments about the obvious danger everybody seems to ignore when it comes to frolicking around a big, deep pool with a two-ton mammal that comes with a mammoth mouth and very big teeth who coincidentally has the word “Killer” as its first name.

I know the woman was merely sitting poolside petting the Orca on the nose when it reached up and grabbed her and drug her into the pool. And if the whales could speak, I’m sure it wasn’t doing anything more rambunctious than playing, roughhousing around so to speak.

But when you weigh a couple tons and have a mouth the size of a small trash dumpster, with teeth no less, roughhousing around can be dangerous, and sadly, in this case, fatal.

The trainer drowned, which is to say, the killer whale didn’t eat her. Whales don’t know we can’t breathe underwater or even hold our breath for as long as they can.

The whale was just doing what whales do in this case.

I think they made one too many Free Willy movies, though I understand Steve Irwin’s daughter is making her film debut in the latest Free Willy incarnation.

It’s hard to believe it’s been almost four years since Irwin died after being fatally stung while swimming with stingrays. Irwin spent his entire life around crocodiles that wanted to eat him. He understood and respected the threat of wild animals.

But we all get lazy sometimes. We relax. We let down our guards. And we shouldn’t.

It used to be we were afraid of wild animals like bears, tigers, dolphins, killer whales and the likes. Not anymore.

Nowadays, and maybe it stems from this whole communing with nature movement or the whole Golden Rule Love Thy Neighbor state of mind, but we suddenly feel that wild animals are our friends, that they aren’t a danger to us, and hey, if you walk up to one with a smile and an outstretched hand, that animal will let you pet it.

Wrong.

And we wonder when we read about tigers mauling Las Vegas magicians or 200-pound monkeys beating someone to a pulp, or pet wolves suddenly turning on their masters and devouring an entire family.

Just because Tarzan had Cheetah doesn’t mean your next-door neighbor should have a monkey, too.

I tell you who’s to blame in all this. Those petting zoos are to blame.

Animals don’t have the known cerebral function for loving thy neighbor. They embrace Darwinism. Animals love their neighbors … for dinner maybe. Survival of the fittest is their only religion. Eat or be eaten. You can’t domesticate that.

You do know that if they could, your dogs and cats would eat you.

The next time you are sitting there on your couch, scratching kitty behind the ears, take a moment and regard the calculating look in their eyes. Fluffy is watching you with that practiced look that is trying to figure out what would be the best way to attack you so as to eat you. ?Do you want to know what that look is really saying?

It’s saying, “Give me time. Not today. Not tomorrow. But one of these days I’m going to figure out how to do this and then my friend, you’re dinner.”

There is a wild in wild animals for a reason.

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