-Not a Darwin Award candidate as he survived- but don’t you love hearing about stuff this dumb? I feel smarter by comparison just reading about this. Its a cheap way to feel superior, but I’m not above it.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1120AP_Alligator_Bite.html
Well, he’s made it to 62, so when he gets eaten, at least we won’t be left with that wistful sense that he might have outgrown his stupidity.
It was nice of the guests to pull the alligator’s tail so he would drop the man. I’m not sure I would have dared to do that. If I see someone getting ready to ride an alligator I’m going to tell him what a bad idea I think it is and then leave before it gets rough!
This week in Peace River, Alberta, a black bear wandered into a (the) grocery store, squeezed into the bakery case, and at an awful lot of pies.
Some lugnut shoved a camera phone in the bear’s face to get a close-up, and the bear justifiably nipped him, then wandered off.
Because he bit a human, there is now a death-sentence out for this bear. They haven’t caught him, though.
Does anyone else think the bear should be pardonned and the lugnut with the camera phone should be stuffed in a trap?
If the bear can be transported away from a town, I surely would vote for him to be spared. I think the problem is not so much that the bear bit the man (although maybe this is a special bear that is known in the town and that does come around peacefully) but that the bear came into the store at all. It is not afraid enough of people and it will keep getting into trouble. I’m not blaming the bear for this—somehow that bear has been able to get food from people sources and now his whole life is ruined because people let him do it. But he is going to come to a bad end no matter what if they can’t transport him way far away. There are other towns with this problem. I saw, maybe on Nature, some ways they are trying to deal with it. There is a woman I think who professionally scares bears who are getting too close to towns and people. It sounds mean and she doesn’t enjoy frightening them, but she is actually trying to save their lives. I’m not sure how successful she is though.
People are just so darned stupid about wild animals. I can’t even begin to understand even being in a store that a bear was in, let alone taking its picture. He should be fined for negligent behavior or something like that.
One of the problems with publicly funded health care is that morons feel totally free to get into any kind of harm’s way, and expect taxpayers to foot the bill. If “lugnuts” knew that he would be facing a $20K medical bill he would stop and think twice about putting himself in danger. He may not have known exactly how the bear would react, but he certainly knew there was risk involved.
I would like to see the same thing happen to morons who deliberately wander outside of patrolled areas in parks, just naturally assuming that the public will pay a few $100K for rescue parties to go search for him. Something is very wrong with this picture. Why am I paying for these fools to get lost and injured?
djm
The story seemed to make it clear that the bear’s entering the store wasn’t a problem worthy of killing the bear - it was the nipping of the phone-wielding lugnut. Maybe we can train the bear to go after cellphones in moving cars?
Sorry to have highjacked an alligator thread…
Re: Gator Ride…
“Stupid is as stupid does..” – Forest Gump’s momma.
And I hope they never do. I hate how people do such stupid things, and then expect justice when something bad happens because of their stupidity 