perzephone | People Who've Died

I don't know if enough people read my journal for me to receive any criticism for what I'm about to type, but I want to remember this day. And maybe people doing a search on the name will run across the rant I'm about to launch.

I don't normally jubilate when people die. I mean, it's a common, everyday occurrence, it's the only guarantee we have in life, and everytime someone dies they leave the living behind, saddened and mourning and lost. I do feel empathy for the families that are left behind.

Steve 'Crocodile Hunter' Irwin has been killed by a stingray.

I'm so fucking relieved it isn't even funny. It's about freaking time that maniac met his just rewards. I'd watch him flipping poisonous, dangerous and endangered snakes around like jumpropes, watched him tease crocodiles with lawn mowers & his kids, watched him act like some big macho Beastmaster or some shit, pissed off at how disrespectful of his zoo's inmates he was, and wish that one of those bushmasters would just nail him right in the damned face.

I think a quote from the Bloomberg article sums it up:
"Stingrays aren't aggressive and sting only when threatened" said Bryan Fry, deputy director of the Australian Venom Research Unit at the University of Melbourne. ``It didn't sting out of aggression, it stung out of fear.''

Crocodile Hunter Steve Irwin Killed by Stingray (Update3)

Everyone around would say, "Oh, he's probably not really like that when he's running his zoo. He's just a showman on t.v.". Yeah, about as much of a showman as the Jackass crew.

I've been handling snakes a looong time, since I was very little. I have slept with my snakes (or they slept with me, more like). I took the time to speak with herpetologists and snake owners and herpephiles to learn the proper care & feeding of reptiles. I watched Ed go from being malnourished, dehydrated, too skinny, his skin tearing like paper from his wretched owners, kept in squalid conditions & actually survive & thrive in my care. Ed is sooo fat & so content and so loving...

People like Irwin make it look like any ape with opposable thumbs can pick up a wild reptile & keep it as a pet, or worse yet, sling it around like so much tinsel. My only wish is that it had been a snake that killed him, but having a stingray impale him is almost as just a death... I wrote protest letters to Animal Planet about keeping him on the air, but I'm not paying for their shows, dig? People like Steve Irwin are why there is a need for shows like "Animal Cops: Miami" & "Animal Cops: Houston". Not to mention the one about the venom clinic.