Waltzing with the Animals
Apparently, a man was attacked by a tiger at the Calgary Zoo this morning. Two men scaled a 42 foot high fence to get into the tiger cage, and one, of course, was mauled and scratched by the predatory feline. This comes just a week after a crazed manic-depressive in San Francisco managed to scale a fence, cross a moat, and scale an electric fence to get in to a bear enclosure at the San Francisco Zoo. And only a couple of years after several troubled youths managed to get into the Tiger enclosure at the SF Zoo, resulting in the death of one of the youths and the tiger involved.
The one lingering question is? Why the hell do you think it’s a good idea to go into a tiger cage?! They are in a cage for a reason, they are not out wandering the streets of Calgary, purring and rubbing up against people, because to them people are food. The thing that bugs the hell out of me here is that people will blame the zoo for not having done enough to protect the animals. Frankly, I think a 42 foot high fence is pretty darn effective at keeping most people out. You could make the fence 1000 feet high and made out of concrete and some bozo would get climbing gear out and try to get in there.
If you get into a cage with a wild animal you deserve what you get and no one should save you. (Provided you are old enough to know what you are doing – I’d expect every attempt to be made to save a young child). When you are in your late 20s you know exactly the consequences of your actions. Worst case scenario, two idiots are removed from the gene pool. And strangely enough, in my opinion, best case scenario, two idiots are removed from the gene pool. It’s a win-win situation. Let them be made an example of by a tiger, or a bear, or a gorilla, or a friggin peacock.
People are stupid, and if you are stupid enough to do something like this you deserve what you get and it is not anybody else’s problem. The zoo should not be held liable for the injuries this moron managed to sustain, and frankly, if the health system was run properly, he should 1) be placed near the bottom of the triage list, and 2) have to pay for the medical expense of being mauled by a tiger due to his own inane stupidity out of his own pocket. The taxpayer should not have to pay for idiots and criminals to receive health care required for injuries sustained while doing something illegal.
Activities like this, in essence, should void your rights under the Canada Health Act the same way opening up your computer and playing with it voids the warranty on it, or the same way performing certain acts voids your life insurance. You wouldn’t offer car insurance to somebody who had been in 12 accidents in the past 12 months, why would you offer health insurance to someone stupid enough to scale fences to get up close and personal with a killing machine.
Just a thought.
CC
