And it comes out

[urbpan]

Sorry I jumped to blame the victim, but it appears I was right.

Okay, so the wall was four feet shorter than the AZA recommendations state. It still took 60 years for someone to be obnoxious enough to annoy the tiger into jumping out.

Here's where the zoo is really culpable: these three guys apparently drunkenly roamed the zoo taunting animals conspicuously enough for zoo guests to report it, for some amount of time, without security throwing them out. But once again, it was Christmas day, and I imagine they were short staffed.

When someone dies for a stupid reason, there's enough blame to go around for everyone.

Comments

[bellisaurius.livejournal.com]

In an older, more civilized time, we would be talking about object lessons; how we should be careful around wildlife, and the importance of appropriate behavior, as opposed to talking about culpability.

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

Yeah, we don't really live in a time and place that cares for 'object lessons.' We live in a culture that assigns a dollar amount to responsibility.

If I were a little more awake I'd write about why risk of danger is a good thing that we actually seek out, but maybe later.

[kryptyd.livejournal.com]

A similar(ish) thing happened at Dublin zoo recently where a drunken girl had her arm ripped off by a tiger. I don't think anything came of it apart from a lot of tut-tutting about the girl and the odd idiot on the radio yelling about how "that tiger should be shot!". The tiget wasn't shot.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2006/0712/zoo.html
Ahh, here's a link. It appears I may have been being "colourful" with regard to the arm being ripped actually off.

[kryptyd.livejournal.com]

Jaysus! I just noticed that that happened in July 06! So now you know what my idea of "recent" consists of!

Here's more drunken big cat idiocy for you
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article141795.ece
I love the Sun reporting; they would definitely have been "mauled to death" had they climbed the fence. Oy.

Sigh...

[gythiawulfie.livejournal.com]

Well it is good the truth is coming out. I hope the Zoo changes some of it's policies and proceedures and starts to upgrade their habitats.

AND I know that at one point, the Metro Zoo in Miami had bullet proof plexiglass enclosure between the people and the moat, on top of a small low voltage electric rail on the other side of that glass. However, after Andrew I don't recall seeing some of that down there. (Alot of the zoo is still being repaired.)

[sin-agua.livejournal.com]

I was extremely suspicious when I heard the victims' gender and ages. I didn't believe this animal just went to all this trouble over nothing.

Young people + alcohol + assholish behavior = comeuppance/death.

I'm just sad the tiger in this case was killed. As far as I'm concerned, it was self-defense and the young men should have to pay to buy the zoo another Siberian tiger.

Taunting children and animals: two things I just can't abide.

[qwrrty.livejournal.com]

Yikes.

It seems increasingly clear that the kids should be held responsible and that it would be appropriate for the survivors to have to pay a fine to the zoo (I have no idea what the cost of a Siberian tiger is or whether it is at all realistic to expect them to shoulder the replacement costs).

But it is hard for me to see anything other than a tragedy for all concerned here. A young man died here. Even if you argue that he deserved what he got (I am not sure that I would agree but it is certainly up for debate), his family will be left with that hole for the rest of their lives. I am sad that the tiger was killed but I find that even more saddening.

[sin-agua.livejournal.com]

I spoke a bit emotionally this morning, but I'm still not sure I feel sorrier for the kid than for the tiger.

Your icon is adorable, btw. ;)

[ndozo.livejournal.com]

Pay a fine?!? Getting killed isn't enough punishment? How about if they fed the kid's corpse to the other tigers? And who killed the tiger? Not the kids. Why did the tiger get killed? Not because the kids bothered it, it was because it got out of its inadequate enclosure and killed someone. Let the dope who ok'd the poor design pay for a new tiger, or the people that built the enclosure. I think the dead kid has paid for his mistake, and I'm guessing that the ones who survived won't do anything similar anytime soon. The zoo is completely at fault here. If their tigers are so sensitive, why don't they put plexiglass between them and the humans. Or maybe they should just have a rickety short, little fence, and they could ask everyone to sign a waiver saying that if someone--anyone--annoys the tigers, someone--anyone--might get killed by that tiger. Then people might behave a little better. Seriously though, I agree, this is a tragedy.

[qwrrty.livejournal.com]

To be clear (I hope!) I think that it would not be unreasonable to expect the survivors of the attack to pay a fine to the zoo. (But I also think that you could make a good argument that they have sure as hell learned their lesson.)

In any event, there is no doubt whatever that the dead boy's family has suffered enough.

[ndozo.livejournal.com]

I agree that people shouldn't taunt zoo animals. But it's just some form of karma that the people who actually were injured/killed were the ones teasing the cat. Once that tiger got out it could have chomped on anyone. It is completely the responsibility of the zoo to be sure that dangerous animals can never escape their enclosures, no matter what: If lightning strikes right next to them, if a bee stings them, if stupid people taunt them, they should never be able to get out to where people are. It's foolish to think that no one will tease a caged animal. It's a macho, dumbass thing that happens all the time. Some people think that animals don't belong in zoos at all and that that is the first mistake in this sad situation. Plus, this tiger had already bitten someone. Maybe it liked the taste. To my mind, getting drunk and teasing a zoo animal shouldn't be a capital crime. Chances are the kid that was killed would have grown out of it and been a perfectly fine man. Taking satisfaction in his death is creepy. And sin_agua, if the "death" part of your equation was correct, there would be far, far fewer people walking this planet.

[sin-agua.livejournal.com]

I obviously had not had my coffee this morning and was not terribly mindful with my comments. Reading them over again now, I see I was being a bit harsh. Probably a reflection of spending years being taunted myself, and growing up with a step-father who was abusive to animals and me unable to do anything about it.

I agree with you that it is foolish to think no one will tease the animals.

Taking satisfaction in his death is creepy. And sin_agua, if the "death" part of your equation was correct, there would be far, far fewer people walking this planet.

If I did take any satisfaction, it was only momentary, and I was speaking a bit emotionally this morning, as I said. But I still feel more sympathy for the tiger than the kid. As for the equation, well...I've seen a lot of stupid people (myself included) miss out on getting themselves killed simply by dumb luck. So yeah, I guess that's why there's still so many of us around. ;)

[ndozo.livejournal.com]

I really understand. I always tend to side with animals first as well, and this morning I was trying to figure out why. I came to a similar conclusion to yours, that having been the clueless target of much taunting and meanness in school, and feeling trapped in that situation, my reflexive sympathy was for the tiger. If only I had been able to maul my tormentors, or perhaps kill them with my teeth and claws, my school years would have been much, much, much more fun. But now, as the parent of a fairly typical teenage boy, I live with my fingers crossed that he will survive these next few years, and he's a pretty reasonable kid, who, I'm happy to say would have been defending the tiger. He might have gotten in a fight over it, but at least it would have been with his own species. I'm sorry if I came back too strongly this morning.

[sin-agua.livejournal.com]

Thanks - that was an incredibly kind response. :)

[qwrrty.livejournal.com]

You were right. I still think you were jumping to conclusions a bit, but clearly not without reason. :-)

It also seems to me that they (and 911) also screwed up by not responding more quickly when they received reports of a tiger attack. I can understand their skepticism, but in this case it seems that prudence should have dictated a swift response first and recriminations afterward. Very sad.

[teratologist.livejournal.com]

Now I'm just mad at the zoo for not being well designed enough to protect animals from people at the hundred-year asshole high-water mark, is all.

[teratologist.livejournal.com]

After further thought, I find it interesting that so many people are attributing the debacle at the San Francisco Zoo to some kind of modern softness. A bit of observation suggests that a predilection for doing stupid things to potentially fatal animals is a trait that is expressed in the human phenotype regularly even in the absence of emergency room doctors and personal injury lawyers, and thus cannot be attributed to modern decadence at all.

[bellisaurius.livejournal.com]

This is true, although certain potentially litiguous elements of it are stuff that hasn't been popular since cicero's day.