Posted on 09/05/2006 9:05:46 PM PDT by Kitten Festival
R.I.P: Steve Irwin's body isn't yet cold and already the Pecksniffs are out, tut-tutting the late crocodile hunter's risky encounters with wild beasts. They miss the point: Irwin's life was about enriching humans.
Irwin, who died over the weekend after a freak attack by a stingray, did not live a riskless life. In fact, for those who've watched his Animal Planet shows, some wonder why a fatal encounter hadn't happened earlier. But it's indisputable that he mastered nature with a rare talent — a talent that took him to the edge of possibility. For the sake of the rest of us, he shared his gift.
Exclaiming "crikey!" Irwin wrassled gators, handled snakes and got close to creatures with sharp teeth, riveting us all with his sunny confidence reminiscent of the pith-helmet British empire era.
He seemed to defy the barrier of television. "When I talk to the camera, mate, it's not like I'm talking to the camera, I'm talking to you because I want to whip you around and plunk you right there with me," he once said.
Maybe that's why the scolds came crawling out of their cubicles, all but saying Irwin had it coming. Irwin's success seemed to have made them sick to the green gills. Now they stand on his grave and claim to have the last word.
Two classes of critics have shown up in Irwin's case, galled by his distinctly Australian enthusiasm and his brawny persona.
Some are safety-firsters who say no one should touch nature because it's just too risky. Others are cognoscente of sorts who say no one should go near nature because all human contact will spoil it.
On Internet sites like Daily Kos, for instance, the local consensus was to condemn Irwin for taking chances, something almost as "bad" as soldiers
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BTTT!
Ping!
He lived life to the hilt, which is more than 99.9% of his naysayers can prove. I for one found him entertaining, informative, and inspirational.
Me too!
Amen to that!
Dennis Prager did a show on Irwin today and the bigger implications of it all. Toward the end of the show, he made the comment to the affect, why couldn't the TV world lose MTV instead Steve Irwin. Follow link to listen to his show.
http://www.townhall.com/talkradio/Show.aspx?RadioShowID=3
I wasn't a fan, but that's because I just don't care about the material, not because I disliked him. Certain people seem to have jumped on his death for a very obvious, very sad reason:
He lived his life without asking anyone else for permission. He lived his life the way he chose to live it, not the way the Daily Kos or even FR would have proscribed.
Little people who live comfortable lives without adventure, without coloring outside the lines, expect congratulations and praise for Doing As They're Told. They want the applause, and the thrill of being alive, without doing anything to deserve them. They want to live lives of excitement, but they like things kept at a nice air conditioned 65 degrees.
These people HATE IT when someone else shows them that they made their own choices, and their choices gave them the lives they have.
We ALL make choices that lead to the lives we have, though our circumstances are different. Some people want to mope and say they never had a chance, they didn't get to choose, etc. But that's bull--we all get to choose how we deal with what we're handed.
Someone like Irwin committed the cardinal sin to these people--he lived a fun life. His death gives these little people a chance to crow that he was wrong, somehow, because he didn't live a long life. Yet he packed more adventure and fun and LOVE of life into his 44 years than most people would if they lived to be 150. (And they would like to live that long, though one wonders why.)
That pisses people off, this love and enjoyment of life, because it tells the Little People that they had the chance to live as they wished--not as Irwin did, but doing whatever it was they dreamed of doing before they conformed--and the person they have to blame for NOT living as they chose was the person in the mirror.
So whenever someone mocks this guy for dying in the course of doing what HE chose to do, that person is someone who was too scared to have a similarly adventurous life, and is confessing to having a soul the size of a dried pea.
Beautifully said!
He was a fool - but an entertaining fool. Shame he killed himself so young.
All these idiots go "Ooooh What nice pretty bear." "Aww - That tiger won't hurt you if you're nice to them." "I bet I'm faster than that cobra." "Let's pet that nice 5-foot barracuda with the 2 inch fangs."
Shows like this one simply perpetuated the myths that "our planet is nice and gentle and only WE are bad and can't everything just get along ... Ooooooohhhh.... Let's tap the heads of the great White Shark - poke Moray eels with fingers" ... the idiot list grows and grows.
The entertainment value is from the audience hoping for and betting on disaster which WILL come when luck runs out. That's why the Romans had their Colloseum (aka Colosseum) Games- the people enjoyed them - later they demanded the blood sacrifices of the gladiators to entertain them.
What will WE demand for blood sacrifice when our "gladiators'" battles grow boring ?
C.S. Lewis once wrote that beyond the great sea of the beyond is pleasure, pleasure, pleasure, more pleasure than anyone can imagine, real heaven.
Irwin seemed to have a line to that sea C.S. Lewis knew of and he has gone home.
Ps - I liked the guy personally, but honestly, who in here thought that he could go on forever taking those extreme risks without it catching up.
I feel sorry for his family.
Timothy Treadwell had it coming. Steve Irwin did not. The difference between the two is striking. One became a meal, the other a teacher of men, an entertainer, but no fool.
My heart goes out to his wife and kids. I know that he was doing a special with his daughter when he was killed, but does anyone know if his daughter was there when it happened? For her sake, I hope not.
Not just on Daily Kos, we had a few of them on FR.
Fortunately, not many. Kos seemed to be pecksniff central.
Very good.
Bravo! Thanks for your post!
I would add one thing. I've thought a lot about Irwin's death, and some others I've seen. In one, a guy pulled out of a supermarket parking lot and got t-boned. He died instantly. When my crew arrived on scene, I was checking the car, and found his grocery receipt. It was time stamped. Approximately eight minutes earlier, he had been talking to a checkout clerk, and had no idea that was the last person he would ever talk to. In another accident, some friends of mine were driving down the Interstate, when a bus in the oncoming traffic lane lost control. It crossed the median and hit them head on. My friend, who was in the back seat survived. He said they didn't even have time to gasp.
When Irwin was killed, he wasn't doing a crazy stunt. He was doing a relatively safe dive, and was hit by a normally docile creature in probably the only place it could possibly have been fatal.
The point I take from his death is this: The day of the Lord comes like a thief in the night. We have no idea what will be our last moment on earth. Some of us may die in our beds, old and full of years, some from disease, and some pulling out of the parking lot at the supermarket. If Irwin were to have any regrets, it would probably be that he won't give his daughter away in marriage, or teach his son how to wrestle a crocodile. How many of us could say that our only regrets were that we weren't here a little longer? Why don't we live our lives in the way we see fit? Why do so many of us make enemies we don't have to make? When Christ calls us, we're going home. No man knows the day or the hour.
Very beautiful post, full of insight.
Now that his life has ended; much too soon for my liking, the naysayers stand around clicking their tongues saying stupid things like "I knew it, I just knew it" and other equally obnoxious stuff. He did what he did because he had such a passion for life. All life. He lived his life to the fullest and I must say I don't personally know anyone who even comes close to doing that.
The green eyed monster seems to be out in force. But you know what? They can in no way diminish his accomplishments which are many.
Good bye young friend. I will always appreciate everything you taught me and the hundreds of times you amazed and entertained me. Oh, and Agro says he didn't really mean he hated you. He just enjoyed the joust.
Peace and love....
"Now back to Steve Irwin. Whatever anyone may think of him he lived with great passion. Instead of just piddling away life he really seized the day. If we could all go forth and live that way. We may die one physical death. But to die a thousand deaths spiritually while wondering "what if" would be more painful. Better to really live than to merely exist. "
Beautiful posts, both!
This thread seems to be attracting the most elegant thinkers on FR, one after another, eloquent, all.
I know. My children and young people all over the world are mourning his death.
Excellent tag line!! I think I'll quote you, and toast Steve with anything but Miller beer.
Steve Irwin: You had to have lived a pretty good life to have this many children mourning your death)
Although I'm an atheist, I have been thinking about this kind of thing a lot lately, though I'm not sure why. There hasn't been a death in the family, though a young person I work with attempted (and failed) suicide. That wasn't the trigger; not sure what was.
Anyway, this has come out in a lot of my behavior lately. For example, I have many books, and many--hundreds, literally--I have bought but haven't read. I have started plowing through the unread ones, and though I feel guilty for tossing aside a book I paid good money for, I keep thinking 'Do you want this to be the last book you ever read? Do you want to spend this last afternoon reading THIS book?'
I know that seems trite to some, but I'm not talking about life-defining moments, just...moments. And if I am thinking that way about book reading, I am starting to think that way about everything I do, gradually.
If we live mindful of the end, I think that all of our imperfect days will include SOMEthing we were glad we were doing in the end.
Perfect.
Think I'll make that my new tagline.
They remind me of the old Thomas Naste cartoon of the live jackass kicking a dead lion.
Similar thoughts have been passing through my mind for the last year or so as well. I struggle with my spiritual beliefs. I don't know if there is an afterlife or if all our dreams are heaven are just manifestations of how difficult it is to let go of this life. If there is nothing else, then what I do counts now, not in some life beyond, and I need to make the most of it.
Agreed. You watched Steve and it inspired you to live life to the fullest more.
Steve really doesn't need defending. He only would have if he had tried to please everyone.
Dittos to that. I regret that his wife and children lost him so early in life...and I regret that my own children will only know Steve's dedication and enthusiasm from long-ago DVDs. I was thinking a few weeks before Steve's passing about how much fun it would be watching the Croc hunter's show on the Discovery Channel with my kids.
Not really, I just was pulling for the crocs. Reminds me of the bear man in Alaska
Steve became a big target for the liberals and MSM because he was a staunch supporter of Howard and liked Bush.
Doesn't shock me at all that the libs and MSM are trying to ruin his legacy.
No - 8-yo Bindi was off trekking in Tasmania with her mom and brother Bob-Bob.
I'm sorry they were apart on Australia's Father's Day on Sunday (even moreso now), but I'm betting that every day was Father's Day for Daddy's little girl.
Bear man in Alaska and Steven Erwin are two entirely different things and can't be compared.
Steve respected the hell out what a croc and these animals could do. He saved literally thousands of animals that would of been killed for one reason or another. Setup livable sanctuaries for many of these species. Brought people close to nature and educated them about it. He was especially good at educating children.
When he was in those pens at his zoo and standing next to the water with a dead chicken in his hand tempting the croc to jump out of the water, he was letting the crocs continue to hunt the way they do in the wild to get that food, instead of just throwing the food in the water.
He respected and cared about these creatures enough to not only house and feed them, but keep them thinking they were in the wild as much as possible so they had a reason to live.
The Bear man in Alaska was a complete moron and by pitching a tent in the middle of a hungry brown bear sanctuary and trying to live amongst them, its no shock what happend to him.
Steve didn't go live in a croc cage to try to get to know them better.
They truly are out in force. Almost enjoying this sick sport of who can say the same things in a more clever manner. Jealousy is such an evil emotion.
He popularized handling wild animals as par for the course. He annoyed the hell out of me for harrassing the animals, like the idiot kayakers and motorboats that show up every time an orca pod shows up in the puget sound.
Give me Nat. Geo and it's distance filming, not some camera junkie wanting to hug anancondas.
You've either never really watched his show or just didn't listen. Your comments totally misportrayed the spirit of his life. He always described how deadly those animals were. He knew he had a special gift to bring us close to it, that's all. I never saw him call everyone into the river to swim with the nice friendly crocs.
Before you go on a rant, know what you're talking about. Crikey!
I noticed how he didn't handle a black mamba....
Darn, I'm going to miss him; he was a great entertainer!
We all knew what he did was risky, but people like me thought that his good nature, kindness, gentle demeanor and positive attitude acted as some kind of "invincibility shield" that would prevent him form any and all danger. How silly it seemed, but the alternative was unthinkable. I'm trying to think of another celebrity that was as positive and just plain feel-good as Irwin, and I'm drawing blanks. In a time when we need more people to inspire us and bring us a little cheer, his death seems even more tragic.
Osama walks the earth and Steve Irwin is taken from it. This proves life is not fair, there are no guarantees in life except death, and we can not take our time on this earth for granted, for we do not know when our time is up.
Look down upon your children, Steve. Keep giving them the spirit of adventure you had every waking hour of your brief stay here on Earth. Protect them from the inevitable bites, scratches, and bruises the your little croc hunters will accumulate as they grow and learn to follow in your larger-than-life-sized footsteps. But most importantly, help them deal with the pain they feel from losing you, their guide, their teacher, their father. Crocs Rule.
We had a neighbor from Eritrea. One of the sweetest most gentle men you could ever meet. A truly good man. He had just got married, had a baby daughter, and his wife had just found out she was a few weeks pregnant with number two. He dies 4 days after finding out she was pregnant again. You have evil bastards that will live to be 162 years old, but my neighbor gets wiped out at 40. Of all the people that could have been taken, Irwin wouldn't have been on my list.
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