To Kill or Not to Kill- Remembering Harambe

The video was scary, but somehow it also seemed calm.  The young 3-4 year old boy looked up at the silverback gorilla almost, it seemed, without fear.  Maybe I couldn’t hear the boy for the crowd.  The most drama seemed to come from the sound of the onlookers each time the 17 year old Silverback gorilla- a critically endangered species, moved with the child in tow. Maybe He was getting irritated by the crowd, not the child. Shortly after this, a decision is made and BAM. 

Harambe is gone.

 Anytime we take an animal out of their natural habitat, we take on more responsibility to provide for them; after all, it is unnatural.  Even with my dog Zoe.  She should be living outside somewhere fending for herself in the wild.  But she gets a free roof over her head, food twice a day, fresh water, and on occasion, doggie treats if she shakes our hand and does a high five.   She is let out in the middle of night if she can wake me, and during thunder storms… she knows she can sleep on the foot of my bed- shivering.  In return for all of this, she barks and keeps prowlers away. Supposedly. Even though I have a security system.

We have a responsibility when we pull animals into our world.  Many feel in this instance, we failed Harambe.  He was in a manmade enclosure, minding his own business when company dropped in.  He has heard crowds before, but somehow this time it was more unnerving. There was nothing he did wrong, but today was going to be his final day in captivity.  

I’m not going to attempt to answer the complexities of this situation, I don’t know all the facts and even if I did, it wouldn’t change anything.  What is done is done, but here are a few things I have heard and something for us to think about: 

 

DISCLAIMER:

THE FOLLOWING COMMENTS ARE NOT NECESSARILY THE THOUGHTS AND OPINIONS OF THIS AUTHOR OR THIS BLOG.

QUESTIONS & COMMENTS:  What if the gorilla was agitated and about to hurt the child?  What would our discussion be now?  What if the child actually died?  Who would we sue?  Who could we blame?  How much could we make? 

Why would we place the life of an animal above the life of a human? What if a tranquilizer would only anger or stun the animal?  Even law enforcement understands there are times that your actions have to be lethal. You can’t risk the unexpected response and the potential harm to those around.  Should animals be exempt from that? Maybe we should have tranquilized the child so he would be still and not feel anything, or perhaps just shoot the child so the animal could live? After all, he is endangered.

Where was the mom when he fell in?  Standing in the crowd yelling “I love you” does no good when you are smelling the breath and body of a huge hairy animal. I’ve lost my child in a store before, have you?  I even accidentally slammed my child's finger in a door, not once but twice in one week.  Does that make me an unfit mother? My child moved too fast, jumped into the front seat before I realized they were there.  That was AFTER UNDOING the seatbelt.  The mother should lose her job in child care, after all, she misplaced her own child. Perhaps the parents should have been shot instead of the gorilla. Charges should be filed concerning the parents.  We have thousands of signatures on  a petition calling for parents to be charged.  (Funny but we can’t get some of the same people to vote) Death threats have already been made towards the parents.  Yeah, let’s kill the parents because the gorilla died.

 We are angry people.  And I get it.  I love animals too.  But I was never commanded to love animals, just to care for them. I am however commanded to love people.   People will always be more important than animals.  At least, in God's eyes.  

But let me get to the main point in this....  

We HUMANS are the real critically endangered species.

We have forgotten how to disagree, we have forgotten how to fight and make up.  When we think an opinion is different than ours, we are ready to draw blood. I don’t even feel right using a scripture that talks about loving one another and laying down our life for the brethren… it seems so lost in this time.  What happened to the people you could count on? Those who would go over board to ensure you were okay?  People who believed when you messed up, maybe you made a mistake, not an intentional act. We are angry, angry people.  We think with emotions not logic, guidelines much less standards.  If I want to shoot at you for driving in front of me, I do.  Maybe we have less patience with each other because we actually should know better.  Some things we do.... we should know better.

We are angry people, and until we find peace with God, learn to love each other and find peace within ourselves, we will continue to be angry.

In conclusion:  Today, we mourn the death of Harambe- a GORILLA.   Somehow, I believe we should also mourn the PASSING OF THE HUMAN RACE.  Unless we get back to the real basics of caring and loving each other, we are doomed. 

R.I.P.  HARAMBE.... It is yet to be seen if we will.