Well, at least we know something like this would never happen to any CC families!
Help me understand an open exhibition. Is it where all you have between animals and you are open railings and the drop/moat? I always thought open exhibitions are to keep animals in not humans out. It’s a lovely setup. Animals don’t look caged. But the setup relies on humans behaving themselves and not go in. Would the incident end open exhibitions?
I’ve had two “disappearing child” moments; they’ve made me more sympathetic toward fallible parents. The first was when I was trying to shop for a gift on vacation. I was wrangling a squirmy 1 year old and my 3 year old asked if he could look at the turning sunglasses case. The display was right next to me so I knew he was there until I realized there was no one on the other side of the still turning case. I went into mama bear mode and headed for the exit to head off any possible kidnapper. Luckily my friend, who was coming into the store, saw the look on my face and said she’d seen my son crawl under the clothes of the rack I’d been at.
The second was when I was at home. I put my toddler down for a nap but when I went to check on her she wasn’t in her bed. A frantic search extended to the neighborhood network; a mom heard me calling for her in my yard and 5 minutes later there were moms searching at the local park and preschool. I called the police who tore apart the house calling for her at airport-level volume. After 10 minutes I was about to start crying when I heard an officer announce they needed to call in a wider search. Just then an officer upstairs called out that they’d found her. She had been fast asleep in a tiny box of stuffed animals and all that was visible was her big toe.
“That, and it presents an interesting problem. This reads like a philosophy or law case. Analyzing these tough situations can shed light on principles we want to follow.”
I completely agree that the situation warrants a thorough review to understand exactly what happened, and what can be improved to prevent it from happening again. I just don’t understand the second guessing, and blaming the zoo or the parents by people who were not there to see exactly what happened. I understand that people are upset, but sometimes it is better to just wait for the facts to come in without jumping to conclusions.
I am also guessing that people who say they would have jumped into the enclosure have no idea how strong a gorilla is.
Who does that rag sheet the daily mail pay to get photos of the family?
Clearly. Many of them are perfect parents that have never turned their backs on their children, even for a split second. We are two of the few imperfect ones here.
What fact findibg? Does anyone disagrees with what happened? People may disagree on what the gorilla was thinking or what the mom was thinking but not on what happened.
As an older woman looking back, I’m pretty sure keeping your kids alive till adulthood is more luck than anything else. We really don’t have as much control over circumstances as we sometimes imagine. I was lucky. There were so many times I was so very lucky. When I think back, it just takes my breath away.
Doschicos can’t imagine a child not having the protective sense to not drop into the pit. I have no problem imagining it. Mine thought superman costumes meant they could fly… really fly. Why not? That’s what they saw on TV.
I think part of the reaction blaming the mom is that people have the impression, whether false or not, that people don’t want to take responsibility for their actions, and there is this impression out there, especially among the older set of “when I was a kid, blah blah blah” or “when I was a parent”, that someone kids these days are nothing but a bunch of nasty, whiny, out of control, spoiled brats (which seems to be common describing the children of ‘modern’ generations, and was said about them, too). People are also angry that a beautiful animal, that was guilty of nothing, had to die this way, it seems so unfair, and they are reacting.
I don’t think the parents should be charged, unless they can prove negligence, if the mother for example was shown to be lying and she walked away and left the kid unattended, for example (which the accounts of people there dont’ corraborate) or otherwise was negligent, it was an accident, a horrible accident, no more and no less. It is what happens where you have human beings doing things, accidents do happen, whether it is the kid running into the road, slips and falls and hurts themself, drowns, you name it.
The more I read, the more I think the decision to take down the guerrila was the correct one, it sounds like the animal was scared and confused, and even though I suspect it probably saw the kid as a gorilla child needing protection, it also was likely so scared and frightened anything could happen, and when you are dealing with life or death they have to err on the side of caution. Tranquilizers depend on the size of the animal and its metabolism, and no two creatures are alike, even among human beings it varies, I saw a guy come into the ER of a hospital once when I was on a volunteer rescue squad, who was wild, in some sort of psychotic episode, was out of control, 4 huge state cops couldn’t control him, there were 2 hospital orderlies the size of NFL lineman who couldn’t get him controlled, and they finally tried sedating him and had to give him multiple doses of a drug,I got word later it was enough to knock out 4 people, barely phased him…
The animal rights group suing won’t stand a chance, though, if the zoo met applicable government and AZA standards, they will have a hard time blaming the zoo for negligence. On the other hand, I would bet good money with strong odds that the family will sue, that while deflecting from their own part in this by saying “it was a horrible accident”, they will turn around and blame the zoo and in the process, try and get a nice score out of this. Sadly, the zoo likely will settle, which to me is rubbing salt in an open wound, not to mention making the defense “it was just an accident” the mom is using a self serving defense and not acknowledging that while not legally liable, she/they had a part in what happened, too.
I think we blame the parents because we don’t like to think control is really an illusion. jmho.
I would agree with you had the boy not told mom that he was going in. It’s an open exhibition. If it’s anything like at the zoo around where I am, anyone can go in. Just crawl under the railings and you are in. Falling into the moat is another matter. You don’t just reply no you are not and expect the boy will heed.
There’s a diagram of the gorilla enclosure in this article:
The kids didn’t just immediately fall in after passing the guardrail. He had to DELIBERATELY crawl forward past a second barrier of bushes.
I understood he had to deliberately crawl through bushes and then jump or dive 15 ft. In my world, this is not unusual behavior for four year olds. It would have made me nervous to be around that exhibit, if I had been there. My husband doesn’t like to take me places like that because of my reaction. I expect kids will do this sort of thing.
@alh My “wild child” is very practically minded. He did buy the whole santa/easter bunny/tooth fairy thing from about the age of 3 even when his older sibling never questioned it much, much longer. He definitely would not think a cape could make you fly nor would he drop 15 feet down although he did and continues to engage in “risks” many people would be afraid of but he’s always been physically capable and no dummy. 18 months old, sure, I can see watching out for a child at that age who doesn’t realize the risk of stairs for example, but I do think most 4 year olds would have more sense. But, as parents, we tend to know where our kids fit on that spectrum and take more precautions if our children aren’t utilize their logic.
@Iglooo is right. The setup at the zoo is to keep animals in more than keeping humans out. As a supposed advanced species, we’re supposed to use our common sense to keep ourselves and our offspring safe. As I saw someone point out on Facebook, we don’t have barriers up on subway platforms to keep people off the rails. There is simply a painted line and we expect people to be careful enough to protect themselves and their minors. There are no railings up (thank goodness!) in many natural sites like the Grand Canyon or the Cliffs of Moher in Ireland.
Accidents do happen, sadly. I wouldn’t go as far as charging the parents but I don’t find fault with the zoo either, with 38 years of no one else making the same error in judgement.
I think another reason why this saddens me and others so much is because we did witness, via the video footage, the gorilla seemingly acting in a protect and gentle fashion much of the time.
“Who does that rag sheet the daily mail pay to get photos of the family?”
If they were publicly posted on facebook, in practice, you don’t have to pay.
I think that in general, zoo exhibits look safer than subway platforms do. And families spend a lot more time in a zoo than they do in a single stretch of waiting for a subway train. I don’t think I could maintain the heightened vigilance that I would have for five minutes while waiting for a subway train during the entirety of a two-hour visit to a zoo, and I doubt that most other parents could, either.
musicprnt @ post 88 - yes. I think it’s reasonable to put at least some blame on the parents, and saying so doesn’t mean I think I am (or was) the perfect parent - far from it. It’s a zoo, with wild animals living there. That a lot of extra vigilance is required doesn’t seem that far fetched to me, especially if you know what your particular child tends to get into or how s/he might behave in certain situations (and given the witness statements about the boy saying he was going in), and the perceived (PERCEIVED) failure to take responsibility by mom in the facebook post.
doschicos - yes, that’s the kind of info I was looking for in wondering about tranquilizers, thank you. Of course we all understand that reactions might vary widely and could put the boy in worse danger, but this kind of thing happens more frequently than we think, I suspect, so I wonder if there hasn’t been some research done, especially given the advances we’ve made in not only the care and treatment of animals, but from the scientific/chemistry community as well.
^Of course, but that is why there is more than a painted yellow line. But breaching a fence, 4 feet of bushes and a 15 foot drop is providing plenty of protection, 38 years worth, to allow for normal vigilance vs. the “death grip on your child” vigilance required on a subway platform. I bring this up because some are finding fault with the zoo that I don’t think is warranted.
In my opinion, if a small child can get into an exhibit at a zoo, the zoo has failed. Period. This is not a case of a parent holding up a child to see above a tall barrier and thereby defeating the zoo’s safety features. This kid managed it on his own. I don’t think that should be possible.
One difference I see is that, it seems to me, zoos are seen as appropriate places for children and usually safe places for children. Zoos encourage the attendance of children.
I expect zoos, children’s museums, Disney, etc to be child safe. I don’t expect the subway to be child safe. I don’t expect a college classroom to be child safe, though I do expect a kindergarten classrom to be very child safe.
I am just as concerned the zoo failed to protect the animal as the child. The gorilla deserved to be safe as well.
Even if the enclosure was safe enough for 38 years, it wasn’t safe enough for child or animal that day. But maybe this is just that illusion of control thing. Maybe it was impossible to prevent the events. To me it was foreseeable such a thing could happen.