Stop cleaning the gene pool with wildlife!

Public health and consumer laws should be applauded for saving millions of lives over the past 40 or so years but there is still work to be done. We should rejoice that today's children no longer have to play with the deathtrap toys their counterparts of yesteryear used. Listen to any boomer and he or she will describe the toys they played with - toys with long  wire pull strings that easily wrapped around their necks, metal toys with sharp edges that would impale them as they tussled with their siblings on the floor, and small choking sized toys that somehow surprised many of their parent years ago. Let's not forget these were the same parents that were blowing cigarette smoke into their kid's faces for fun. But not enough systems are in place to save everyone!

Dangers were many years ago and not all the kids made it through -which may account for why families had more kids. Parents had to figure that there were going to break a few eggs making their family omelette. Anyway, for good or bad,  the government came along and helped these people by providing  needed educational campaigns. They even saw fit to place warnings on plastic grocery bags to educate parents about the bag's tendency to climb up a toddler or infant's body and affix itself over the child's head. How many innocent lives were save?

So by conservative estimates we can probably guess that thousands - if not millions of people have been saved with these successful educational campaigns. Unfortunately - some people can not be helped. Some out there refuse to heed the warnings or are unable to recognize dangers unless there is a posted warning sign to read. Even if they see a warning - they do not always believe. These are the ones we need to focus our energies on in order to save them from cleaning their own gene pool.

Today we hear a report out of Alberta Canada that two men broke into a zoo in the early am hours by climbing an eight foot fence topped with barbed wire. This was the first of two fences that separates the public from, "Vitali" a two year old Siberian Tiger on the other side. Apparently - being inside the first fence did not afford a close enough look at Vitali so one of the men moved closer to the interior fence - close enough that the tiger was able to grab his arm and pull it through and maul it. Fortunately for the man, he was able to make it out alive. I know what most of you are thinking - how could they be so stupid?

But let's not rush to judgement here. Nowhere in the story did it say that there were posted warning signs anywhere in the area, nor did it say that the tiger gave clear verbal or physical warnings to the men that he - the tiger - was a dangerous carnivore - which  one would think would be mandatory in this day and age. Anyway, who of you out there knows the danger of entering the cage of a little 600 lb tiger? How many of you have ever done it? We don't normally see tigers around our suburban neighborhoods - perhaps the men viewed the tiger on the same lines of our common domesticated house cats - just a bigger version. I know of many a person who has approached a kitty on the street in order to hold it and love it up. Maybe the men saw the tiger and just wanted to give it a loving squeeze or pay a visit? 

Oh well, hopefully now the zoo will post warning signs all over that area to protect these types of people. But we will still not have solved the problem. What are we to do about people who visit the National Parks and wild game preserves? Who will help them recognize a groundhog from a grizzly bear, a badger from a Bengal tiger or a Koala from a cobra? No my friends there is still work to be done. We need to save these people. Good luck and God bless!