Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last few days or so, you’ve probably heard folks be shocked and upset at the death of Harambe, a silverback Gorilla at the Cincinnati Zoo who was shot and killed after a 4-year-old boy fell into the enclosure there on May 30.
As the days continue to progress, the individual pieces of the story are becoming clearer, which is helping to lift the mask on how dangerous the situation was for the child.
According to an article written in the Huffington Post Canada, Greg Tarry, associate director of Canada’s Accredited Zoos and Aquariums (CAZA), made several notes about how the gorilla was a threat to the life of the child.
“Even when it was standing over the child in the water, that’s generally kind of a dominance thing,” Tarry said in the article. “He was jerking that child around like a rag doll.”
The move which took Harambe’s life was considered a tragic necessity by many zoological experts, since the gorilla was showing signs of aggression towards the boy.
Multiple sources, including the director of the Cincinnati Zoo Thane Maynard defended the use of the gun instead of a tranquilizer.
He stated, “Tranquilizers do not take effect for several minutes, and the child was in imminent danger. On top of that, the impact from the dart could agitate the animal and cause the situation to get much worse.”
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Regardless of the quotes from several experts discussing why shooting the animal was a tragic but needed necessity, many commenters and social media keyboard warriors believe that the life of the child whose life was in danger was less important than the life of the gorilla, as noted in multiple examples across plentiful social media sites.
According to multiple accounts and an article written on The Daily Banter, reactions included the likes of “responses to this tragedy range from cries of “the parents should have been the ones shot,” to, “another innocent beautiful animal has been… killed as a result of awful parenting,” to, “kids are a dime a dozen, there’s millions of them, he’d be one less moron in the gene pool, the gorillas are the endangered species here not brats,” to “open season with $1000 a bounty on those too stupid to live!” to “it’s the stupid cunt who didn’t notice her child wasn’t there,” to, delightfully, “eugenics comes to mind.”
The same article summarized it best when it said “An undulating online army of angry idiots, righteous in their absolute moral authority and bolstered by the warmth of all those Facebook likes and shares, raining fire down on a person or people they know literally nothing at all about involved in a situation about which they simply don’t have all the facts yet.”
While the shooting and the death of an innocent, endangered animal is certainly nothing to celebrate and something to be rightly mourned, doing what had to be done to save a fellow human being is nothing to make jokes at, or to chastise because the process would have taken the death of an animal.
It’s becoming apparent that there is a chance that this is becoming a cultural war in between those who value animal lives over the lives of humans, and vice versa.
It’s becoming increasingly scary to see those who would, time and time again, put the lives and safety of humans on the backburner to save the life of an animal.
Defending animals and their livelihoods, especially if they are endangered species is something that is duly important, and something that more people should become involved in.
But in rare and tragic situations like these, wishing death and vitriol against parents and people who most likely feel the weight of the world on their shoulders does not show the compassion that you want to emit, and it does not show the peace that animal activists and humans alike want to see in the world.
While we should take every step necessary in order to ensure that situations like the ones that happened in Cincinnati do not happen again, we should also be aware that in the event that something like this does happen again, we should realize and acknowledge that the zookeepers and the people that if the situation calls for it end the life of the animal have known the animal for much longer than a bunch of keyboard warriors and desk chair activists, and it must pain them to bring the end to an animal that they’ve known for years, but they also have a duty to save a member of our own species, a human child who is just as unrepeatable and irreplaceable as a beloved animal.
This was not a case of willful, premeditated killing. It was a necessity to save a life.
RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in public affairs. You can write for us.
Cover Photo Credit: Jere Keys/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
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Taylor Swift’s ‘Wildest Dreams’ Video Has A Big Race Problem
Last week’s MTV Video Music Awards will likely be remembered as a hot-bed of drama, social issues, and controversy, spurned by the likes of Miley Cyrus, Nicki Minaj, and Kanye West. The slightest mention of the awards show is enough to disturb the silence in any room. This is the effect of popular culture at its finest.
But, there is one music video which can be distinguished as emblematic of the whole controversy, released during the award show and drawing attention to the reflective nature of said popular culture: it is fuelled by the cues of our society and what we deem to be acceptable. Or, in this case, what can not be deemed acceptable.
The plot-line of Taylor Swift’s ‘Wildest Dreams’ is easy to understand: intended to complement the sorrowful lamentations of a doomed relationship, Sunday night was witness to a dark-haired Swift posing sadly as the star of a 1950s Hollywood film against a backdrop of what can only be described as the most colonial of images of Africa.
With Scott Eastwood as the object of her affection, her relentless glances at him are not enough to provide the pair with a happy ending and so, the glamour is for nought and the drive into the sunset is non-existent. So too, as many of us have picked up on, is the presence of non-white Africans.
Reductionist at best, Swift’s ‘Africa’ is stereotypically conveyed with all the patronising ignorance of someone imagining what would constitute as The Exotic Land of Africa, a colonial illustration leaving out the knowledge of it being a continent, complex, rich in many histories, and therefore difficult to package and sell so neatly. Still, it did not stop Swift’s creative team from trying.
So Taylor Swift’s Wildest Dreams video was filmed in “Africa” but what country? Also, why does it only contain animals and white ppl #Taylor
— Lena Olson (@LeynuhPawp) August 31, 2015
Rather than using Africans as props in her new music video, Taylor Swift just sticks to white people… http://t.co/CSMBNMf2sb — Tom Murphy (@viewfromthecave) August 31, 2015
From the depiction of rolling grasslands, wild animals in migration patterns, dry dust flying as Swift kisses her co-star in her throwback hunter outfit, the video enables the audience to see all of these things as mere accessories.
The romanticism of this history is a clumsy, heavy-handed act which calls to attention an out-dated racial hierarchy and is scarily reminiscent of colonial attitudes
They are ambiguously, stereotypically ‘African’ enough to contribute to not only the myth of Africa, more at home in a historically out-dated periodical, and ambiguously, stereotypically ‘African’ enough to warrant more attention on Swift and her lover. It would be easy to make the argument that indeed, she is the star and this is her music video. But what must be recognised is the fact that the spot-light is on a truly horrifying image: Swift’s Africa features white people, complicit in acting the role of colonial settlers under the facade of the creation of a film.
Watch The Video:
Is @taylorswift13 not aware of the legacy of colonialism in Africa or….???????? Know your history, sweetheart. #WildestDreamsVEVO
— Sydney Murray (@sydmurray) September 1, 2015
The romanticism of this history is a clumsy, heavy-handed act which calls to attention an out-dated racial hierarchy and is scarily reminiscent of colonial attitudes: ‘Africa’ can be groomed to fit an image the white person deems acceptable, can be plundered for its beauty whilst the locals remain invisible, and can become the mythical image of exoticism anyone fed on racist stereotypes sees it as.
The video casts a hazy, rose-tinted glow to the white imperialist presence in the African continent, romanticising it so that Swift does achieve that old Hollywood ’50s colonialist film vibe she’s looking for
It is truly as Binyavanga Wainaina writes about in his Granta Magazine essay, “How to Write About Africa:”
“Africa is big: fifty-four countries, 900 million people who are too busy starving and dying and warring and emigrating to read your book. The continent is full of deserts, jungles, highlands, savannahs and many other things, but your reader doesn’t care about all that, so keep your descriptions romantic and evocative and unparticular.”
Swift is not a stranger to the romantic, the evocative, and the unparticular. In fact, these qualities seem to be a staple of her song-writing style, and yet, within the context of the ‘Wildest Dreams’ video, these are not qualities which can be dismissed as simply indicative of her personality.
The video casts a hazy, rose-tinted glow to the white imperialist presence in the African continent, romanticising it so that Swift does achieve that old Hollywood ’50s colonialist film vibe she’s looking for: ‘Wildest Dreams’ can easily be recognised as an example of Western media providing a propagandistic image of the exotic frontier playground, sitting comfortably alongside John Huston’s The African Queen and Sydney Pollack’s Out of Africa in these efforts. It is an achieved goal Swift has every reason to not be proud of.
The video is deceptively portrayed as simply detailing a complicated love-affair. As Zak Cheney-Rice concisely explained for Mic:
“It is remarkable that the insidious nature of the African colonial fantasy is so seamlessly glossed over. This matters. When a pop culture product reaches as many people as a Taylor Swift video does, the images it presents have implications beyond their immediate purview.”
Cheney-Rice has every reason to be wary of Swift’s creative products in light of her influence as one of the world’s biggest female popstars, and especially so when said creative products are as disastrously constructed as ‘Wildest Dreams’.
When it comes to influence, it is a by-product of fame which must be handled with responsibility.
It is exactly this which is lacking in this music video, and while director Joseph Kahn may be comfortable to shirk this one must recognise the importance of contentious, important historical landmarks, like the African continent having to suffer under European colonialism, being treated with more respect and awareness and less lazy nonchalance.
Ultimately, it is the fact that these attitudes surfaced so casually in our modern age omitting the truth of Africa’s history and the Black African presence, whether intentionally or not, in the place of romantic fantasy which deserves to be called to attention.
In this case, Swift’s love-story stopped short of occurring between her protagonists and began to cast back to a part of history which needs no affection. It is this which is truly distressing about ‘Wildest Dreams.’
Cover Photo Credit: GabboT/Flickr (CC By 2.0)
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Here Are 7 Tips Your Dog Is Trying To Teach You About Living Better
By Douglas Green
How would you like you like to spend 2016 as contented and centered as your dog?
As a psychotherapist, I spend a lot of time dealing with people and our big-brained problems. On most issues, like how to create a telephone that uses 3D touch to show birds catapulting into pigs, we are just brilliant. But we leave a lot to be desired in such areas as how to deal with each other, and how to live…those “human” quandaries!
So a few years back, I started watching my dog, Shirelle, to see how she avoids these problems. And I’ve tried to pass on what I’ve learned.
Now, many people have this idea, that you should only improve your lives once a year, when the calendar changes. A dog would say that’s crazy. If Shirelle found an imperfection in her squirrel-chasing technique in March, she wouldn’t wait ten months to adjust it – but oh well, that’s what makes us human.
Below, I’ve shared some key life lessons for us sapiens as we embark on 2016. Not to improve you so much, as to just make you happier – which, of course, is what dogs crave to their cores.
1. A few more times a day, forget that you have a past and a future.
Wise people will tell you to “live in the moment.” Pooches do that all the time; that’s why no dog ever needed a yoga class. But let’s face it – our jumbo-tron brains are too powerful not to constantly refocus on tomorrow, next summer, and yesterday.However, we can pause that time-traveling, for moments. Try checking in right now. Treat this second as the only point that exists. What do you have, what do you need (right now, not for dinner or your retirement), what feels good, what hurts? And once you’re done, go back to your regular mind.
Try this a few times a day. If you already do it, add a few more and just see how it resets you.
2. Put yourself in someone else’s shoes, more.
Even the least selfish person often has trouble relating to others. How many of us sing about brotherhood, but the second we click onto our beloved social media, rant that anyone who disagrees with us about a tax rate is uglier than a naked mole rat?When you’re positive someone else’s point of view is evil and insane, try to admit, instead, that we all have similar brains and figure out what led them there. Once you do, you can still disagree with them, but you’ll have lost the unhealthy prejudice.
After all, dogs mostly find us folks incomprehensible, but they still love us and try to follow our thinking.
After all, dogs mostly find us folks incomprehensible, but they still love us and try to follow our thinking. If you can do this same for others, your humility might make you as lovable as…okay, not quite as lovable as Marley, but closer than you are now.
3. Pollute and poison less.
All animals pollute, but humans are the only ones brilliant enough to create materials that don’t serve the earth at all. When you throw a plastic bag out, or dump millions of gallons of toxins into an ocean, you can’t just kick some dirt over it and make your mess okay, the way mutts can.A dog would suggest, and request, that you simply improve. If you’re a lazy slob, and you just start recycling your beer bottles, that will help things a bit. And if you already re-use paper, save your shower water, and drive an electric car charged by the sun, maybe you could also buy more locally-grown food? Every bit helps!
And just to clarify, animals don’t really notice which individual humans or corporations do the polluting. As far as they’re concerned, all us humans left that trash there, and all us humans haven’t cleaned it up.
So please, go a little out of your pathway and pick up that can, or try to help a river not turn to poison. It’ll make you feel good. And the stray pup out on the street would do it too if he could. Just for the feeling.
See, this cool dog gets it. Photo Credit: Rich Robinson/ RISE NEWS
4. Find more moments to enjoy and find more to enjoy about more moments.
When you open your front door in the morning, what’s going though your head? Lateness? Upcoming traffic? Some argument you had over breakfast?You know what goes through a dog’s? The smells! The hit of fresh air with an unexpected temperature! Hundreds of sounds suddenly so clear! And even though her eyes are nowhere near as powerful as yours, millions of things to see!
Do you take in the sky? Do you count the stalks of grass? Do you check to see if there are any squirrels or ants or bees or lizards or even cats in sight?
And that’s only one moment. Each day has 86,400 seconds in it. Do you spend even one just rolling in what is? Or do you rush to media, to hear some pundit tell you whether the day was worth living or not?
Right now, pick a leaf off an interesting tree, look it over carefully, sniff it, run your fingers over it with your eyes closed, and chew it. Feels like being a kid, doesn’t it? Back when you did such things by instinct – the way a pup does all the time.
5. Give yourself just a bit more sleep.
Scientists estimate that dogs sleep twelve to fourteen hours a day on average, which means some snooze a lot more.I’m not suggesting you go to that extreme, but one reason dogs tend to be so healthy and active is that they grab z’s whenever they can. What if you found a way to go to bed just a half hour earlier tonight? Or to take a nap this afternoon?
Maybe record that TV show, curl up, count sheep, and see what happens to your mood, your skin, your work skills, and even how others treat you.
6. Be silly more – silly for you.
People say dogs are clowns, for the way they act when they see a leash, or the signs of oncoming dinner. But what’s wrong with that?Silliness isn’t just a part of life; it’s a core of it, a celebration of it. Now, if you’re great at telling naughty jokes at dinner parties, that’s fine. But when’s the last time you ran around in a sprinkler on a hot day? Sang so loud you hurt your vocal cords? Or barked in conversation with a dog?
Here’s my definition of silliness: Any action, the doing of which would normally make you blush in embarrassment. Every silly act actually helps you overcome your fear and shame. Every dog lives it, and any good doctor would prescribe it often.
7. Tell and show those you love that you’re crazy about them more.
Here’s where canines most excel. When you come home at the end of a long day, do you tell your family how happy you are to see them, and that they even exist? What about at your job – do you find ways to express your feelings about your coworkers?The most common deathbed regrets humans report are not having spent more time with those they love, and not having let them know it. And that’s dumb, because nothing is easier! Just let it out!
Jump on a friend and kiss the top of their head. Yell across a business networking confab, “I have the best assistant in the world!” And call your mother and tell her you’re grateful.
No one can control what the world does to them, but these tools all help making living whatever hand you’re dealt more enjoyable. And, in all my years of watching dogs, if there’s a way to do too much of any of these, I haven’t seen it.
So try them, and good luck. May this be the year your tail learns how to wag!
Douglas Green is a psychotherapist, specializing in helping kids and teens build lives they can be proud of. He is also the creator and writer for AskShirelle.com, which helps kids, teens, parents, and others around the world with advice from the point of view of a friendly dog, and is the author of The Teachings of Shirelle – Life Lessons from a Divine Knucklehead. You can learn more about Green at www.CavalleriaPress.com, and connect with him on Facebook and Twitter.
Cover Photo Credit: Sandra Druschke/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
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These Ole Miss Frat Guys Don’t Respect Women, Are Fucking Assholes
Here’s something you already knew: some fraternity guys at the University of Mississippi are total assholes who don’t respect women.
Here’s something you probably didn’t know: they are dumb enough to display their anti-woman feeling in public while thousands look on.
During the annual Ole Miss Derby Days event last week, two Sigma Chi members serving as emcees and who combined have the comedic ability of two damp rags, asked various sorority members competing for Derby Day Queen a series of gross questions.
Which Sigma Chi would they “go down on?”
What type of sausage would they prefer: “linked or Sigma Chi?”
One of the question sessions was caught on video tape:
“So you’re telling me your nickname’s not BJ?” one of the emcees asks. “I’ll give you an easier question. What’s your fondest memory of the Sigma Chi basement?”
When the woman answers, “Getting rowdy in neon,” the second emcee butts in.
“We’re gonna go ahead and go with her nickname is BJ.”
HAHAHA.
We think it’s funny to force women to have oral sex with us. HAHAHA.
Not everyone thought it was funny.
Abby Michelle Bruce, an Ole Miss student and current sorority member blasted the event on Facebook in a post that quickly went viral.
“Tonight, my eyes watered up as I watched women be humiliated in the name of “philanthropy,” Bruce wrote in the post. “I attended the event, not out of support for the way Sigma Chi runs their philanthropy event, but to cheer on friends who had put lots of time and effort into the dances (some, not out of choice, but of requirement by their respective sororities) only to be mortified and completely ashamed that I am even remotely associated with such an event.”
Abby Michelle Bruce during an interview with NewsWatch Ole Miss, a campus TV station. Photo Credit: NewsWatch Ole Miss.
“I think the question all Panhellenic women at Ole Miss (and women everywhere, greek or not) should be asking here is “why?,” Bruce wrote in the post. “Why do we pay money to participate in these events to be humiliated? Why have we allowed ourselves to be objectified? Women’s fraternities were started as an empowerment movement – what happened?”
The president of the Ole Miss Sigma Chi chapter Clay Wooley called leaders from each of the sororities involved with Derby Days in order to apologize for what took place.
But in an interview with campus TV station NewsWatch Ole Miss, Wooley didn’t seem to fully grasp the implications of what happened.
When asked whether he thought the incident was emblematic of campus rape culture, Wooley spit up all over himself.
“You know, putting it into the category of rape culture though, that is extreme,” Wooley said. “It’s supposed to be done out of innuendo and fun and it got carried away too far this year and shouldn’t have taken place.”
Hold up a minute frat chief.
So you mean to tell us that the event is “supposed” to be done out of innuendo?
First off, innuendo is tough to pull off. You probably should have your smarter guys do it. If you have any.
And secondly, wasn’t this whole thing meant to raise money for charity or some shit like that? I forgot because of all the sexism and untalented people.
Nah bro, you better keep thinking about all of this.
Ole Miss has launched a Title IX investigation into the matter.
Perhaps most disturbingly, some Ole Miss sororities have cracked down on their members in an effort to limit public damage and save face with the fraternities.
According to NewsWatch Ole Miss, one sorority member was forced out in recent days for posting about the subject on social media. She has refused to speak publicly due to perceived retaliation against her.
Another current sorority member agreed to talk to NewsWatch Ole Miss, but only if her face was blurred and her voice modified.
And the campus TV station also obtained text messages showing that at least five sororities have issued a gag order on their members from talking to media.
“It has been so encouraging to hear and see since the event ended that I am not the only one,” Wooley said in her Facebook post. “So, I am putting this all out here so that other women might see that they are not alone either. We deserve better than to be dehumanized. We have rights, and we have the power and authority to demand they be met. Let’s give ’em hell, rebs.”
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WATCH: NewsWatch Ole Miss report on Derby Days clusterfuck
RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in public affairs. You can write for us.
Cover Photo Credit: NewsWatch Ole Miss/ Youtube (Screengrab)
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