You’ve probably heard or read about Harambe of the Cincinnati Zoo. He was the 420 pound silverback gorilla that was shot and killed on May 28th by zoo officials to protect the life of a 3-year old child that managed to slip into Harambe’s domain. Such is the outrage at the killing by many in our humanistic society that the story has spun across several 24-hour news cycles as well as exploded in the internet and print media.
The preschooler managed to wiggle into zoo’s Gorilla World enclosure, walk through some bushes, and then fell down the 15 wall into a moat that separated the gorilla from onlookers. The gorilla went to the child and was reported to have been “violently dragging and throwing the child.” Within ten minutes zoo officials had been notified and responded. Zoo officials determined that it was too dangerous to attempt to use a tranquillizer gun because it might enrage the gorilla during the time it takes for the tranquilizing drug to take effect. Instead they made the decision to shoot and kill the gorilla.[1] Jack Hanna, the respected and renowned American zookeeper, fully agreed with the decision. Hanna said he saw video of the gorilla jerking the boy through the water and knew what would happen if the animal wasn’t killed. “I’ll bet my life on this, that child would not be here today.”[2]
It takes 5 to 10 minutes for a gorilla to lay down and go to sleep, so what’s that male going to do if all the sudden, “pow” he feels this thing hit him? He’s going to go back there, what is this thing? pull it out, and he’s got a child in his hand … We’re going to have a disaster. Within one split second. You wouldn’t even want to witness it.[3]
Rather than rejoice with saving the life of a 3-year old child, it seems that there are thousands if not millions in America culture that have made the killing of Harambe the center of the story. Jane Goodall, the world-renowned British primatologist and conservationist, sent an email to Cincinnati Zoo executive Thane Maynard. She expressed her sorrow for Maynard for “having to try to defend something which you may well disapprove of.”[4]
I tried to see exactly what was happening – it looked as though the gorilla was putting an arm round the child – like the female who rescued and returned the child from the Chicago exhibit…Anyway, whatever, it is a devastating loss to the zoo, and to the gorillas. How did the others react? Are they allowed to see, and express grief, which seems to be so important? Feeling for you.[5]
By “others,” Goodall appears to mean that the other gorillas at the zoo should be allowed to see and express grief at what had happened to Harambe.
One Cincinnati animal rights activist helped organize a vigil just outside the zoo gates “to honor Harambe who turned 17 the day before he was shot.[6] Another expression of this collective moral outrage was the initiation of a petition to hold the parents accountable for negligence and lack of supervision.
A sad incident at the Cincinnati Zoo has prompted this petition. On May 28, 2016 an unattended four-year-old boy [as originally reported] was able to crawl through a series of barriers at the Gorilla World enclosure. The child fell an estimated 10 to 12 feet into the moat surrounding the habitat. The 17 year-old male Western Lowland Gorilla named Harambe then got a hold of the boy. The gorilla was perceived as dragging and throwing the boy. The zoo made the last-resort decision to shoot Harambe because of the increased risk of aggression if a tranquilizer was used in such close proximity to a human. This heartbreaking decision was made in the best interests of keeping the child and the public safe. This beautiful gorilla lost his life because the boy’s parents did not keep a closer watch on the child. We the undersigned believe that the child would not have been able to enter the enclosure under proper parental supervision. Witnesses claim that they heard the child state that he wished to go into the enclosure and was actively trying to breach the barriers. This should have prompted the parents to immediately remove the child from the vicinity. It is believed that the situation was caused by parental negligence and the zoo is not responsible for the child’s injuries and possible trauma. We the undersigned want the parents to be held accountable for the lack of supervision and negligence that caused Harambe to lose his life. We the undersigned feel the child’s safety is paramount in this situation. We believe that this negligence may be reflective of the child’s home situation. We the undersigned actively encourage an investigation of the child’s home environment in the interests of protecting the child and his siblings from further incidents of parental negligence that may result in serious bodily harm or even death.[7] [emphasis added]
As of June 7th the petition had received over one-half million signers.[8] The petitioners have already judged the parents guilty of neglect and lack of supervision. Why? Because something bad happened to a child. No one can deny that there are occasions of neglect or lack of supervision by parents or caregivers. But in the normal course of life bad things will happen to even the children of the most caring, attentive, and protective parents. But humanists must not bother with such distinctions in their rush to judgement and condemnation when bad things happen. One is guilty until they have proven their innocence.
This is one of the hallmarks of the modern humanistic society. Something bad happens. Therefore, someone was victimized and someone must be held accountable. For these cultural vigilantes, one is either a victim or a victimizer. There is no middle ground, and it is up to the powers of NGO activists (non-governmental organizations) and socialistically-minded governments to assess the situation, parcel out the requisite penalties, and dump another load of meaningless rules and regulations on Americans in a futile attempt to assure that nothing bad will ever happen again. No element of life is so small or insignificant into which they will not stick their long bureaucratic noses, be it sugary soft drinks, genderless bathroom facilities, or other such examples of demagoguery.
It is difficult to imagine that the signers of the change.org petition who had raised children of their own would never have had moments of inattention or distraction which may have resulted in a bad outcome for their child such as failing to prevent their child from falling from a bicycle, preventing a child from slipping out of a yard whose gate was left unlocked, becoming separated at a park or zoo, or allowing a child to jerk his hand from his parent’s hand and dash into traffic.
The social engineers of the humanistic world which they have created will argue that education is the key. Education leads to appropriate behavior modification in both children and parents which will minimize such unfavorable outcomes in life. However, there is a disconnection between humanism’s belief in the perfectibility of man and their means of achieving that perfection. For most of a century American children and their parents have been immersed in John Dewey’s democratized education model in which the teacher is merely the facilitator and must not impose fixed values or notions of right or wrong. Children are presumed to be inherently good and must be allowed to explore and develop their own relativistic versions of truth. But in the real world, bad actions and bad behavior have consequences that demand rigorous adherence to fixed standards of behavior. In other words children are taught to think one way but must act another way when they become adults. This is just one of the basic fallacies of the humanistic understanding of the world. It ignores the innate fallen nature of mankind but demands perfection without the fixed values and timeless objective truths of the God who created the universe and mankind. Such disconnection is one of the principal causes of the rapidly deteriorating social fabric at all levels of America life—government, marriage, family, economy, education, arts, and culture in general.
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The massive moral outrage and hand-wringing at the unfortunate death of a single silverback gorilla is astonishing. Where is the moral outrage when approximately 3000 unborn babies are aborted each day of the year in America? Where is the moral outrage when in slightly less than two months the number of babies aborted in America equals the entire population of 175,000 silverback gorillas remaining in the world? What is the value of a child compared to a silverback gorilla? In the humanistic view of the world, it appears to be very little.
Larry G. Johnson
Sources:
[1] Alex Abad Santos, “Harambe, the zoo killing that’s set the internet on fire, explained,” Vox culture, June 1, 2016. http://www.vox.com/2016/5/31/11813640/harambe-gorilla-cincinnati-zoo-killed (accessed June 7, 2016).
[2] Dan Sewell, “Correction: Zoo gorilla-child hurt story,” Associated Press, May 30, 2016. https://www.yahoo.com/news/vigil-planned-cincinnati-zoo-tribute-143125063.html?ref=gs (accessed June 7, 2016).
[3] Santos, “Harambe, the zoo killing that’s set the internet on fire, explained,” Vox culture.
[4] Patrick Brennan, “Jane Goodall to Cincy zoo director: I’m so sorry’,” cincinnati.com, June 2, 2016. http://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2016/06/02/jane-goodall-cincy-zoo-director-feel-so-sorry/85285432/ (accessed June 7, 2016).
[5] Ibid.
[6] Sewell, “Correction: Zoo gorilla-child hurt story,” Associated Press.
[7] Sheila Hunt, “Justice for Harambe,” change.org. https://www.change.org/p/cincinnati-zoo-justice-for-harambe (accessed June 7, 2016).
[8] Ibid.
