WHERE IS PETA??
Sources: CBS News, CNN, Chicago Tribune, Wear Your Voice Mag, Romper.com, WHOTV, Youtube
Within the span of two weeks, two very young Children were attacked by wild animals.
Lane Graves, 2, of Nebraska was killed by Alligators while vacationing at DISNEY World in Florida. Several Alligators were Euthanized before Lane's lifeless body was recovered.
I offer my prayers and condolences to the parents of Lane Graves.
By the way Lane Graves was a White child.
Isaiah Gregg, 4, of Ohio was recently spared death after falling into a Gorilla pit while visiting the CINCINNATI ZOO with his parents.
However in order to save little Isaiah, an Adult male Gorilla named Harambe had to be shot after he was seen dragging Isaiah and demonstrated other signs of Aggression.
After Harambe was shot and killed, PETA an organization which protects Animals' rights, immediately began publicly protesting and questioning why CINCINNATI ZOO officials allowed Harambe to be killed in order to save a BLACK male child.
Ohio Police also investigated Isaiah Gregg's parents to see if they perhaps intentionally allowed Isaiah to fall into the Gorilla pit in order to later SUE the Cincinnati Zoo.
But I didn't hear PETA screaming about Killing the Alligators at the Disney resort while Law Enforcement officials were trying to recover little Lane Graves' body.
And............
No Police in Florida are investigating the parents of Lane Graves to see if they properly supervised Lane prior to him being dragged off by an Alligator and killed.
Two very young Human Beings were recently attacked by wild Animals.
One Child survived, the other Child died.
One Child was White, the other Child was BLACK.
Why does the Mainstream Media, Police and Federal Government continue to inject RACE into every situation in American society?
DISNEY had "NO SWIMMING" signs posted around the beach resort where Lane Graves was snatched by Alligators, yet Lane's parents allowed him to WADE in the water.
Is DISNEY still legally GROSSLY NEGLIGENT or CULPABLE?
Not far from the Magic Kingdom, a child was swept up by an alligator, dragged into a lagoon and killed.
The 2-year-old had wandered away from his parents, as toddlers often do. Before they knew it, the child had made his way to the edge of the water where a 4- to 7-foot gator laid waiting. A day after their son's body was found, the Nebraska couple who had been on vacation at an upscale Walt Disney World resort thanked the public for their prayers and asked to be left alone to grieve. For the most part, the public and the media obliged.
People correctly understood that this was a horrific tragedy that no family should have to endure. A toddler had innocently gotten too close to a man-made lake where alligators dwelled, placing his life in grave danger. And in the end, the helpless child lay dead.
There was no chorus of brutal attacks on the parents for losing sight of their child for a quick moment. There was no online petition calling for child endangerment charges against the mother. There were no candlelight vigils for the five alligators that were killed by rescue workers during their frantic search for the boy. And no one blamed the child for simply doing what children do.
Any of those reactions would have been insensitive, even inhumane. Yet that is exactly what happened last month after a 3-year-old boy fell into a gorilla habitat at the Cincinnati Zoo.
Of course, there is an obvious difference in the two incidents. Lane Graves died and Isaiah survived. Other than that, the circumstances basically were the same. Why, then, was the public reaction so different?
I believe the answer has a lot to do with how we value lives. Some simply are more expendable than others. Lane was from an affluent, suburban family. Isaiah is not. Lane was white. Isaiah is African-American.
After writing a recent column that said zoo officials were right in killing the gorilla after it dragged the little boy through a moat, a reader sent me this email:
"Your column about not understanding those who are outraged at Harambe's murder troubles me deeply. A person named Harambe was shot because his life was deemed less valuable than a person named Isaiah. Like racism, 'speciesism' (sic) is fueled by fear and ignorance."
I could not bring myself to respond.
It should not be a surprise to anyone that poor, black boys from the inner city are the most vulnerable of America's children. When we look at an African-American boy from Cincinnati, we don't always see the same inherent innocence that we would notice in a white child from Nebraska, though they are close to the same age.
Multiple studies have found that black boys are more likely to be mistaken as older than they actually are. As a result, they experience higher suspension rates in school and are thus introduced to the criminal justice system and other adverse situations at much younger ages that white boys.
According to the Civil Rights Data Collection, a national survey conducted by the U.S. Department of Education, schools begin kicking African-American students out of class at higher rates than white students as early as preschool.
A recent survey found that black boys, though they made up 52 percent of preschool enrollment, represented 79 percent of preschoolers who were suspended once and 82 percent of preschoolers suspended multiple times.
One of biggest problems, according to researchers, is perception.
Whether we realize it or not, skin tone and social class often play a role in determining our comfort level. And the way we respond to people sometimes is based on how comfortable we feel with them.
In a Stanford University study, researchers asked 190 teachers to review information about a student misbehaving in class. In one scenario, a student fell asleep in class. Some teachers were told the boy's name was Jake, and for others, it was Darnell, a common name for African-Americans. In many cases, Darnell received the harsher punishment.
The result is a growing achievement gap between black and white boys. But it also lends itself to a lack of compassion for African-American boys.
Cincinnati Zoo officials had no choice but to shoot and kill the western lowland gorilla, yet it created an unnatural outpouring of rage. Most of it was leveled at the mother, who had turned to attend to one of her other three children when Isaiah scampered off. Before police and prosecutors decided that no charges were warranted, an online petition seeking "Justice for Harambe" had earned more than 100,000 signatures in less than 48 hours.
Anger also was clearly aimed at Isaiah.
Some people didn't think the toddler seemed frightened while in the grasp of a 450-pound dominant male gorilla. Some criticized him for being too curious, pointing out that he had been overhead telling his mother that he wanted to go swimming with the gorillas. Some just labeled him as a bad kid when, in fact, he was just being a normal kid.
Lane's family, including his 4-year-old sister, were sitting in a beach-like area near the resort's pool when he went to the edge of the bank to play in the water, authorities said. His playpen was set up nearby.
Bloggers took to social media asking for compassion for the parents. Some compared Lane to 18-month-old "Baby Jessica" who was rescued after falling into a well in 1987. Another said it was reminiscent of the abduction of 6-year-old Adam Walsh from a shopping mall in 1981.
The Orange County sheriff said a routine investigation would be conducted but quickly added that charges against the parents were unlikely.
"I believe what this 2-year-old was doing was what, perhaps, any 2-year-old might be doing as well," the sheriff said at a news conference.
The sheriff got it right about Lane and his parents, just as authorities in Cincinnati got it right about Isaiah and his.
What happened at the Disney resort was horrible. And what could have happened at the Cincinnati Zoo would have been just as bad.
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