The Faces of Death

How long before this is on YouTube?

Videotape of the moment Steve Irwin was hit by a stingray's tail shows the Australian naturalist pulling the barb from his chest, his manager has said.

"The tail came up, and spiked him here [in the chest], and he pulled it out and the next minute, he's gone," Mr Irwin's manager, John Stainton, said.

For an intellectual explanation of why Irwin was so damn entertaining, read this.

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I was watching Steve Irwin before it was cool. I discovered him by accident, channel surfing. Commercial, commercial, Law & Order, infomercial, holy crap is that guy picking up snakes by the tail?! As I recall, it was a show called, “The Ten Deadliest Snakes in Australia.” He was not a big…
Holy crap. I get up on this holiday morning, and what is the first thing that I see when I check out the ScienceBlogs most recent posts, but a bunch of posts on Pharyngula, Pure Pedantry, Dr. Joan Bushwell's Chimpanzee Refuge, and Evolving Thoughts, The Scientific Indian, and Afarensis? Steve…
First, they go after the beloved Steve Irwin. Now, they've begun attacking us outside of the water: An 81-year-old boater was in critical condition Thursday after a stingray flopped onto his boat and stabbed him, leaving a foot-long barb in his chest, authorities said. "It was a freak accident,"…
No way: BRISBANE, Australia (AP) - Steve Irwin, the Australian television personality and environmentalist known as the "Crocodile Hunter," was killed Monday by a stingray during a diving expedition, Australian media said. He was 44. Irwin was filming an underwater documentary on the Great Barrier…

I think the rise of tv for tots may be related to not just the increase in autism diagnoses, but sensory integration disorders and related issues, but not by commission but omission. The increased use of tv and video games along with a variety of other cultural forces like working mothers, increased concern for kids' safety and parental control over every detail of children's lives has resulted in kids who spend more time inside sitting, rather than outside falling off bikes, getting muddy, and experiencing the sensory and cause-effect lessons of the real world. Outside time is often highly supervised-- soccer, swimming, etc. and inside time may be watching other people do things or be "educational". Opportunities for free exploration vs "virtual" living are limited. During the early years, that becomes a developmentally irrevocable loss. Of course, all caveats apply, and I don't want to romanticize the good old days of at-home Moms who pushed their kids out the door after breakfast and didn't want them back until dinner-- it didn't entirely work for me as a child-- but children just don't have as many concrete, real, sensory experiences as they used to, and don't get to follow what I think is their own internal developmental agenda. Surely these losses can't be consequence-free.

By Mary Dreyer (not verified) on 08 Sep 2006 #permalink