'Crocodile Hunter' Steve Irwin killed

Stonehead · Post: # 32506Post **Stonehead** » Mon Sep 04, 2006 7:41 pm

Muddypause wrote:I expect Boots and Nev will tell us that Australia is now in a period of official mourning, flags at half mast, black arm bands de rigueur, 24 hour TV coverage full of vacuous people saying "Well, I knew Steve personally..."

From the Sydney Morning Herald: Superstar ignored at home

hedgewitch · Mon Sep 04, 2006 9:17 pm

I for one am saddened by his death - his passion and enthusiasm was admirable and he did an awful lot of good work for conservationalism.

red · Post: # 32541Post **red** » Mon Sep 04, 2006 11:14 pm

Muddypause wrote: I gotta say the man irritated the hell out of me

yep, I have to agree. I never liked the man and then there was the baby incident - you know the one when he was tormenting a croc with his baby son in his arms....... Then I really disliked him. and then there is lots of controversy over his conservation work, with suggestions of him intervening too much.
Perhaps he did more good behind the scenes than I know, but what I saw was showmanship and unnessary risks.

All death - and particularly unncessary death is sad, and I think of his family.

Wombat · Post: # 32565Post **Wombat** » Tue Sep 05, 2006 10:38 am

Well, my two Bob's worth!

While I was never a "fan" I did admire his enthusiasm etc. especially after seeing an interview with his wife to the effect that he was like tha 24 hours a day! (well except when he was asleep).

To paraphrase the great English writer Talbot Mundy - He won't kick, he was doing what he loved, it's being caught off stage that hurts.

It is a shame for a bloke to pass when he still has young kids, my condolences to his family, and I wish the best for Steve, wherever is..

Nev

Pssst! Muddy! Your cynicism is showing....

Stonehead · Tue Sep 05, 2006 10:52 am

Wombat wrote:Well, my two Bob's worth!

While I was never a "fan" I did admire his enthusiasm etc. especially after seeing an interview with his wife to the effect that he was like tha 24 hours a day! (well except when he was asleep).

Yep, pretty typical of a certain kind of Aussie. Enthusiastic, over-the-top and no off-switch. You don't just dig a hole, build a fence or catch a croc, you have to jump in and really do it with extreme enthusiasm, maximum effort and mega boisterousness.

It can be good, it can be bad - but the world would be a poorer place without people like that.

PurpleDragon · Tue Sep 05, 2006 11:07 am

I always liked his shows, and my son and I used to watch them all the time. My DD was a bit scared of the crocs and stuff, so we never really carried on with her.

I think he was very enthusiastic and really loved his subject. I thought he had a childlike fascination with the natural world, which was passed onto children watching his shows.

Quite frankly, you often get presenters who are dull as ditchwater, trying to drum up enthusiasm for things, and kids just don't get interested.

Yeah, I agree, taking his baby into the croc pen was inexcusably irresponsible, but - hey! - none of us is perfect. My DS drank half a bottle of painkiller one time and had to go to hospital - that didn't make national news but it was my stupid fault. To err is human, as they say. His mistake on that occasion was overconfidence in his own ability.

wulf · Post: # 32598Post **wulf** » Tue Sep 05, 2006 12:24 pm

A good bit of perspective from another Steve (a friend of mine and fine bass player) here...

Wulf

Muddypause · Tue Sep 05, 2006 12:40 pm

Wombat wrote:Pssst! Muddy! Your cynicism is showing....

To misquote Mark Twain: "Those of you who are inclined towards cynicism have the widest selection in history".

Actually, I wrote much more, but decided that this thread was not really the place for it.

I'm not intending to offend people's feelings about the guy at this sensitive moment, but I do have issues with what he seemed to be about. But it seems that perception is everything, and my perception is different to others on this forum, which has surprised me somewhat.

I had the man down as part of the trivia of TV star culture; I didn't think what he did had much more to do with conservation than 'I'm A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here' does. Was he showing the importance of wildlife, or was he trivialising it? Maybe I read him wrong, but I hadn't got him down as someone you could properly call an environmentalist - I thought he was just turning the outback into a zoo, for all us TV tourists to gawp at. To me, this seemed to be nature reduced to the same level as bungee jumping.

den_the_cat · Tue Sep 05, 2006 12:55 pm

he was a 'proper' conservationist, albeit a controversial one, he'd brought up huge tracts of land for conservation use, ran the Australia Zoo and had actually discovered a couple of species I think, there was a programme on on him a year or so ago which was much more thoughtful than the usual stuff that you saw him doing

Although I agree with you in a lot of ways as I tend a bit more to the 'leave them alone' way of thinking myself and didn't always think his dragging snakes and crocs around for the cameras was a good thing I think a lot of the trapping etc that he did was with a view to tagging and research not just for the cameras.

Plus of course, almost anything that gets kids enthusiastic about nature is good, even if it is a bit flawed, not many three year olds like David Attenborough and there's no substitute for getting them interested young....

digiveg · Post: # 32772Post **digiveg** » Wed Sep 06, 2006 4:56 pm

Stonehead wrote:It can be good, it can be bad - but the world would be a poorer place without people like that.

I think maybe it's a poorer place because people like that are respected...sorry, but he had no right risking his child's life like that; and some of the stuff he did with animals was downright degrading.

And I apologise to anyone who respected, liked etc. Steve for that, but c'mon - it's important to THINK about what we're going to wish for, innit? Do you really think the world would be better for more people who would dangle their son in front of crocs? Because that's part of the totality of who he was, right? Maybe a bit of selectivity would be a good idea here...

But it's still a shame he's dead - and especially so for his family. I bet they wish he'd been a bit 'tamer' right now - in fact, I bet his wife wishes he'd been a plumber, or even an accountant - because now he's gone, and gone for good. What a waste...and such a pity he had to pursue, and was no doubt encouraged to pursue, that kind of life. Yuck.

circlecross · Tue Sep 12, 2006 8:46 pm

My dh thought it a little odd that the news reported "suprise attack" or "unexpected " or something, as you sort of think, "I would be suprised to be attacked by a stingray, but he was in a tank or something with them, so it wasn't that much of a suprise"

I didn't think much of him - I didn't really know he was a conservationist - just a noisy freak, so i am sorry he died, as kids did seem to "get" him (and he has a family etc), but I shan't lose sleep over him (doing that already with an internal kicking alien).

I remember a clip of his show on Harry Hill's TV burp, the one show of it I watched, and him sneaking up on a kangaroo, whispering to camera "you have to be reeeel careful with these beauties..." or some such "typically Aussie" phrase and then leaping on it yelling "wrap it in a tarp...get that tarp", with kangaroo flattened, arms outstretched, looking disgruntled as only a kangaroo that has had the poop scared out of it can.

Susan

circlecross · Thu Sep 14, 2006 8:24 am

I saw on the news yesterday that people have been attacking stingrays and leaving them on beaches with tails cut off, to die.

Kind of goes against what Mr Irwin was all about doesn't it?

Susan

Andy Hamilton · Thu Sep 14, 2006 10:40 am

circlecross wrote:I saw on the news yesterday that people have been attacking stingrays and leaving them on beaches with tails cut off, to die.

Kind of goes against what Mr Irwin was all about doesn't it?

Susan

This is against what he would have wanted. However, the report that I saw stated that many fishermen will cut off the tails of stingrays if tehy get trapped in their nets. This practice has gone on for some time and might be just because stingrays have been in the news more people have noticed.

It was only 4 or something I heard anyway so that sounds like it could just be fishermen. The media looking for a story perhaps? Not like them at all.

circlecross · Fri Sep 15, 2006 9:08 pm

I mean, it's not as if the stingrays are going to think "oh, no (or struth?) look what's happened to those guys! We better not sting anyone anymore". Or worse, as my dh fears, there could be a mass outbreak of al-quiada type stingray attacks on humans due to the lack of respect shown to their right to sting a person...
yes we need more sleep.
And yes, it probably is a scaremongering by the media, or we have just noticed this practise etc.