OK. While acknowledging that it’s sad when someone dies
a) before their time and
b) in tragic or unfortunate circumstances
I’m finding it really difficult to relate the reaction to the untimely death of Steve Irwin to the TV personality who was (as far as I was aware) most famous for provoking dangerous animals in order to get a rise out of them on camera.
“This komodo dragon [prod] looks like he’s sleeping [poke] but lurking just underneath the passive surface [poke-poke] is a wild and vicious beast [prod, poke, nudge with boot] ready to lash out [poke, etc] at any moment [big lizard lunges and snaps jaws in direction of man in khaki shorts] CRIKEY! DIDYA SEE THAT? HE COULDA HAD MY LEG ORF!”
It seems, however, that his death is causing a massive public outpouring of grief, as people (viewers, fans and others with a terrible grasp of spelling and grammar, which I’m sure doesn’t say anything at all about his populist appeal) flock to praise him for his environmental concern, bravery and heroic personality. Moreover, they seem surprised - shocked, even - that he died in such a manner, to which I can only boggle: surely it was only a matter of time? If you live by the sword, and all that…
Not being a fan or much aware of his work, I can’t comment, but I can say that I honestly felt more touched by grief when Charlotte Colman died - and even that was fleeting. I’m not hard-hearted, I think; I just don’t get the personal level people seem to be feeling this on.
I think perhaps the problem is that I don’t watch much TV, and when I do it’s not the sort of entertainment-for-the-masses which primetime consists of. Added to that, I really don’t have much mental space devoted to the cult of personality, so I’m trying to find a personal equivalent scenario that will help me to understand why people seem to be reacting like this.
Would this have been like David Bellamy dying when I was 9? Attacked by a giant grub, perhaps, during one of his characteristic forays through the undergrowth? I don’t know. John Noakes, tumbling from Nelson’s Column? Tony Hart, tripping on his studio and nicking a major artery with a particularly badly-positioned pallette knife? Perhaps.
Sorry, I don’t mean this to come across as heartless. I’m honestly a bit bemused by the reaction, is all.
I can’t say I liked him but he did look passionate about his work.
The South Park parody of him was obsolutely hilarious… eg (with liberal quote accuaracy):
“Now this croc looks quite happy, I’m going to stick my thumb up its a$$. Oh crikey he’s really pissed now.” Of course when he finds a frozen man (frozen since the 1990s) in the wild he wants to do the same.
[Ref: ep. 218 Prehistoric Ice Man [the crocodile hunter]
Needs an Amazon.co.uk link to the box set Meg!
There’s a nature guy on Channel 5 who looks and acts just like Steve so he is replaceable.
well put, meg.
as i wrote elsewhere (along with “he who lives by the swordfish, dies by the swordfish”):
he was passionate about people thinking he was a legend, didn’t have a clue about wildlife, and didn’t give a fuck about the animals that he used as stooges in his manic dance for attention.
he was australia’s version of princess diana.
(i’m australian, btw)
Yet I know people who have visited his reserve thingy (zoo?) and have nothing but praise for it…
So yes, a flawed character but when he wasn’t floundering about for the cameras, he was genuinely in it to “save the animals” (a couple of his shows featured rescues for some animals in appalling conditions).
I’d rather have a Steve Irwin than a Jamie Oliver.
(God, not much between them mind you! Ya think the nation will mourn if Mr. Oliver was to choke to death on a turkey twizzler… irony, irony, they’ve all got it irony..)
Am I the only one who remembers an internet rumour several months ago (maybe longer) that he’d died at the hands…er, teeth of a croc? Ah well. RIP.
John Noakes having his throat ripped out by a suddenly rabid Shep, maybe?
I have to confess that never having heard of Irwin until this week, I’m probably not best placed to comment.
gordon: but did they then go see any of the wildlife preserves kept by the GENUINE conservationists? eg David Fleay’s. if all you’ve seen is Euro zoos (eg london zoo), then almost anything will look amazing by contrast. i’ve talked to brits raving about wonderful zoos, that australia was in the process of shutting down for being cruel to the animals. surreal, but that’s all they knew.
i grew up near where he was based — i’ve not been there myself (he only fired up after i left oz), but even the tourists’ descriptions and internet videos of what he had gave me the cold shudders.
i’d rather have someone genuinely trying to achieve what he says he’s trying to achieve, than someone trying to achieve attention/social status by paying irresponsible lip service to what he says he’s trying to achieve.
so i’ll take one jamie oliver over an infinite number of steve irwins.
It’s funny, but I’d never heard of the guy until he was dead. It was exactly the same with Jill Dando whenever that was: the media (and in Dando’s case obviously the BBC especially) were full of it, and I’fd never heard of her AT ALL. As far as I was concerned she was getting her fifteen minutes by being dead. Which is how Steve Irwin seems to me.
I realise it’s a personal thing, and that there are people out there who feel the same way I would if, say, Martin Sheen died. But it’s very weird.
Jesus Christ - can we PLEASE lay off the whole “He was Australia’s Diana” thing? I think that’s an easy tabloid (and UK at that) reading of the drama, and is way off. Yes, there’s people who are upset about it - but then, there’s people who went into deep mourning for Dale Earnhardt or Jill Dando, too: the death of a celebrity doesn’t exactly mean that something’s indicative of the nation as a whole. I know more people that were upset by Peter Brock’s death later that week, or by Colin Thiele’s death that day (I believe), or Don Chipp’s death around the same time. (Don’t get me started about how this whole grief-at-celebrity-death thing is just a way of ‘me-too’ing someone else’s tragedy… grrr.)
What makes it perhaps notable is not the fact that he died from an animal - that was kinda expected, as even he wouldn’t be stupid enough to say that he was bulletproof - but the fact that he was still relatively young, and at the top of his game, as far as what he did went. (The fact that he has two young children also ramps up the weep-ometer, at least in terms of the popular press.)
(Saltation: I work in the veterinary/zoology industry, and though Irwin did get a bad rep for being too grandstanding and self-promoting, most will give him credit in terms of positive action towards animals formerly thought of (in the public mind) as being “bad” or “evil”. It takes some doing. Furthermore, I can tell you that the way he appeared on TV - and yes, it makes me, as an Australian with polysyllabic ability, cringe - was exactly the way he was. Nothing was put on by the bloke, which is both his gold and his cross to bear. While I didn’t particularly like him, I think you’ve painted a pretty simplistic portrait, and one that’s off.)
Irwin did a lot of land purchasing for the sake of keeping it from being developed: in that regard I think he did really well. I didn’t like him personally, but fuck, I’d rather have him than Paul Hogan represent us OS, if people are going to choose some kind of bushman bogan. The fact of the matter is that not many in Australia had *any* idea of exactly how successful and popular OS Irwin had been - that, for me, was the surprise of the matter, not the fact that he died.
Anyway, I’m not going into mourning for anyone less than Nick Cave.