Polar bear shot and killed in self defense by cruise ship guard

chandoog · Jul 30, 2018

gutter_trash said:
This planet is so doomed with posts like these.

lol .. please stop with this nonsense.

You're saying "pro tip dont go adventuring where bears exist". This is an island inhabited by people. One of the guards was *ALREADY UNDER ATTACK* by the bear when another guard shot him in self defense.

Animal preservation is one thing but saying human lives matter less than wild animals attacking them is another kind of other worldliness. If you're concerned about these animals, please head out to that island and stop all 'tourists' from going there and from trying to not die at the hands of an attacking bear, instead of sitting behind a screen and advocating human death.

Westbahnhof · Jul 30, 2018

gutter_trash said:
guy should be fired

What part of the procedure when encountering a polar bear did he not follow?

Chamaeleonx · Jul 30, 2018

chandoog said:
Tasers don't often work on aggressive human beings, it's very safe to assume equivalent things might also not work on aggressive charging bears.

I am not versed in the technologies, I just expected humanity to come up with effective measures of protection that doesn't involve killing.

derdriu said:
Here is the safety document for tourism rules in Svalbard, it states what you can do to help prevent polar bear attacks.

https://www.sysselmannen.no/globala.../english/brochures/safety-in-svalbard-eng.pdf

but this time the guards did not see the bear, there was no time to react and the bear was already attacking 1 guard. unfortunately all other measures would have been too slow.

Also it is required by law to carry a gun in such remote areas, or have a guide with a gun. This also applies in the north of Norway, not just Svalbard

I can understand that, a reasonable advice for locals to take. Still not sure about tours through such areas (yes financial benefits, etc.) for tourists that just want to snap pictures . =/

Westbahnhof said:
Didn't we have this whole thing when Harambe was shot? Tranquilizers need to have the correct dosage and some time to work.
I don't think it's something that you'd want to rely on in an emergency situation like this.

We had the same discussion (was the shot deserved or not) there about the parents not paying attention to their child.

Deleted member 29682 · Jul 30, 2018

Branu said:
I guess that's what I meant when I said we've made enough advances in science and technology that there must be some means of safely and immediately incapacitating a dangerous animal without killing it, especially one whose habitat we've invaded.

Biology and medicine are ever changing fields. What we assume to be straightforward very rarely is. It's like asking why there isn't a cure for a particular disease yet - chances are someone's trying, but science takes time and there are any number of roadblocks and unexpected results and side-effects that preclude quick and perfect answers.

Nowise10 · Jul 30, 2018

Resetera too woke again

Luchashaq · Jul 30, 2018

SliceSabre said:
So you'd sit and watch another person get mauled and eaten by an endangered animal because "There's more people."?

A stranger? Yes.

My wife or best friend? No.

Play stupid games win stupid prizes, you shouldn't be fucking around near endangered animals that are starving and can eat you.

Westbahnhof · Jul 30, 2018

Chamaeleonx said:
We had the same discussion (was the shot deserved or not) there about the parents not paying attention to their child.

My post was only about why tranquilizers were not used back then, and here.
(And it was the fault of parent and zoo back then, IMO. The ape was obviously innocent. While probably necessary to safe the child, it was 100% humans who were guilty)

Luchashaq said:
A stranger? Yes.
My wife or best friend? No.
Play stupid games win stupid prizes, you shouldn't be fucking around near endangered animals that are starving and can eat you.

I'm just glad that this is not a situation that usually happens, because people are required to be armed when going out there without a guard.

TheCthultist · Jul 30, 2018

Livia said:
And why can we not show the pic of the dead bear? This is reality, can't shy away from that..

Yup, same with the whale from a couple weeks ago. It brings a lot more weight to what's being talked about when you can actually see some aspect of it in front of you like that.

Chamaeleonx · Jul 30, 2018

Westbahnhof said:
My post was only about why tranquilizers were not used back then, and here.
(And it was the fault of parent and zoo back then, IMO. The ape was obviously innocent. While probably necessary to safe the child, it was 100% humans who were guilty)

I know, same reason they don't use to tranquilize animals near roads as they might run onto them and cause an accident/harm to themself.
Still, I was hopeful we have means to deal with wild animals without putting them down. =/

chandoog · Jul 30, 2018

Chamaeleonx said:
I know, same reason they don't use to tranquilize animals near roads as they might run onto them and cause an accident/harm to themself.
Still, I was hopeful we have means to deal with wild animals without putting them down. =/

Such technology doesn't exist for humans which works without issue or uncertainty either. Animal safety tech would be a second after human safety I would think.

Branu · Jul 30, 2018

Cocaloch said:
This doesn't make sense. If it doesn't exist it doesn't exist.

Ok? Perhaps it's something to turn our focus towards, so we can make tragedies like this avoidable when making treks into rarely visited territory possibly inhabited by dangerous animals. I already acknowledged the means of incapacitating them don't exist, but we're an advanced enough society that developing them shouldn't be a challenge.

Chamaeleonx · Jul 30, 2018

TheCthultist said:
Yup, same with the whale from a couple weeks ago. It brings a lot more weight to what's being talked about when you can actually see some aspect of it in front of you like that.

Personally it just makes me sad, disregarding if it is a picture of a human or an animal. My thought always is, "couldn't there have been ways to prevent it". =/

gutter_trash · Jul 30, 2018

Civil War

#teamPolarBear

Westbahnhof · Jul 30, 2018

Branu said:
Ok? Perhaps it's something to turn our focus towards, so we can make tragedies like this avoidable when making treks into rarely visited territory possibly inhabited by dangerous animals. I already acknowledged the means of incapacitating them don't exist, but we're an advanced enough society that developing them shouldn't be a challenge.

I'm not sure why you think it shouldn't be a challenge. We don't even have anything to safely incapacitate raging humans, do we? We can do a lot, but a living body is complex as hell. I don't think there is an easy solution for this.

Cocaloch · Jul 30, 2018

Branu said:
Ok? Perhaps it's something to turn our focus towards, so we can make tragedies like this avoidable when making treks into rarely visited territory possibly inhabited by dangerous animals. I already acknowledged the means of incapacitating them don't exist, but we're an advanced enough society that developing them shouldn't be a challenge.

I think this is a fundamentally bad way at looking at what science and technology are and do in society. In fact this approach is why Conant originally became interested in formalizing the history of science. Science and technology isn't just magic where we can snap out fingers and have whatever sort of device we want just appear.

Nowise10 said:
Resetera too woke again

If by woke you mean keyboard warriors that have profoundly disturbing and anti-social approaches to interacting with other people. The thinly veiled punitive responses here aren't exactly what I'd call particularly progressive.

Personally I'm quite interested in what percent of people in this thread advocating for letting these people die for daring to transgress on such pristine "uninhabited territory" had ever heard of Svalbard before this thread.

chandoog · Jul 30, 2018

Branu said:
Ok? Perhaps it's something to turn our focus towards, so we can make tragedies like this avoidable when making treks into rarely visited territory possibly inhabited by dangerous animals. I already acknowledged the means of incapacitating them don't exist, but we're an advanced enough society that developing them shouldn't be a challenge.

Let's develop this tech for humans first, then we can focus on polar bears.

mute · Jul 30, 2018

How about not get off the boat?

Cocaloch · Jul 30, 2018

mute said:
How about not get off the boat?

Time to roll back the clock to 1595 boyos.

gutter_trash · Jul 30, 2018

Polar bears serve as culling the population of seals since seals going unchecked can devastate fisheries .

One less polar bear means that seal populations explode means that fish count get depleted

HellforLeather · Jul 30, 2018

Luchashaq said:
A stranger? Yes.

My wife or best friend? No.

Play stupid games win stupid prizes, you shouldn't be fucking around near endangered animals that are starving and can eat you.

1. What the fuck?

2. maybe the guy that shot the bear is his best friend, what then?

Pomerlaw · Jul 30, 2018

gutter_trash said:
Polar bears serve as culling the population of seals since seals going unchecked can devastate fisheries .

One less polar bear means that seal populations explode means that fish count get depleted

Nah you can thank Brigitte Bardot for the seal population.

Xe4 · Jul 30, 2018

Branu said:
Ok? Perhaps it's something to turn our focus towards, so we can make tragedies like this avoidable when making treks into rarely visited territory possibly inhabited by dangerous animals. I already acknowledged the means of incapacitating them don't exist, but we're an advanced enough society that developing them shouldn't be a challenge.

If you really must know, drugs take some time to activate in a system. Usually a few minutes at least. You can usually reduce that time by upping the drugs, but the more you increase the tranquilizer the higher a chance you have of killing the animal, and even then it still takes some time. What you may need to resolve in seconds tranquilizers take significantly longer to do.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tranquillizer_gun

It's not a limit on science, it's a limit caused by biology.

There are better ways to reduce casualties of bears than that. Permitting tourism through a lottery system, proper procedure for when you see a bear, and reducing development in wildlife preserves does significantly more good than inventing some sort of magic tranquilizer.

Kin5290 · Jul 30, 2018

gutter_trash said:
Polar bears serve as culling the population of seals since seals going unchecked can devastate fisheries .

One less polar bear means that seal populations explode means that fish count get depleted

Considering that this polar bear was desperate enough to attack humans it probably wasn't doing a great job preying on seals.

Normal · Jul 30, 2018

Branu Since we're in such an advance society it shouldn't be a problem developing the drug, let us know when you complete it. It shouldnt be a challenge for you.

Deleted member 10060 · Jul 30, 2018

HellforLeather said:
1. What the fuck?

2. maybe the guy that shot the bear is his best friend, what then?

Why is a human life important? There are 7-8 billion or whatever the fuck we're up to by now of us, and we're destroying the planet and driving other species' to extinction at an alarming rate.

Why should I care about a human life more than a polar bear, of which there are only 25 000 left?

Chamaeleonx · Jul 30, 2018

Usyren said:
Branu Since we're in such an advance society it shouldn't be a problem developing the drug, let us know when you complete it. It shouldnt be a challenge for you.

We rather produce more alcohol, drugs and ways to kill each other. =P
I know what you are getting at but your point makes little sense as he probably isn't in the science field employed.

Kin5290 said:
Considering that this polar bear was desperate enough to attack humans it probably wasn't doing a great job preying on seals.

I doubt any carnivore would leave a human alone, flesh is flesh after all. =x

Segafreak · Jul 30, 2018

Tourism slowly killing the planet.

DevilMayGuy · Jul 30, 2018

Luchashaq said:
A stranger? Yes.

My wife or best friend? No.

Play stupid games win stupid prizes, you shouldn't be fucking around near endangered animals that are starving and can eat you.

You're just a regular old weird take factory, huh? Are you capable of a nuanced opinion, or is absolutism just your fetish?

I swear to christ this forum is filled with antisocial, misanthropic weirdos.

Deleted member 29682 · Jul 30, 2018

Chamaeleonx said:
I doubt any carnivore would leave a human alone, flesh is flesh after all. =x

A lot of them do, but polar bears are noted for being one of the few species that actively prey on humans even when they're not desperate. It's all about convincing the carnivore you're not worth the effort or risk, but polars bears aren't used to us and are bigger than other bears, so they're a lot more likely to take that chance.

dee_activate · Jul 30, 2018

Luchashaq said:
A stranger? Yes.

My wife or best friend? No.

Play stupid games win stupid prizes, you shouldn't be fucking around near endangered animals that are starving and can eat you.

but no one was "fucking around"

and thanks Westbahnhof for quoting the safety section. I'm getting a feeling that some are not really paying attention, just trying to get reactions out of other posters =/
Must be a slow day.

Rangerx · Jul 30, 2018

Its sad because the polar bear didn't ask for humans to turn up in its habitat but if its a choice between saving a human or polar bear I'll pick the human every time.

Pomerlaw · Jul 30, 2018

Einherjar said:
Why is a human life important? There are 7-8 billion or whatever the fuck we're up to by now of us, and we're destroying the planet and driving other species' to extinction at an alarming rate.

Why should I care about a human life more than a polar bear, of which there are only 25 000 left?

Here we go...

Good luck with this thread guys, I'm out.

BriGuy · Jul 30, 2018

Einherjar said:
Why is a human life important? There are 7-8 billion or whatever the fuck we're up to by now of us, and we're destroying the planet and driving other species' to extinction at an alarming rate.

Why should I care about a human life more than a polar bear, of which there are only 25 000 left?

Damn dude. That's a pretty reprehensible outlook you've cultivated there.

Xe4 · Jul 30, 2018

Segafreak said:
Tourism slowly killing the planet.

Not really. Tourism in many places is doing wonders reducing poaching and overfishing. That's why so many ecologists are advocates of ethical tourism designed to protect the environment.

As with anything, tourism has problems that will need addressing, but it's not nearly as simple as tourism = bad, no tourism = good. The interplay between economics, the population, and the ecosystem is a complex issue that people can (and have) writen a thesis about.

GaijinDensetsu · Jul 30, 2018

I mean compared to all the other terrible disaster mankind has wrought on polar bears this one extra bear is just a drop in the bucket. If the tourism is contributing to funding for conservation then it is definitely worth it especially if this type of shooting is a rare incident.

Cocaloch · Jul 30, 2018

Pomerlaw said:
Here we go...

Good luck with this thread guys, I'm out.

This sentiment was posted on the first page.

Chamaeleonx said:
We rather produce more alcohol, drugs and ways to kill each other. =P
I know what you are getting at but your point makes little sense as he probably isn't in the science field employed.

That's the whole point though. Turns out magically making whatever you want is in fact not particularly easy or the inevitable result of an "advanced society."

chandoog · Jul 30, 2018

Einherjar said:
Why is a human life important? There are 7-8 billion or whatever the fuck we're up to by now of us, and we're destroying the planet and driving other species' to extinction at an alarming rate.

Why should I care about a human life more than a polar bear, of which there are only 25 000 left?

I'll be honest, I feel sorry for people around you.

HellforLeather · Jul 30, 2018

Einherjar said:
Why is a human life important? There are 7-8 billion or whatever the fuck we're up to by now of us, and we're destroying the planet and driving other species' to extinction at an alarming rate.

Why should I care about a human life more than a polar bear, of which there are only 25 000 left?

So are you saying the guy who shot the bear should have just sat there and allowed the guy to die? You can make the argument that maybe we shouldnt be traveling to these environments where endangered species live, but thats another conversation. So I guess human life isnt important unless its someone close to you?

Fridge Freezer · Jul 30, 2018

This thread seems mad to me. People have utterly lost their ability to emphasise with human actions. Its as if they expect life to be scripted.

Westbahnhof · Jul 30, 2018

Einherjar said:
Why is a human life important? There are 7-8 billion or whatever the fuck we're up to by now of us, and we're destroying the planet and driving other species' to extinction at an alarming rate.

Why should I care about a human life more than a polar bear, of which there are only 25 000 left?

Because you should be able to relate to the uniqueness of the human mind, and feel empathy for a person infinitely different from you, and yet so similar, with an immeasurable depth of social connections and thoughts.
It's really weird that you think of a person as one of many.
"There are billions of us, who cares if some die" is a horrible take, and I wonder if you'd also say something like this about starving children and people dying of diseases that could easily be treated.

Camwi · Jul 30, 2018

Einherjar said:
Why is a human life important? There are 7-8 billion or whatever the fuck we're up to by now of us, and we're destroying the planet and driving other species' to extinction at an alarming rate.

Why should I care about a human life more than a polar bear, of which there are only 25 000 left?

Because that human life has infinitely more potential to do good for this planet than that polar bear does.

Cocaloch · Jul 30, 2018

Einherjar said:
Why is a human life important? There are 7-8 billion or whatever the fuck we're up to by now of us, and we're destroying the planet and driving other species' to extinction at an alarming rate.

Why should I care about a human life more than a polar bear, of which there are only 25 000 left?

I'm not sure why you're pointing out that it's arbitrary then talking about numbers as if them mattering to the conversation wasn't also arbitrary.

gutter_trash · Jul 30, 2018

Camwi said:
Because that human life has infinitely more potential to do good for this planet than that polar bear does.

not true

polar bear is culling seal population, the polar bear is culling human population.

the polar bear is actually more beneficial to the planet than the human

Snake Eater · Jul 30, 2018

Animals don't randomly attack unless they're threatened

RedMercury · Jul 30, 2018

Einherjar said:
Why is a human life important? There are 7-8 billion or whatever the fuck we're up to by now of us, and we're destroying the planet and driving other species' to extinction at an alarming rate.

Why should I care about a human life more than a polar bear, of which there are only 25 000 left?

This is a bit extreme when you can care about both at the same time

Snake Eater said:
Animals don't randomly attack unless they're threatened

When they are hungry too, the bear did look very skinny.

Westbahnhof · Jul 30, 2018

Snake Eater said:
Animals don't randomly attack unless they're threatened

Unless they feel threatened, you mean. Or territorial. Or rabid. Or very hungry. In any case, what you said is wrong.

Reckheim · Jul 30, 2018

Einherjar said:
Why is a human life important? There are 7-8 billion or whatever the fuck we're up to by now of us, and we're destroying the planet and driving other species' to extinction at an alarming rate.

Why should I care about a human life more than a polar bear, of which there are only 25 000 left?

ok there Thanos.

chandoog · Jul 30, 2018

gutter_trash said:
not true

polar bear is culling seal population, the polar bear is culling human population.

the polar bear is actually more beneficial to the planet than the human

Ok, going by your posts, it's pretty obvious you're trolling in this thread ..

right, right ??

Otherwise, what's your stance on the clubbing of seals ? Surely you seem into culling seal population .. you must be a fan of seal clubbing too right ?

Camwi · Jul 30, 2018

gutter_trash said:
not true

polar bear is culling seal population, the polar bear is culling human population.

the polar bear is actually more beneficial to the planet than the human

I don't know if you're being serious or not, but just in case..

That human being can also cull the seal population, all while working towards helping increase endangered species' numbers, or working towards reducing the pollution on the planet, or finding the cure for fucking cancer.

Xe4 · Jul 30, 2018

For what it's worth if some poacher was hunting a polar bear and got killed by the bear defending itself, many of the responses here would be different. Mine certainly would be. But that's not what happened at all.

It's also worth noting being ok someone killing killing an animal in self defense is not equivalent to not wanting to protect the species. Polar bears are great and we should be doing everything in our power to ensure the species remains sustainable.

But that doesn't mean we shouldn't also protect ourselves if one tries to kill us, that's a rediculous sentiment.

Snake Eater said:
Animals don't randomly attack unless they're threatened

Polar bears very much do randomly attack when they're not threatened. Particularly if they're hungry or rabid.

Polar bear shot and killed in self defense by cruise ship guard

User requested account closure

▲ Legend ▲

Erarboreal

User requested account closure

User requested account closure

Erarboreal

Alt Account

Attempted to circumvent ban with alt account

Blue Venus