Croc Hunter Steve Irwin as a Selfish, Irresponsible Ass

This today from AP:
"Crocodile Hunter" Steve Irwin always felt he would die early but that it would be a car wreck, not an animal, that killed him, the widow of the daredevil TV star and conservationist said Wednesday.
In her first interview since Irwin died from the jab of a stingray Sept. 4, Terri Irwin said her husband had an uncanny way with animals that both of them believed would keep him safe as he caught crocodiles, snatched up snakes and played with other dangerous beasts.
"I never thought it would be an animal, he never thought it would be an animal," Terri Irwin said in the interview with Australia's Nine Network, aired Wednesday. "I thought he would fall out of a tree, he thought it would be a car accident."
Asked by interviewer Ray Martin if Irwin believed he would die early, Terri said, "he had a very strong conviction that he would. To the point where I'm grateful in a way, because we're prepared."
Irwin, 44, died minutes after a stingray's barb pierced his chest while he filmed a TV show on the Great Barrier Reef. His death prompted an unprecedented outpouring of grief in Australia and among millions of fans of his televisions show "Crocodile Hunter."
A memorial service held for him last week at the family-owned wildlife park where he lived in Queensland state was broadcast on three television networks in Australia and picked up by international networks. Prime Minister John Howard attended, and Hollywood stars Russell Crowe, Cameron Diaz and others sent video condolences.
Terri Irwin, originally from Eugene, Oregon, has spoken publicly only twice since her husband's death, once to Martin and in a second interview with ABC television's Barbara Walters. The Walters interview is due to air Wednesday in the United States.
Terri Irwin said she has not seen the film of her husband's deadly encounter with a stingray and that it will never be shown on television.
"What purpose would that serve?" Terri Irwin said in the Walters interview, according to excerpts released in advance by ABC.
State Premier Peter Beattie announced on Wednesday the road that runs past the park in the hamlet of Beerwah would be renamed after the television star and conservationist.
"Steve Irwin and his family have put Beerwah on the map and I can think of no more fitting tribute," Beattie said.
Irwin's friend and business partner, John Stainton, has seen the film of his death. He told Walters he never wants to see it again and does not want anyone else to see it. "It's just a horrible piece of film tape," he said.
Terri Irwin was on a trip in Australia's southern Tasmania state with the couple's two children, 8-year-old daughter Bindi and 2-year-old son Bob, when her brother-in-law reached her with the news.
"I remember thinking, 'Don't say it. Don't say it. Don't say it,'" she said. "I looked out the window, and Bindi was skipping, skipping along outside the window. And I thought, `Oh, my children. He wouldn't have wanted to leave the children.' And I knew it was an accident. It was an accident so stupid. It was like running with a pencil."
She said it is important for her family to continue the work her husband did in teaching the world about wildlife.
Irwin told Walters she is getting through her grief "one minute at a time."

Over and over, Steve Irwin himselv was convinced as were others that he'd die early. His wife seems to have gone along with it, either actually believing it, or giving in to him by simply acknowledging it (thereby helping facilitate it? Discuss.). Friends and colleagues and business partners did the same, either buying into it, believing it truly, or just generally going with the flow. Why mess with the gravy train that was STeve Irwin, Inc., Crocodile Hunter and international commercial and conservation icon?

So is this some sort of romantic notion of predestination? Religious belief in divine fate? Well, none of that is borne out in this short description. Where's the mentin of God, Jesus, the Great Spirit, any form of Something Bigger Than Us? NOpe, not one word of that, either in all of his shows and public persona, or in all of his post-death pronunciations from family, colleagues, and fans.

What is recorded here is a self-rationalizing construct of mortality based on sheer selfishness. Steve Irwin was an entertainer and a wildlife specialist, one or the other taking center stage depending on who was paying the bills. He did unbelievably wild things with any manner of incredibly dangerous and unpredictable creatures, over and over. The I'll-die-early toss-off is just another way of saying, "Yeah, I do dangerous stuff, and I'm going to keep on doing it because I enjoy it and so do all of the fans. But I know, one day the odds will catch up with me." And that's exactly what happened.

More than anything, it was absolutely, crytal-clear, painfully obvious that he enjoyed every single bit of doing it. Whether it was being in a pond with a crocodile or getting bitten by a snake, he was into it all the way, a true adrenaline junkie addicted to the thrill of the confronation, the dance with danger and the threat of death, and likely also the thrill of the unwavering attention that so many accorded him when he pulled his stunts (and one has to admit, many of the things he did with dangerous animals were stunts).

Did he like animals and want to protect them? Sure he did, but that isn't what drove him. That much is clear. What drove him was the thrill of the hunt, the rush of the confrontation, touching danger and walking away smiling.

So Steve wraps it all together by constructing an elaborate albeit transparent fantasy of death, a way of saying nonchalantly, "I know what I'm doing, and it's dangerous, but I'm a professional. Sure, sometimes what I do could be considered irresponsible, but hey, that's just me, so that's what'll happen. Okay, mate?"


And who's left? It's heart-wrenching to read the above account of a mother taking the phone call giving her the news she's always expected but never really thought would come, that her two children--the ones she is watching playing witout a care in the world right outside the window--are now fatherless. That's the tragedy here. It's not the world's loss of a vocal and influential world conservation spokesman, although that is something to consider. The tragedy here is that the selfishness of one man for his own personal pursuits. Remember when he so unbelievably stupidly took his baby child in his arms into a crocodile pit? One misstep, one misguided hornet down the front of his shirt, one stiff breeze, and the world would've been treated to a father accidentally feeding a human baby to a crocodile. That was absolutely obscene, and this is a term I use very sparingly, as obscene as that unthinking, similarly narcissistic circus freak Michael Jackson dangling a helpless baby three stories above a Paris street. But I digress.

Who's left? A widow and her two children are left. No more Dad. Consolation, I guess, is that Irwin's media presence has provided them with a significant cushion so they are not looking at a major change in the way they live. But who will teach the kids to ride bikes? Who will be there for the first date and the high school graduation, college graduation, to preside at the wedding of his daughter? Not Stever, because he had things that were more important to him.

I'd love to have a motorcycle, or skydive, or even go bungee jumping. But I don't, and I won't. And I won't swim with sharks or sea snakes. No paragliding or mountain climbing either. Too much risk in those any number of pursuits which would be incredibly enjoyable for me personally, but in which the slightest miscalculation on my part or others', the slightest whiff of a breeze, the slightest imperceptible animal signal, could take me right on out of the picture for my wife and two children. I guess that's the ultimate definition of parenthood and parental responsiblity: I'm living for them, and for what I can and will do in the future, instead of living for me in the now.

Steve made his own choices, and the consequences put him where he is. I make my choices, every single day in things as banal as choosing one road over another to take to work. As bland, lame and mushy and self-constrained as these choices may seem to many people, I know they will take me to where I want to go, and to where my wife and my children want me to be, for as long as possible.