We just saw some of the footage with Steve Irwin and the baby, and Kathleen’s observation was that, crocs aside, she wasn’t thrilled with the way Irwin was holding the infant since he was apparently making no effort to support the baby’s head, which is–y’know–Rule One.
But now I’m thinking about the fact that Irwin is indeed in the entertainment business, and one wonders–presuming that the authorities told him never to do this again–just when it *is* both safe and permissible for an entertainer to start bringing his children into the “act.” Let us take as a given, just for the sake of argument, that one month old is just too ridiculously young for the child to be around crocs.
When *is* the child old enough? When *can* Steve Irwin bring his kid into the croc hunting fold and have it be “okay?” When the child’s a year? Five years? Ten? Or should it be mandated that no parent can expose his child to hazardous performing conditions (and that’s what this was: a performance. When you’re doing stunts and entertaining crowds, that’s a performance) if the child is under the age of consent?
Well, now you’ve got a really interesting situation, because there goes circus families. High wire acts, trapeze acts, teeter boards, knife throwing. We were just watching Cirque du Soleil on TV the other night and there were three Chinese kids whipping these incredible bolos around with remarkable dexterity…but what if one of them misjudges for a microsecond and concusses himself or one of the other kids? Yes, kids in trapeze and high-wire acts are in harnesses and there are nets…but harnesses and break, and if you land on the net wrong, you can still snap your neck.
Here there’s a whole movement to try and eliminate animal acts from circuses because it’s allegedly cruel to the animals, and I don’t recall any sort of movement to eliminate children from acts because it’s potential child endangerment.
With the authorities cracking down on the Croc Hunter…I wonder where the line is drawn. I personally am not at all sure.
PAD
• 
Recent Comments