Python eats bunny: not your average Christian lesson
Those of us who grew up in rural areas learned early on the cycle that begins in birth and ends in death. Unlike city kids, we witnessed the birth of baby chickens each spring. We also witnessed the dressing of some of those birds once they became adults. Hunting was a birthright. Fishing was a means to put food on the table. Butchering farm animals was meant as a means of seeing to it a large family had meat to eat.
I never witnessed unnecessary cruelty. We respected the creatures that helped to feed us.
It never would have occurred to the men in our family to taunt an animal. It never would have occurred to them to laugh as an animal lay dying.
You can imagine the horror then, at a classroom full of children witnessing what appears to be a science demonstration. An adult male is monitoring a large python curled on the floor. The male turns and grabs a small black baby rabbit. The children laugh—some of them sound nervous.
The male then turns and begins to bait the python with the rabbit, dangling the squirming creature in front of the snake. Suddenly, the man places the rabbit within striking distance. The snake grabs it and proceeds to eat it, rendering the small animal helpless, and subject to a long, slow death.
The children laugh and scream. They sound gleeful. The man laughs.
This reportedly happened in my home city of Jacksonville, Florida, at a private Christian school.
Where are the benefits in this lesson? These children have not been taught anything spiritual. They have been treated to a horror movie, a live one. This seems to be a preoccupation with others as well; there are a number of videos at youtube.com like the one linked above.
If a hunter offered to take school children into the woods to pursue game, parents and administrators would likely be up in arms.
To demonstrate the senseless act of taunting two animals, followed by the rapid devouring of prey teaches nothing about the wilderness or the creatures living there. You cannot teach cycles of birth and death with sensationalism.
What these children witnessed and were a part of is the savagery of the human heart. Most of us would think such a lesson the complete opposite of Christianity or any other major religion as well.–Kay B. Day
The video shown to these children can be viewed at the Jacksonville TV station CBS47 Web site.
Word Press, Technorati, Tags, Python eats bunny, Christian school, science lesson
May 28th, 2007 at 4:10 am
They can watch wildlife video’s if they want to see how snakes eat - and in captivity - it is NOT necessary to feed live animals to snakes - but the truth is either way something has to die for them to be fed - but when children are seen to be making fun of it - questions the mentality of these children and the teachers, who need to rethink about where they are leading these kids - it is all absolutely disgusting ! THANK YOU SO MUCH for posting this story and making people aware what is going on within classrooms - CHRISTIAN (?) classrooms !
May 28th, 2007 at 12:10 pm
[...] Feed Rabbit To Snake. School Can’t Spell. May 28th, 2007 by Bijhan Al-Attack After reading Kay Day’s post on Current Events Watch I was sifting through some of the news reports on the incident. I came to [...]
May 28th, 2007 at 12:27 pm
Thank you both for coming by and commenting. I’m having trouble getting my own comments sent because of our very lousy Internet situation here in Jax.
I’m still upset about the methods used to teach this “lesson.”
best, Kay
May 28th, 2007 at 1:24 pm
This was absolutely not necessary to teach anything. This was cruel and barbaric. Perhaps one should toss the teacher into the lions cage at the zoo. Same thing here. This is not natural.
May 28th, 2007 at 3:14 pm
this is absolutely ridiculous, the teacher I believe is sadistic and should be dismissed. Things like this should not take place on any occasions that have got something to do with education, should be repeated by no means, it will do more harm than good. For me it is tremendously appalling, shows nothing but lack of compassion of “educating” personell.
May 28th, 2007 at 5:14 pm
I certainly wouldn’t call this educational, more like barbaric!
We all know every animal has to eat, but taunting a creature like that, both snake and rabbit included, is totally unnecessary and completely inhumane!
What sort of example does this set for our young people?????
NOT a good one, in my opinion!!!!
May 28th, 2007 at 5:19 pm
The teacher is obviously sick and sadistic. Nothing good will ever come out of this lesson other than more humans will grow up to be non compassionate and worse, sadistic monsters which we don’t need more of, thank you very much! Please teach future generations the right, compassionate way about life. I find it very disturbing that this teacher was allowed to show children such horrible act. He should be sacked.
May 28th, 2007 at 6:40 pm
As a psychotherapist I find this deeply disturbing - this is no better then the truckloads of families in China who get bussed in to watch fat tigers slowly killing calves and the empathy-challenged people (a large percentage of society in China’s case) who laugh at that. There is a well established link between animal abuse and interpersonal violence and both the teacher and the kids who show genuine enjoyment for this kind of thing should be watched closely as they harbor a great potential for harm to other people due to their enjoyment of watching something/one suffer. This should NOT be allowed in schools.
May 29th, 2007 at 1:30 am
That’s not a rabbit in the video. It has a tail. Rabbits don’t have tails.
May 29th, 2007 at 1:34 am
Sorry I didn’t realise it was a different video to the news item. In the UK it is illegal to feed live food like this.
May 29th, 2007 at 3:04 am
Several things emerged from watching that video: firstly that the demonstration was unnecessary, secondly that the students and the teacher thought it was fun and enjoyed watching constructed cruelty and thirdly that it illustrates how people act as God in deciding what lives and dies.
The spectator enjoyment of the class was similar to that of those who enjoy bullfighting and at an earlier point in time, those who enjoyed watching Christians thrown to the lions in the days of the Roman empire.
That the python was well looked after is clear but the rabbit met a grisly death after being terrified. This teaches dual standards: that the python is good and to be fed and applauded and the rabbit is an object of amusement and its feelings are to be ignored.
The whole video is a disturbing commentary on how people are and how they are taught, and by extension - why the world is in such a mess today and is such a dangerous place! lack of respect for life and believing one form of life is better than another, when the same God made all forms of life, and as was observed by the poet William Blake:”For everything that lives is holy.”
May 29th, 2007 at 5:51 am
I really do not think this should be taken into the classroom, maybe a video of them in the wild.
May 29th, 2007 at 6:59 am
This is sending the wrong message to children regarding life & death, and how Animals survive. Any fool would realize this! Steve Irwin is rolling in his grave! Feeding snakes is done with dead Animals, in captive situations. This is not even close to education, this is immoral behaviour, and has no part in a classroom!! Thank you so much for bringing this to everyone’s attention, although it will also make it’s way through the web for sickos to amuse themselves:( I will never understand this type of behaviour! Nature is simple, but when you add man to the picture, things become twisted with greed & ego!
Rich Russom
May 29th, 2007 at 8:31 am
Sandy, I agree, it is definitely not natural, not the way this lesson was taught.
Miwa, I think the children received a very negative message–agreed it did more harm than good.
J.P., like you, I was bothered by the taunting too.
Jessica, I’m curious to see how the school will deal with it, although they have said this type lesson will not be offered again.
Nikki, I also thought about the link to personal violence. I agree with you.
Ruth, the original video of the school demo is linked at the end of the article. That video was posted at a TV station site, so I didn’t place an image here because of uncertainty about intellectual property rights. But you can view the video at that site. The top video illustrates the talking point in my article, that people seem to enjoy and derive pleasure in seeing small animals eaten by captive snakes.
Steve, thanks for the quote from Blake. He’s an amazing poet.
John, that’s a very good point–at least with videos shot in the wild, there’s a natural scheme totally lost in this classroom.
Rich, good points–this situation was artificial.
Thanks to all of you for commenting here, and do come back to read again.
best, Kay B. Day
May 29th, 2007 at 2:48 pm
What is being done about this teacher? What a sick lesson! I expect though half of those poor kids will have nightmeres about this even though they laughed at the time! Perhaps for those who thought it was truely funny next time let them see how their beefburgers are made!
It sickens me to think that parents allow this, I know if that was a lession my child was being taught I would take my child out of that school!
Moll
May 29th, 2007 at 9:43 pm
Children should not have watched this. It is horrible and scary.
May 30th, 2007 at 9:13 am
Michelle, I haven’t heard anything beyond the school’s apology. It’s private, so they probably are more tolerant than a public school might be. I wouldn’t want my child to go to that school either.
Sharon, I agree.
Thank you both for visiting and commenting.
best, Kay
June 1st, 2007 at 12:06 am
All of these comments are awesome & exactly how I feel! Very well put! I don’t understand just what this sicko biology teacher was trying to get across? We all know snakes eat mice, rats & rabbits. By watching it, what was the educational meaning behind it? And it is totally unreal to me that some idiots out there are justifying it! John J.D. Photography & Mary Alice Pollard are right, if the food chain of the wild must be taught, a movie of how it REALLY happens should be shown instead. Snakes don’t get their food handed to them & prey have at least a chance for escape! The poor rabbits feelings were totally disregarded & that is not right for any living creature or learning experience, it was a cruel, cruel thing to do. The teacher ought to be tormented first & then fed to an Anaconda!!!! In reality though, he should be fired as well as any faculty members that were aware of this!!!
June 1st, 2007 at 10:36 am
Tracy, I don’t think anything valuable was taught in that lesson. You’re right–it was not an example of what happens in nature; this lesson was totally out of context.
Thank you for visiting my column and for commenting.–best, Kay