I tend to agree, its very tragic for his family, but why would anyone do the things he did on a daily basis when he had a family?

Ultimo wrote:

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I think the reason it's a tragic accident is because of the animal that has killed him, if it had been a crock or a snake then sure fair enough you grab hold of these things one day they are gonna get you, but people go swimming with stingrays on vacation, it was not considered that dangerous. Also you have to remember what the guy has done in terms of conservation and raising awareness of these animals to people in Australia and all over the world.

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I'll have to echo Ultimo here. It's tragic because he died doing something safe, not when he was doing the extreme stuff he was known for. And so what if he was a loony, he still did good work.

Just like anybody else, he had die-hard fans, and to those fans it's going to be tragic no matter how he died.

John Belushi died of a drug overdose and I still consider that a tragedy. I was crushed when I heard the news.

Most people just say he was an idiot that did it to himself. But I see the tragedy in a man who couldn't control his impulses and had no one around him willing to help.

During the live recordings of a song called "Guilty" that he did in the Blues Brothers concerts he has a llne where he says something about people always giving him cocaine or something like that and at that point in the song the crowd always lets out a big cheer.

From what I've read on John he tried so hard to clean himself up, but everybody wanted to party with the great John Belushi. Every average Joe thought if they came up to him with some coke he'd be their best friend. He just couldn't escape it.

ANYWAY. I guess what I'm saying is I think it's hard to judge a person for what they did or how they died. And regardless of how they died to some people it TRULY will feel like a tragedy.

Heck, a suicide is a tragic death when you think about it.

Just my two cents.

But he didn't jump on a stingray. He swam with them in the exact same way I swam with stingrays in the Caribbean. In this case, he wasn't doing anything out of the ordinary. So like I said, it's like a race car driving getting killed in a car crash OFF of the track going 45 miles an hour.

maybe he smelled bad...

that could be!

i think what i am reading into jd's point of view is that an animal in the wild no matter how docile, is still an animal with animal insticts and they do not "think" like humans, so it shouldn't be such a suprise when a person dies working with wild animals.  even the circus performer who raises a bear from a cub runs the risk of being killed by his "tame" bear.  perhaps it's not that the steve's death was not tragic, because it was, but that the suprise is played out a bit overrated...

-- Edited by disco strangler at 12:00, 2006-09-21

-- Edited by disco strangler at 12:01, 2006-09-21

Yes, he did do that. I saw a clip of him talking about all the flac he was getting for that. He said "I was in complete control of the situation at all times, at no point was (the baby) ever in any danger".

JD The Jazz Doctor wrote:

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not really. I think dave's the one that actually broke the story here on the forum.

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I only meant that JR called you ornery this am.

well, i thought it was a good thread...

perhaps your are just tired of having steve crammed down you throat...

now we well get the made for tv movie, the movie movie, the action figures, the books.....

my husband calls it "working dumb"