For those of you who have had the unfortunate pleasure of reading Oregon’s “major” paper, the Oregonian, you deserve an apology and a new newspaper. Over the past five years, there have been a few times when I have been so flabbergasted by the content, that I have emailed a response to the Editor. And of course, my responses have never been published. Friday’s front page news capitalizing on the recent Tiger attack at The San Francisco Zoo was another loosely strewn article masquerading as news that sounded more fictional than fact.
The Oregonian has sunk to a new low. ‘Decades later, still in the lion’s den’ is the sensationalized ramblings of old druggie about an incident that he and his friends brought upon themselves in 1970. The “eyes filled with tears” and the “Good Bye Kenny” lines are ridiculous attempts to pull at the heart strings of its readers and, in general, it demonstrates poor journalistic skills. I am doubtful of the alleged chain of events that occurred that night. Bowers was admittedly under the influence of either alcohol or drugs, although Hoover Barnett simply writes Bowers was “partying.” Since no one from the zoo provided an alternative account, the article is dubiously one sided and it lacks documentation that should be necessary in a front page article. In addition, the fact that this obviously disturbed man came back into the zoo and killed those animals is outrageous and the writer seems to justify this behavior by saying, “he did not want the lions to suffer.” What did the writer hope to accomplish by this article? One should take responsibility for the the choices that one makes and blame should not be placed on outside parties, whether they be alcohol, heroin, zoo keepers or lions.
