Rrrright…
Let’s start by saying that if animals are unaware of their own mortality, it’s absurd to talk about “suicide”, we all agree on that. One thing’s true, though: pets suffering from depression (because they’ve been abandoned by their owners or a pet friend) might let themselves die of starvation.
I know this, I googled it.
And this isn’t exclusive to domestic animals: there’s this famous case of a pair of lions hunting together somewhere in the savannah... One of them got injured and died a painful death. The other, full of grief, immediately gave up his will to live. He laid at his friend’s side until he died of starvation.
It is said that Emperor penguins mate for life, and if one of them dies, so will its mate not long afterwards. Same with swans and seahorses, to name but a few. I'm not really sure if this is caused by depression or lack of sex, but either way, it proves my point.
Aside from depression, there are various other reasons why an animal would –voluntary or not- kill itself: excruciating pain, for instance. I heard of a black cat that jumped out a 7th storey window when his beloved owner died.
It’s important to add that the man was lying in bed listening to Anastasia’s single “All 4U” when he met his maker.
On “Repeat” mode.
The cat survived him a day.
Those are the facts, you jump into your own conclusions.
A reconstruction of the tragedy played by a professional stunt
It’s weird, but some animals definitely “know” that something very very very bad is gonna happen to them, so they kill themselves first in a less painful manner (or so they try, at least).
Check this out: scorpions, when surrounded by flames, will sting themselves in the back.
Agonizing bees will sting you to tear off their bellies and end it all faster.
And I’m sure you’ve got a friend, or a friend of a friend, who saw a crazy dog jumping off the bridge trying to avoid being run over by a car. That’s a classic.
Then there’s the altruistic kind of suicide, like when your guardian dog gives his life to protect you and your family from rogues.
I knew this 3-year-old Doberman that prevented a home robbery when the owners were out partying, as always. He scared the shit out of the intruders, who run away seconds after breaking in through the backdoor. Two days later, the dog died from asphyxia. This was so unexpected, that the owners took his body to a vet for an examination. They found two gloved fingers stuck inside his larynx.
Gross, right? Surely that poor beast hated being left home alone, but stayed true to his owners till the end.
My favourite case of altruistic suicide is perpetrated by a particular kind of termites in Australia. These suckers will explode their bodies if their nest is under attack. I’m not kidding, it seems that their guts are so sticky that can immobilize the intruders right on the spot. Can you beat that?!
“Assisted death” is not unheard of in the animal kingdom either. There’s a parasite called Horse Hair that can force crickets to commit suicide by jumping in and out a pond to exhaustion. As it turns out, this is the only way in which Horse Hair parasites can kill themselves. And fortunately for them, crickets are too dumb to stop helping.
Salmons will jump right into a bear’s open mouth if, after swimming 2000 miles upstream, they don’t get laid.
Luckily, there are no mass suicides in the animal kingdom.
You probably heard of the “lemmings”, right? A.k.a “the suicidal animals”…? It is said that whole flocks of these cute little rodents would jump off cliffs or drown themselves… Bull! It was recently discovered that a population of lemmings would split into two groups when their numbers are too high for the food available. This happens way too often because lemmings reproduce at an alarming rate (it helps them keep warm, they say). So some will stay behind as the rest migrate to find alternative food sources to survive. This isn’t mass suicide, these dudes really want to make it!
Lemus Lemus a.k.a Lemming. Ain't it cute?!
Ok, sure, some might get disoriented and stampede against a rock or fall off a cliff in hordes… That’s quite common when you’ve been on the road for so long, in inclement weather and with scarce food around; your tiny paws swell and you realize that it isn’t worth it. The ones you’re sacrificing for are safely at home, fucking like hell and probably giving shit about you right now.
I don't know if you saw Disney’s documentary White Wilderness, which won an Academy Award in 1958. It featured some staged footage with lemmings jumping into sure death after faked scenes of mass migration. A Canadian counter-documentary, Cruel Camera, found that the lemmings used for the film were flown from Hudson Bay to Calgary, where they did not “jump off the cliff”, but in fact were launched off using a turntable.
Jeeeesus.
A Times Magazine article dated two days later, reported that the crew of White Wilderness committed mass suicide after having been publicly exposed.
A counter-article retorted that they’ve actually been murdered by a bunch of Canadian animal rights lovers armed with poison snakes.
And finally, 11 lemmings jumped right under an Amtrack train after reading the whole story. Fortunately, the literacy rate among lemming colonies dropped to zero afterwards.
So what about whales? It is known that stranded whales were surely following a leader that for some reason lacked a sense of direction or was simply berserk. Some scientists believe that in order to get rid of their gaga elders and stupid youngsters, middle-aged well-to-do whales came up with this idea of “join in and follow the crippled leader”. This allows them to get rid of all their scum in one go.
Many oceanographers currently use this argument to demonstrate the superior intelligence of whales and other sea mammals over human’s.
Some extreme left-wing whales stranded on a beach in the coast of Peru.
There is a spooky case that remains yet to be solved… it certainly beats me. In Jatinga (north east of India) every year during the monsoon season, thousands of birds supposedly commit “mass suicide” by either crashing into the ground or jumping into fire. The ones that survive show no desire to fly back. Since the average size of this bird’s brain is way smaller than the whale’s (and slightly smaller than an average school teacher’s), scientists believe that there’s no complot involved here. Some say that these birds might be collectively attracted either to light (if they jump into the fire) or darkness (if they crash into the ground).
I say… guys, maybe it’s a bit of both; maybe it’s a creepy chain reaction, a series of unfortunate events like leafs falling down the tree in Autumn. Some got bored, some lost a bet, some tripped, others went sad at the loss of their kins… It may turn out to be a simple case of multiple “individual suicides” happening at the same time for very different reasons.
Birds drawn to fire in Jatinga.
In any case, it is generally believed that domestic animals are more prone to suicide than wild ones. I used to think that this was a misconception, because ordinary people witness domestic deaths more often than in the wilderness. I would think that MOST animals in the wild will eventually find enough reasons to put an end to their miserable lives. If they're lucky. I mean, before they end up hunted down by predators or catch an unspeakable decease when scavenging on rotten food, or suffer from a fatal case of diarrhea after drinking from a polluted pond (yes, I’m a National Geographic reader... sue me.)
But recently I came across a very interesting article written by a British animal behaviour psychologist. He says that pets are more prone to suicide because “most owners breed them as surrogate friends and partners, thus transferring a lot of strain and negative emotions onto them”.
Ok, ok… now we’re talking, this I can relate to.
If this chum is right, this might help explain why cats and dogs -in particular- show clear suicidal tendencies, even during carefree play.
Compilation of caught-in-the-act cats displaying suicidal tendencies
When it comes to dogs… well, they can get pretty suicidal too, you know?
Let me elaborate.
Various studies demonstrate how a specific scene or location can trigger unexpected responses in people and animals alike: an eerie echo in the breeze… an unfamiliar odour… a creepy looking tree in the middle of the garden…
In case you didn’t know, the most famous suicide hotspot in the world is the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. Being one of the major tourist attractions in the United States, and knowing that the U.S. suicide rate is 11.1 per 10.000 people per year (ranked #41 in Wikipedia’s list), one must assume that people must travel from all over the world just to jump off that monument. Well, if I were to kill myself, I’d probably leave my squashed body for somebody-I-give-a-shit-about to clean up after, too.
What is it with the Golden Gate Bridge that drives them wiiiiiiiiillllld?! Beats me.
Now, guess what? Dogs have their own Golden Gate Bridge. It’s called Overtoun Bridge and it’s in Scotland. In the past 50 years, over 50 dogs “committed suicide” jumping off that bridge and into the river some 300 feet below.
Overtoun Bridge
Curiously enough, in Celtic mythology, Overtoun is known as “the thin place”, an area in which heaven and earth are reputed to be close. Were these dogs 'spooked' by some supernatural or external force emanating from the bridge and deliberately leapt to their deaths? A Daily Mail online article shines some light for us: “Psychic Mary Armour took her own Labrador for a walk along the (Overtoun) bridge to test the theory. However, she reported no unusual sensations. ‘Animals are hyper-sensitive to the spirit world, but I didn't feel any adverse energy' she said afterwards”.
Ok… thanks for the enlightening input, you freak.
I found on Youtube a short movie based on Lucky Rocky's story. In case you haven't heard of it, it's the story of a monogamous dog that caught his bitch cheating on him and went suicidal. Check it out, the leading dog's performance does Rocky justice:
Ok, enough of this intro; what’s the story about Suicidal Fish, anyway?
Right! This subject’s been bugging me for quite some time now.
You know what? I think this article is getting a bit too long, so I’ll tell you all about it on my next post.
Stay tuned :)
Yours unlawfully,
Pinker Mint
- - - - - - - -
Related articles
On suicidal birds in Jatinga
On Lemmings and the White Wilderness story
Daily Mail article on Overtoun Bridge
Time Magazine, online edition. "Do animals commit suicide? A scientific debate"
List of Countries by Suicide Rate
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario