his page collects news stories that are examples of poeple doing extraordinarily stupid things, and getting killed/maimed in the process.  These are commonly called "Darwinian" in honor of Charles Darwin's brilliant observation that the strong survive, and the weak perish. I often post about these when I see them since they amuse me, and I generally have something snarky to add to the proceedings.  The true online clearinghouse for this sort of thing can be found on the Darwin Awards site, if you seek more confirmation that most of us are really, really stupid.

For a story to be truly "Darwinian" the victim should be doing something very stupid to get into trouble, and the trouble should kill them, or at least render them unable/unlikely to reproduce. If they are no longer of childbearing/siring age, then the accident should take their children out with them.  The trouble with this is that kids often do the stupidest things, through lack of judgment and common sense, (such as while emulating something they saw on Jackass) and while their self-applied deaths are technically Darwinian, it's hard to take too much pleasure in their deaths, since after all, they might have gotten smarter with age.  So when you read about something happening to a 13-18y/o on this page, try not to laugh too hard.

Most of the links will be dead by now, but you can try searching on the actual quoted text and perhaps find the story in a Google archive somewhere.  If not, you'll have to settle for reading what I've got quoted here.

More recent additions are added on top of the page.

December 12, 2003

News from Arkansas about a pit bull that was responsible for the deaths of its owner and his young son.  Nothing unusual there, given the breed, but the method of death is a bit different than usual.  There wasn't any biting, for instance.

They tried to drown the dog in an old mining pit, fell in, and drowned. While the dog watched.

December 6, 2003

Lorenzo Pilagatti's wife and daughter watched in horror as he was buried alive and died in a trench he had excavated in his front lawn. The 40-year-old unemployed construction worker had climbed into the three-metre-deep trench he had dug with a backhoe at his 94 Elgin Mills Rd. home at 8:30 p.m. on Monday when the sides collapsed, trapping him up to his neck. Richmond Hill fire and rescue crews worked for several hours to free him until a second collapse completely buried Pilagatti just after 1 a.m. yesterday.

A Richmond Hill town worker at the scene said Pilagatti was trying to hook his house into the town's sewage system.

"It appears he didn't want to be attached to his septic system and wanted to connect to the sewer."

Pilagatti did not have a work permit, the worker said.

"The homeowner had excavated a 12-foot hole to install a sewer pipe," said Belinda Sutton, spokesman for the ministry of labour.

November 20, 2003

He really liked that hat.

LETHBRIDGE, Alta. (CP) _ A man was crushed to death Tuesday when he dived under a slow-moving semi-trailer to retrieve his baseball cap.

High winds had blown the hat off the man's head as he got out of his white convertible in the parking lot of a farm supply store. The wind carried the well-worn hat underneath a loaded semi-trailer just as it started to move.

"The truck was rolling forward and he dove under to grab the hat. He tried to grab it and wiggle out quickly,'' said witness Josh Emard.

Let's hope they bury him in it, assuming he can be re-inflated enough to be posed in an open casket, that is.

November 17, 2003

¤ Some enjoyably-Darwinian news for you.

A boozy night on the town turned tragic for two Bronx college students yesterday when they took a joyride on the roof of an elevated subway train - and smacked into a metal bridge.

Loughrey, whose family lives in Montague, N.J., was an "exemplary" student who recently won a scholarship, said Kimberly Cline of SUNY Maritime.

He and Hochstetter spent the summer on the Empire State VI, sailing around Bermuda, Italy, Spain and Estonia. Both were in a regimental program that leads to licensing by the Coast Guard.

During summers and on weekends, Hochstetter worked as a deckhand on the Sea Queen, a party fishing boat out of Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn.

Neighbors said they couldn't imagine the tall, polite young man doing something as foolish as trying to ride atop a train.

"This wasn't a reckless neighborhood kid," said Ron McComiskey, 42, a safety manager for the Transit Authority, who lives across the street.

September 25, 2003

I would call this one "Darwinian" but for the fact that 1) no one was killed, and 2) making fun of hallelujah singers crashing a bus would make Baby Jesus cry.

Okay, seriously, how do a bunch of gospel-hour passengers make you lose control of the bus?  Did the driver keep turning around to scream "sit down and shut up!" or did he get caught up in dat ole holy spirit and start swerving along with the beat or what?  Keep your eyes on the road, sir.

September 5, 2003

Gloriously Darwinian story today, from Oz.

The man suffered a fractured pelvis and severe burns to his genital area after a firecracker exploded between the cheeks of his buttocks.

An ambulance was called to Dapto's Reed Park about 2.30am on August 10 after reports that the man was haemorrhaging from the buttocks. He was transported to Wollongong Hospital in a serious but stable condition, and he is expected to remain in hospital for several months.

The man suffered extensive injuries from the explosion and required emergency surgery. He now has a colostomy and a catheter, and is sexually dysfunctional.

Dr McCurdie said he believed the man had stumbled while the firecracker was in his buttocks, and fell down on it.

"By virtue of the fact that the explosion was confined in an upward direction, it went up into his pelvis, blasted a great hole in the pelvis, ruptured the urethra, injured muscles in the floor of the pelvis which rendered him incontinent.

At first you might think, "How can it be truly Darwinian if he's not actually dead and therefore incapable of furthering his genetics?" And that's a good point, but note that even though he's still technically alive, he is out of commission sexually, which makes this a "13 of one, baker's dozen of the other" sort of situation.

The article itself is pretty dumb, since the last half of it is basically an interview with some surgeon who goes on and on about the dangers of people imitating the stunts they see in Jackass the Movie. Of course the article says it's not clear if the guy has ever actually seen that movie, but when it comes time to blame entertainment for stupid people's behavior, the facts are never that important.

Dr McCurdie said young people were particularly susceptible to imitating movies like Jackass.

"I think films like that can influence people, particularly younger people," he said.

Of course the guy in this case is um... 26!

And lest you think I'm defending Jackass, I am not.  I can't stand that sort of "we're idiots." entertainment.  The mere fact that it exists depresses me. Jackass, amateur fist fights, Jerry Springer, pro wrestling, and so on. But the fact that people try to blame everything while avoiding personal responsibility for anything depresses me even more.

And just to complete the circle of hypocrisy, I must admit that I've come to somewhat enjoy some aspects of Jerry Springer, since Malaya enjoys watching it in short bursts just to see the idiots scream at each other.  I'll blog about it and the other hicksploitation type shows some day.  1) I am astonished that people continually volunteer to go on those shows when they simply have to know they'll end up humiliated, and 2) I can't believe the level of white trash (of every race) that Jerry's producers somehow bus in from West Virginia.  And yes, it will be one of my rantier and snarkier blogs... ever.

¤ In yet more Darwinian news, we have another case of someone basically begging to be killed.  And then getting his wish.

Authorities said about 10 people ages 15 to 23 were throwing tomatoes and firing paintball guns at passing cars from a corn field on state Route 241 near Mount Hope.

Members of the group told deputies that the driver of a luxury car stopped when a tomato hit it and threatened that he would shoot if it happened again. The driver then turned around, passed the group and was struck again with tomatoes.

Deputies said the car returned about a half hour later, and the driver got out with a shotgun and started shooting.

I suppose they'll catch the guy and prosecute him, but it hardly seems fair.  Give him a medal, put all of the paint ball and tomato idiots into prison, and call it even.

-------

And here's another comment on yesterday's blog, this one from Zeke.

Those tomatoe throwers were Amish and taking part in an annual or semi annual day or something like that and part of it is throwing tomatoes and such at cars on the road. It is pretty well known in the area it was mentioned in the other articles made by other news companies. The article that you have makes it seem like jackass type things. But when you hear that it is semi well known in the area the guy totally overreacted.

This is another example of the price I pay for blogging something on a day I don't post updates.  I saw the story about the shooting Tuesday night, and wrote up the thing I posted then.  However since I blog on Mon and Tues, but not Wed, I didn't post it until Thursday's blog, which I posted early Thursday morning.  And by that time several more stories about the shooting had been released, and they'd added more context to the news.

The added info was that it was a local tradition, and mostly harmless, and no one ever thought they'd get hurt.  I thought that was largely irrelevant, and liked my initial and unsympathetic reaction to the news, so I left it as it was.

I wouldn't disagree with Zeke; a guy who blows some Mennonite away for throwing a tomato at his car is clearly overreacting. And I don't think the guy should go unpunished if they catch him.  However, if you're out in a field at night throwing things at moving automobiles and especially if you or people with you are firing weapons (even if they are just paint pellet guns) and some guy drives by and threatens to come back and blow you away if you throw another tomato at him, and you then throw another tomato at him... You may not deserve to die, but you can't really expect a whole lot of sympathy if he does what he promised.

Plus, as the news item said, the guy who got killed was fricking 26 years old.  We can sort of overlook that sort of asshole vandalism from teenagers, but 26?  That's a bit old to chalk up your stupid and illegal behavior as a youthful indiscretion. What is he, George Bush?

February 1, 2003

Darwinian story of the day.

A lioness in a Spanish animal sanctuary ripped the right arm off a British tourist after the 54-year old woman clambered up a barrier and stuck her fingers inside the cage, local media reported.

"The lady climbed up the three-meter high barrier...She climbed to the top and stuck her fingers inside the enclosure. Then Martha, one of the lionesses, grabbed her fingers, tugged her in and ripped her arm off."

Given this display of stupidity, the park staff elected to butcher her and feed the rest of her to other animals, as an example to the rest of the tourists.

No, actually they airlifted her to a hospital where she'll get surgery and begin learning to wipe left handed.

January 25, 2003

A rather Darwinian death today.  Two idiots (teen aged boys, needless to say) were out late at night, throwing eggs at moving cars on a busy street. They hit the wrong car, and some guys pulled over and beat the shit out of them, stabbing one to death and putting the other in the hospital by beating him with a pipe.

Guess they won't be throwing eggs at moving vehicles again, huh?

August 15, 2002

Darwinian story of the day.

Realizing the chase was futile, officers turned off their wailing sirens. The two students riding the motorcycle turned around toward the officers and gave them the finger. However, they failed to notice that they had gone through another red light and slammed into the taxi. The boy steering the motorcycle died instantly.

August 14, 2002

New fad is to put a miniature TV into the center of your steering wheel.  Having a visible TV in your car is against the law in 38 states.  Adding to the irony is the fact that they remove the air bag to put in the monitor.  This apparently Darwinian innovation is mostly popular amongst the sort of people you'd expect it to be popular amongst.

Rap singer Kaleidaskope says removing the air bag to install a TV in the steering wheel of his Mercedes-Benz CL 55 "was all for show" and that he rarely drives the car outside his Long Island neighborhood. "It makes a statement. It says you're either a ballplayer, a rapper or making some serious cheddar (money)."

It might say something about you being a superficial idiot as well?

All site content copyright "Flux" (Eric Bruce), 2002-2007.