''It was not a fraternity-sanctioned event.''

December 25, 2003 7:26 AM

Michael Bloomberg and Woodrow Wilson must be proud. The Holiday dinner meets double-secret probation. Be afraid - very afraid.
posted by trondant (16 comments total)

The South is so appealing.
posted by tomorama at 7:55 AM on December 25, 2003

So they killed an animal and ate it?

The horror...
posted by srboisvert at 8:32 AM on December 25, 2003

The South is so appealing.

So are glib generalizations about large areas of the United States based on the actions of three people.
posted by sklero at 9:59 AM on December 25, 2003

I had to stop reading the article a few times because it made my stomach turn. I can only imagine the delight these frat boys took in killing the animal.

My grandfather´s fraternity! My own college! Well, at least the incident will probably make the fraternity less desirable choice for sorority girls on campus (like, those guys could be rabid!), thereby breeding these idiots out.
posted by jennak at 10:23 AM on December 25, 2003

what?

there's good eatin' on a racoon.
posted by hob at 11:13 AM on December 25, 2003

What's the matter, Drew Curtis not accepting submissions today?
posted by JollyWanker at 5:05 PM on December 25, 2003

Shit, boy. We just gonna fricassee us up some 'coon.
posted by monju_bosatsu at 7:54 PM on December 25, 2003

Metnioning Bloomberg and Wilson was a nice hook. Nothing at all to do with the story.

What a dumb ass you are.
posted by flatlander at 9:13 PM on December 25, 2003

It's nice to see the old chestnuts roasting on the open barbecue spit every year, the othering of the wacky and inscrutable flyover.
posted by dhartung at 9:47 PM on December 25, 2003

Go fuck yourself.
posted by trondant at 12:13 AM on December 26, 2003

easy now, trondant. you gotta admit this has furk written all over it ...

yet while i'm here, whatsamatter u? i'm a strict vegetarian and i can't even get offended by this. (of course, i wouldn't be offended if they did it to a rabid dog, either, so maybe my opinion is a bit different than most.)

by the standards of what happens every day, i'd consider this animal's death to be "humane," and the frat boys simply exercising their god-given rights as masters of the animal universe. :/ snark
posted by mrgrimm at 9:40 AM on December 26, 2003

Wow, it's true; fraternities are training grounds for the ruling class. They have a long way to go to before they're in Cheney's league, though.
posted by George_Spiggott at 11:10 AM on December 26, 2003

For the benefit of all, I will attempt to enumerate the various points in this story where things seem to have gone a little, shall we say, askew? That is, those points whereat one might say, "Dude, that's fucked up" (encompassing the entire spectrum between, "Dude, c'mon, that's a little fucked up," to, "Dude, that is so fucked up"):

1. Some frat brothers spot a raccoon near the dumpster of their frat house, which does not appear to be in the middle of the woods, or even the edge thereof. Unusual, but nothing too fucked up about that.
2. The raccoon does appear to behaving "erratically" -- an ambiguous term, to be sure, but which I take to mean listing, stumbling about, perhaps repeatedly bumping into the dumpster or other objects. Behavior, in any case, that would imply that the raccoon is maybe a little out of its mind. That, and the fact that it has wandered at least a kilometer away from anyplace that isn't full of cars and streets and houses and people to end up at this dumpster. Although, judging from its proximity to UGA and its census tract data, this is a neighborhood full of college students who, if my experience of Ithaca has any relevance hereto, are likely too busy shmokin' up studying diligently to securely fasten the lids of their outdoor garbage receptacles, or even put all their outdoor garbage into said receptacles, thus creating a veritable raccoon heaven. But this is all total stereotyping on my part; if anyone has any direct, firsthand experience of this place, I'd love to read it.
3. For my part, the first thing I would do when confronted with a wild raccoon behaving erratically next to my house is not to get too close. The best response when this occurs in a populated area is to call the local animal control department so that trained professionals can deal with the situation. The second best response (and the one that makes the most sense when this happens in the woods) is to try to scare the raccoon off, so that it does not eat your garbage or pets. The third best response - the response of last resort, in other words - is to try and kill it yourself. And I don't know about you, but if I were walking through my neighborhood (or even better, the neighborhood next to mine, which seems to be similar to Census Tract 6 in Clark County, Georgia) and saw a bunch of nice young men clubbing a wild animal to death in their driveway, I would have to say, "Dude... that is fucked up." At the very least.
4. Despite the rather disturbing sight that this would have made, up to this point a disinterested observer might be moved to admire the initiative of these young men, who instead of relying upon faceless government institutions (i.e. Animal Control) to solve their problems, instead step up to the plate and take responsibility for the situation. One might admire that, until the moment when the brothers are confronted with a dead raccoon corpse next to their house. I cannot pretend to know what was going on through these young men's minds at this point - "We must destroy the evidence"? "Reuse, Recycle, Reduce"? -- but at any rate, they choose to dispose of the animal by skinning it, cooking it, and eating it. C'mon, dude. You have to admit, that's a little fucked up, right off the bat.
5. I don't know what they're teaching the young people in Georgia nowadays, but here in upstate New York, if you see a raccoon, you automatically assume the possibility of rabies, until the raccoon proves otherwise. An "erratic" raccoon just clinches it. As I mentioned before, my first impulse when confronted with a raccoon (and I've had a couple of encounters) is not to get too close, and that goes triple if it exhibits signs of rabidity. One thing that I would definitely not do, short of being threatened with starvation, is to eat a possibly rabid animal that I found rooting through my garbage. Dude, that is so fucked up.
6. I have to wonder, given the people involved, the time of year, and the rather fucked-up behavior exhibited by raccoon and frat boy alike, whether these brothers had been partying a little beforehand. I think it would be scarier if they hadn't been drinking -- that spontaneously killing, skinning, and eating a possibly rabid wild animal is their sober, considered response to this situation.

Now I know that on occasion, when people hit a deer out on the backroads -- especially if they're driving a pickup truck, if only for the added convenience -- they may choose to throw it in the back and have a quiet little barbecue the next day. That seems kind of funny, and maybe slightly ill-advised (who knows where that deer has been?), but nothing to write home about. The raccoon incident is distinguished from this sort of situation in several ways: The deer is killed out in the country, not a residential neighborhood in a college town. The deer's death is an accident -- a happy accident, for a certain sort of meat-eater, but an accident nonetheless. The deer is not seen to be behaving in a way that could indicate a rabies infection before it is deliberately clubbed to death in a driveway and eaten.

So to sum up, as best as I can read the situation: Three guys of unknown sobriety see a possibly rabid animal by their dumpster. They decide to kill it. And then skin it. And then eat it. Not too far away from the University of Georgia. Where they go to school, and flirt with the young lady sitting next to them, who probably doesn't know that that guy asking for her number might have eaten a rabid raccoon yesterday. All in all, pretty fucked up. Wouldn't you say?
posted by skoosh at 6:56 AM on December 27, 2003

skoosh --

· The frat house is on the frat-sorority row, so I´m sure it´s raccoon heaven. It also explains why their neighbors aren´t going to stop them -- their neighbors are frat members too. Scary how mob mentality works.

· I agree that these guys are friggin´idiots, but let´s not assume that all "young people in Georgia" are.

· This is embarrassing to UGA students like myself. But let me assure you that this idiotic behavior is pretty much centralized to Milledge Ave. and the other frat house locations.

· Interestingly enough, December 13th was during finals. Nice to know how the Phi Kaps chill out after some tough finals.
posted by jennak at 8:28 AM on December 27, 2003

My dear jennak, I did not by any means intend to imply that the behavior of these -- for lack of a better word (yet still polite and in keeping with the absurdly over-the-top, just-for-fun-and-not-meant-to-be-sarcastic gentility of this comment) -- gentlemen in any way reflects how any other young person of Georgian descent would have acted in their place. If it appeared so, I can only offer you my humblest apology.

That being said, it appears that you are a young person in Georgia -- have said young people's Georgian elders been remiss in their duties as far as rabies awareness education goes? Or is rabies just not as much of a problem in the New South as it is in the Old North?

ps. I screwed up my strikethrough tags in my original comments, and for that, I apologize, though not as sincerely and wholeheartedly as with my first apology, since in this latter case, no one seems really to care all that much, and it is a pretty trivial matter anyhow. I don't even know why I brought it up. I'm sorry.

Now I feel like apologies 2 and 3, which were, after all, advanced in the spirit of lighthearted absurdity, might somehow diminish the impact of my first apology, which really is sincere and heartfelt, and therefore might needlessly cause further pain and suffering to those who might have bristled at certain perceived implications in my original comment. I feel I must apologize for that.

Oh, and it occurs to me that all this apologizing has derailed the thread. My bad.
posted by skoosh at 1:33 AM on December 28, 2003

Am I a young person in Georgia? Well, I don't know...I'm 24. As a freshman said to me the other semester..."you're so old!" (One can only imagine how bad her 30th birthday will be for her.) I'm not *of* Georgia, though.

I think these guys were just drunk idiots. Most people know that wild animals are apt to be rabid.
posted by jennak at 4:21 PM on January 7, 2004