Parent Of The Year
June 24, 2008
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85 Responses to “Parent Of The Year”
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OhMahGawd!! Those things are NOT nice woodland creatures. Someone should throw the parents in there with bits of trail mix glued to the bodies.
Raccoons love finger food.
These parents should be reported to the local Youth Protection agency, and this child should be placed with a foster family. For as long as this child resides with these two individuals, the child will be at risk of physical danger.
RACCOONS!
Just awesome. I’d want my dad to do that. OH NO RACCOONS.. They’re not gonna kill the kid and they won’t have rabies in a zoo. BFD.
Where in the hell do they have raccoons in a zoo? Bizarre!
That’s cool. More parents need to be like this. Imagine the memories and toughness that kid will have.
nah, he’s doing it right. obviously the kid wanted to do it. think about the memories this kid will have. now thats father & son bonding. AWESOME.
Hey, this picture is completely out of context! He was *oviously* trying to save the kid and drag him away from the verochious raccoons, attempting to suckle on the kids tasty brains… Mmmmh.. braaaains…
They should quit teasing the hungry animals and just drop the kid in.
That kid will remember that forever, and definitely in a positive way.
NOM NOM NOM NOM NOM!
I think it’s pretty obvious that this is not a zoo. Do you guys honestly think they keep raccoons in a zoo? With a fence that low to boot? Retards.
Somebody needs to punch this guy in the face. And Cory, too. That racoon could have slashed that kid’s face several times before the father even knew what was happening.
That kid probably asked to feed the coons and after making a scene the parents caved and indulged the little brat. If you think he’s better in a foster home you should talk to kids that get stuck in that hellish lifestyle. Any parents who are taking their child to the zoo are 10 times more capable of providing care than any foster parent.
Why do some automatically presume that he’s the father?
Maybe he’s just a bully trying to shake loose the kid’s lunch money?
Maybe the adult in question had no choice in the matter, because it was part of his initiation for becoming a full fledged member of the Notorious Raccoon Gang.
You guys are such pussies… did your parents sit you down in front of the TV every day and tell you not to move to much or else you might get hurt?
I am not going to say that it is smart to put your kid inside of an enclosure with animals you don’t know but it certainly doesn’t warrant a punch in the face or removal of the child from the home. Maybe if parents let their children live a little we wouldn’t have an obesity epidemic because everyone is too scared to go outside and do something.
I’m sure he’d hear the screams and lift the kid out of the pit in time
There are raccoons in the zoo in Mexico City, but most definitely enclosed.
People do this in Zoos and security actually has to keep people from it. My ex-wife used to complain about it all the time. The parents that do this should be thrown to the animals to remove them from the gene pool.
American paranoids…
John–
Lots of zoos have raccoons, especially the ones in countries that don’t have wild raccoons. I don’t know if this photo is from a zoo or not, but you can’t make assumptions based on the presence of raccoons.
Mike–
That guy looks like he’s in reasonably good shape. He’d probably tear your cheeto-eating ass in two if you tried to punch him.
And if all the kid is risking is a few scratches on his face, then it’s worth the risk. I don’t believe in taking reckless chances, but kids have to be allowed to explore and take chances that don’t carry a high risk of serious injury. The kid is probably in a lot more danger when he rides the bus to school in the morning than he was when he was feeding the raccoons.
It’s obvious the kid was hungry, but I don’t think it shoud be alowed to Raccoons feed the kid.
Everything to save a buck
I told you if you did not do your home work I would feed you to the Raccoons!!! Didn’t I, didn’t I.
Zoo or no, I love it! I interacted with a couple of fuzzy squirrels by the river in Austin last week, and then released a lost turtle back into the water after I found it heading towards a street. Does that mean I’m a danger to myself? Clearly the raccoon wasn’t foaming at the mouth. I applaud parents like these who encourage their kids to explore the world and reach out.
p.s. Concerned Citizen, you and others like you are the reason why the Nanny State spreading across North America is making life miserable for everyone. Shame on you. I feel bad for your children, you probably dress them in bubble wrap.
I was raised by domesticated raccoons, swaddled in their arms, fed from their mouths, that child is absolutely safe, you city dwelling denizens in your high-rise cages are the true animals to be afraid of.
Although I wouldn’t do this with my kid, I wouldn’t go as far as all of these crazies saying they’d call child services. Obviously, those parents want to give their child an unforgettable experience, the worst he’s going to get is a scratch mark or two in the worst case scenario.
People are too protective of their children in the present. If you don’t let them get bruised up a bit or take a risk every once and a while, they’ll be idiots when they can do it on their own.
To “Concerned Citizen”; the last thing you’re “concerned about is teh wellbeing of this child. Perhaps it was dumb of the parents but at some point we need to keep meddling idiots like you away from families and a kids right to be with it’s loving parents. Your attitude and the damage you’re prepared to inflict on a family over a minor eposode of poor judgement is absolutely disgusting.
I don’t think its such a big deal for his Dad to do that…but it’s amazing the mother would go along with it…she rules!
Ugh, this makes me a little ill, what are those parents thinking? I’ve worked with raccoons in wildlife rehabilitation for six years, and this is such a bad idea on so many levels that it makes me cringe. For those who think it’s a good idea because of the memories the kid will have, know that a raccoon is capable of dealing significantly more damage than “a few scratches,” they have serious claws and teeth and can be vicious and unpredictable, even when tame (perhaps even especially when tame). Even if the animals in question are in a zoo (which is not clear from the photo) and therefore vaccinated, the rabies vaccine is not proven in raccoons, so that animal should really be put to sleep for testing, since the child has now been exposed to its saliva. If this happened in a U.S. zoo and was noticed by zoo officials, the raccoon was almost certainly euthanized because of this person’s careless actions. Last but not least is the fact that raccoons are vectors for diseases other than rabies, most notable being Baylisascaris, a worm that is harmless in raccoons but will migrate in human hosts to the brain and/or eye. I know from experience that it is difficult to deworm even a juvenile raccoon, and again the efficacy of deworming drugs on raccoon roundworm has not been extensively studied, so even if these are captive animals undergoing completely proper medical treatment, chances are it has some of these worms about. Not to mention diseases the child may be passing on to the raccoon, or the fact that whatever the kid is feeding it is probably not good for it.
Even if these are captive, tame, 100% friendly animals, this is a BAD idea, for the animal and for the kid. Wild animals are wild, even in zoos, and should be admired from a distance. The parents are grossly irresponsible.
That’s pretty cool. I envy that kid his childhood.
My granddad was a veterinarian. My dad took me to his clinic once when I was around seven. They had a raccoon in a cage. I tried to pet it through the chain link fence. It bit my finger, drawing blood. It hurt a lot.
I didn’t tell anyone.
Nothing happened and I’m still not scared of racoons.
Idiots! CPS doesn’t get involved with families who use poor judgment like this guy did. If these animals are in a zoo, I’m sure that there are signs posted about being cautious.
This is a cute photo…. Shows some creativity. However, the cuteness belies the potential danger that this child was exposed to. Had that cool, slashed the eyes of the child, it would be too late to do anything other than feel remorse. But, we all do things that we look back on with regret. I just hope it never involves regret with how we treated our children…whether we live on the edge…or whether we live with reckless abandon.
Wow, Michael Jackson looks so different… but still dangling his kids!
Stupid Coon. You should have used the child as a ladder for escape.
GET-R-DONE!
Parent of the year?
Maybe it’s not his kid.
raccoons are scary…my brother got attacked by one when he was like 6 because he tried to walk towards it. Also, they have rabies
Listen people. I’m the kids father and Corky Jr. is taking food from the ‘coon. We’re poor and have to get food wherever we can find it. Bastards! Don’t judge us.
jajaja , amazing !!
Concerned Citizen: You are such an idiot. You really think the kid should be removed from his home and placed in foster care because his dad is hanging him down to feed a raccoon? Yeah, that’s a great answer. Ruin the kid’s life over something simple.
Of course there’s someone out there who believes that it’s their place in the world to tell other people how to raise their own children. Shut your pie hole “Concerned Citizen” - your concern is a larger social problem than these parents.
I’d sooner turn a kid over to wild raccoons than Child Protective Services.
My parents had a biologist friend when I was growing up who had a raccoon. Couple scratches, whatever. Seriously people worry so much about danger these days. This isn’t even dangerous. I would have hated to grow up with the hysterical overprotective parents posting on here.
I wish my dad would have done that for me when I was kid, hanging my older bro over a pit housing some species unfriendly towards humans … Today there’d be less agitation over who inherits what!
One picture and people are demanding he go into a foster home and that the parents are bad? Talk about being close minded and opinionated. Seeing as how the parents seem to be smiling and the kid is actually reaching out to the feed the raccoons, I don’t think this was a malicious act. Just a family goofing off at a petting/viewing zoo. For those of you still freaking out, I suggest getting those rubber safety door knobs for your children, padding them with foam everytime they play a sport, and rush them to the doctor for every cut and bruise. [cough, over-protective, cough]. Even still while not the brightest idea, everyone wasting so much time complaining about these parents, ask yourself: do you *know* where your kids are at this exact moment of reading this?
oh please! I’ve had raccoons visiting for decades. They never mess with my cats or me and have always been just fine. People need to reconnect with Nature and get over their phobias. Animals read your intentions and react accordingly. If you are there to feed or assist them they know that.
that is awesome. anyone who thinks this kid should be in foster care is insane.
A picture is worth a thousand words. It looks like the image has been cropped to make it look even scarier.
So funny that so many fell for the bait and the bringing up child services etc.
Evolution at it’s finest in my opinion.
@Tara, the parents are not grossly irresponsible, they’re just ignorant of the risk. People have raccoons living around their homes, gardens and garbage. We don’t euthanize every raccoon and get all prissy, they accept the risk of a close encounter like they accept many risks. A zoo may get it’s panties in a wad over raccoon contact but how much of that is pantomime and legal CYA rather than real risk? The biggest risk we face is being overrun by nannys who want to coddle us from cradle to grave. If I cited all the possible outcomes of various car accident scenarios and called you grossly irresponsible for putting your kid in one every day for something as non essential as soccer practice I wouldn’t be looking out for your kid I’d be being an insufferable chicken-little, and in fact a few years driving in a car is WAY more risky that giving a raccoon a Dorito and the risks are certainly more apparent to the “irresponsible” parents, but everyone does it, get the message? Sadly I doubt it.
The kid’ll be fine, and he’ll remember that day for a long time.
It’s important to do dangerous things when you’re a kid. I remember the day my parents took me to the beach, covered me in bird-seed and bread , before legging it….
I can remember the sound of flapping getting louder and louder…. That’s the first time I saw seagulls close up… and the first time I realised that no matter how nice people are to you, or say they care about you…. they are all dicks.
absoluty WONDERFUL
If the child fall, he can break his neck or skull…the risk is more than just some scratches, so this behaivour carry a high risk of serious injury
When michael jackson shown his baby through a 10th floor window, he was demonized. But there was no racoons under the window. This guy-dady is like him: idiot
`If the child fall, he can break his neck or skull…`
i really doubt it… from that height… on to snow…
plus i reckon the racoon would help break his fall.
replace the racoons with paedos, then you have a child welfare situation
@EARL
I liked your comment very much.
Pple just assumed the guy be child’s father. What you are telling might also be true
Respeck to the Daddy.
When I was a kid my step-dad used to dangle me over the egde of multi-story car parks. Not because he was cruel, or wanted to hurt me, or was in some way twisted, or because he wanted me to get taken into care, but because it was FUNNY! I was small, he was big, he wasn’t going to drop me and it made us both laugh. Can we please just stop wrapping kids up in cotton wool - those racoons won’t do it any serious harm and the fall certainly won’t.
Those raccoons were not originally part of the zoo, they entered the “children at play” cage and ate all the youngsters. Now they’re considered good luck and people have been feeding them their toddlers for the last 5 years or so.
I heard that kids can give racoons tummy ache…
Gotta love all the humanistic namby pambies waffling on about the poor kid. If I was that kid I’d love it!
Face it guys, just living is dangerous! You could be struck down any second, and many people do! So instead of worrying about the inevitable how about living life and enjoying it rather than staying couped up at home like you are right now?
my dad did that shit w/ me in my backyard… and the raccoon punched me in the junk
Those are the fattest coons I’ve ever seen.
I’m just waiting for that “railing” to pop off that disintegrating concrete “barrier”. That way, they all fall into the racoon pen. They go for the jugular.
“Concerned Citizen”, I can’t tell if you’re sarcastic or serious. I can only hope that you’re sarcastic.
Holy Crap, you are all a bunch of pansy wimps
its a raccoon! i grew up in South Africa running around with Snakes crossing crocodile rivers.
Makes a man of you.
Try do something daring, if you get scratched big deal, scars are cool
#25 Laurie;
You do realize you’re an idiot, don’t you?
I am amazed at the number of folks that want to lock these parents up and remove this child from his/her home. For God sakes - at least the child has 2 parents that transport him/her on outings. As for this incident - I will be willing to bet that the child will remember this day until he/she draws their last breath. Kids do not break so easily.
Parent Of The Year? I don’t think so…
The kid’s fine — I’m worried about obese raccoons being fed junk!
Still better than K-Fed.
Wow, what a bunch of bitches. Its a fucking raccoon get over it. They are like big kitties. And come on its in a fucking zoo they aren’t going to have rabies in a zoo. This is how parents should be raising their kids. These are the kids that turn out to be real humans with actual experiences, not like the bunch of bitches that want to government to come in a ruin every one’s life because the kid might possibly maybe get hurt doing some thing fun. Maybe your parents should have taken you out to see the real world, maybe then you wouldn’t be such pussies.
Not all of you, but some of you, need to live a little. Put this kid in foster care?! I more more abused by the threats of our first grade basketball coach. What’s the worst that could happen? The raccoon could scratch the shit out of the kid, but more likely than not, the father would be able to get the child away from the animal before any permanent damage occurred (That’s worst case scenario!). If this child was thrown into foster care, s/he would most likely be miserable, seeing how these parents actually take interest in their child. Grow some balls and stop treating children like your good china. They will scar, they will heal. Again, the best lessons in life are learned from mistakes.
i can imagine that most of the wonderful peeps who left a comment has even seen a raccoon, not on the net or t.v! i am talking about: hey theres a flood and a bunch of babies and mama are chillin under our car(long time ago) maybe we should try and help the damn thing. oh no! not the nasty wild vicious beast! your the ones who never take your kids to the park(you know the real big parks to camp and fish at) because yer worried about violence and drugs and thugs, hey wise up learn ta shoot and hunt teach yo kids ta fish and maybe when the world’s shit hits the fan you will survive a couple weeks. it’s okay if you disagree, more piece of mind for me when the shit does hit the proverbial fan. just gotta be patient fer all yer diein quivers ta end.
How many raccoon killings have you heard of? First off, raccoons in the wild would rather run than attack something twice their size. Second raccoons that are familiar with people will eat out of your hands.
These raccoons just standing around with tons of people are not wild raccoons. The kid is in more danger of being dropped and injured than being injured by the raccoons. Unless cornered a raccoon will run away before fighting if it is afraid.
I am saying these things from experience, I hate raccoons and at the first chance I bean the little thieves in the face with the closest thing I can grab (generally because Im camping its a beer bottle but sometimes an empty lantern fuel container). Ive seen em move a cooler out from under a park bench so they can take off the lid, they aren’t stupid. They are just hungry.
“hey look that giant thing is putting its young near me,it looks like he is trying to feed me something, forget that I think Ill scratch its eyes out and run for my life”
Probably not whats going through the coons thieving mind. Seriously some of these people are the ones that walk through the mall with their kids on a leash. My dad had a leash, but he didn’t put it around my arm or waist no sir. He wore it around his pants and called it a belt, when I did something wrong he applied the leash to my posterior which generally garnered my immediate compliance.
One more thing, although there is a chance for transfer of a disease it doesn’t mean you should be afraid of the raccoon or keep your children from it. Hospitals can do wonders in the off chance the raccoon did do something to the kid. As has already been said, the car ride had a greater chance of injuring the kid than the raccoons. Why test your luck then? What is life without risk, a procession of controlled events which leads to your death? which is amazingly similar to the outcome of a life filled with risk although caution probably will make it a little longer.
Anyone watch or read papillion? Remember the dream he had while in solitary? “you are guilty of a much worse crime… A wasted life”
Actually CG, we racoon hunt with some frequency and you’re right - I don’t take my kids to parks (even the “real big ones”) because we own 1200 acres and we’re surrounded by about 40,000 acres of woods. I’ve seen a wild racoon a time or two. And no, not just “on the net or t.v.”)
I didn’t recommend foster care, but I’m still going with my original assessment.
I used to take my daughter to gatorland ,she loved to hold the gators but, i dont think i would tried that there. I have always tried to instill the the appreciation and wonderment of nature and animals in her, even the bad. So i would be called a bad father for letting her roam the woods in florida to search for lizards???? I learned how to swim at age 5 when my dad threw me in a pool and said swim to him, well here i am at age 47 so i guess i learned [ by the best i might add ] I suggest that “CONCERNED CITIZEN’ contacts Bindi in australia and demonizes what her father put her through. I think she will shut her pie hole then, OH, by the way, my daughter now attends the police academy and forensics college, So was i that neglectfull in my parenting????? RIGHT ON cg!!!!!!!!!!!
O meeee goddddd!
Kids should be medicated and locked up in a secure room 24h/24h!!!
No windows, too dangerous!
No objects, he could hurt himself!
That’s the only way to protect them!!!
The evil racoons are the most deadly animals on earth!!!
I am sure the whole family enjoyed their visit and the kid will have great memories!
PS: Never ever use a fork or a knife! You could by accident stab yourself in both eyes!
The kid’s fine; he doesn’t need to go with a foster family.
Whoever said the kid should be taken away and placed in foster care is a fucking idiot.
You have to watch these PETA freaks, feeding their kids to the animals now?
Still, it’s better than stripping off all the time, especially in the snow.
Brilliant parents. Seriously. I would have loved to do that as a kid. My dad let me stand on his shoulders when I was about 5 so I could pet a camel over the fence at the zoo. It was cool. I hugged it, and got bitten of course. It’s the only thing I remember about that zoo trip. It was seriously the most fun ever. I hugged a camel. It bit me. I yelled. Then I got my dad to lift me up again so I could feed it a peanut butter sandwich.
Kids get hurt. They’re supposed to. It’s part of being a child. It teaches you about taking risks, dealing with pain, and that pain is survivable.
Adults need to make judgements too. It isn’t a lion, or an alligator, or a bear. It’s a little fuzzy racoon. The worst that will happen is that the kid gets a bite on the hand and a series of rabies injections.
Harry - a PETA “freak” wouldn’t be wearing a leather jacket. =)
And I don’t think this kid was in any real danger…especially since this picture has been photoshopped!
Hah, j/k.. I’m pretty sure it’s real. And I’m pretty sure a racoon wouldn’t attack a kid in this kind of situation. If the racoon was cornered and felt threatened, it’d be a different story.
The only mistake these parents made was doing this in front of a camera.
That’s a wonderful experience for the child.
Not the best decision by the grown up I’d agree. On a modern standpoint, and how the world is now. Molly-coddling is a worse decision.
I wish my daddy had done something like that for me….
People are entitled to their opinion….
Whether the rest of us agree or not. It’s a mad world for sure.
I’m fortunate not to be affiliated with any of the above or below HATERS.
Think of it that way folks who agree.
Actually, raccoons make very good pets. We had one when I was a kid, and my 2 little sisters and little brother loved it. I would take him outside, and he would climb a tree. If we all went inside. about 5 minutes later he would be at the door wanting in. It was fantastic having a raccoon for a pet.