3 ms·

Agreed. Also, the author's need to call the locals xenophobic for not wanting poisonous snakes imported seemed a bit off

curun1r 10y ago
I don't know if it's xenophobic, but I do think it's ignorantly fearful. I've had a near-lifelong fear of snakes that started when I was taken to see the movie "The Black Stallion" when I was very young. While it's a touching movie about a boy who develops a special bond with horse, there's a scene where he has an encounter with a very scary cobra that traumatized me. Recently, I resolved to confront my fears. I went on vacation to Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia, where snakes much more dangerous than rattlesnakes are common. The first time a snake crossed my path there, I was so startled that I couldn't even identify what kind it was, only that it was probably arboreal since it had a thin body and was able to raise itself off the ground a pretty considerable height. But it scurried off before I could get more than a couple seconds to observe it. Over the course of the months that I spent in Southeast Asia, I saw many more snakes and I didn't realize the effect (or lack thereof) they were having on me. That was until, near the end of my trip, I had a cobra pass about 6 feet in front of me. I should have been terrified...here was the exact snake that featured in so many of my childhood nightmares and it was close enough that it could decide to attack me. But instead of being terrified, I calmly watched as it slithered off into a bush. In fact the one common theme of the roughly dozen encounters I had with snakes there is that they just wanted to get away from me. And while my fear of them diminished, they consistently seemed to be afraid of me. I understand the fear of snakes very well. They're so different from us and they've evolved a defense/hunting mechanism that's basically targeted at us (well, most mammals). But I'm also starting to realize how irrational that fear is. Just because these snakes are poisonous doesn't mean that they're likely to poison anyone. I know the definition of xenophobia involves people from other countries, but the root of it is really fear of what's different from ourselves or fear of an "other." So, to the extent that xenophobia is that fear of what's different, maybe it is xenophobic to be that irrationally afraid of snakes.

curun1r 10y ago

I don't know if it's xenophobic, but I do think it's ignorantly fearful. I've had a near-lifelong fear of snakes that started when I was taken to see the movie "The Black Stallion" when I was very young. While it's a touching movie about a boy who develops a special bond with horse, there's a scene where he has an encounter with a very scary cobra that traumatized me. Recently, I resolved to confront my fears. I went on vacation to Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia, where snakes much more dangerous than rattlesnakes are common. The first time a snake crossed my path there, I was so startled that I couldn't even identify what kind it was, only that it was probably arboreal since it had a thin body and was able to raise itself off the ground a pretty considerable height. But it scurried off before I could get more than a couple seconds to observe it. Over the course of the months that I spent in Southeast Asia, I saw many more snakes and I didn't realize the effect (or lack thereof) they were having on me. That was until, near the end of my trip, I had a cobra pass about 6 feet in front of me. I should have been terrified...here was the exact snake that featured in so many of my childhood nightmares and it was close enough that it could decide to attack me. But instead of being terrified, I calmly watched as it slithered off into a bush. In fact the one common theme of the roughly dozen encounters I had with snakes there is that they just wanted to get away from me. And while my fear of them diminished, they consistently seemed to be afraid of me. I understand the fear of snakes very well. They're so different from us and they've evolved a defense/hunting mechanism that's basically targeted at us (well, most mammals). But I'm also starting to realize how irrational that fear is. Just because these snakes are poisonous doesn't mean that they're likely to poison anyone. I know the definition of xenophobia involves people from other countries, but the root of it is really fear of what's different from ourselves or fear of an "other." So, to the extent that xenophobia is that fear of what's different, maybe it is xenophobic to be that irrationally afraid of snakes.