Sticks and Stones

An 8 year old boy was attacked by a bear in a Tennessee National Park. Dad and older brother fight the bear with stuff to stop the attack, which worked. . . .eventually.

John Pala, a 43-year-old health insurance salesman with no backwoods experience, twice pulled the bear off his son before he and Evan's 10-year-old brother, Alex, pummeled it with rocks and sticks, then ran for safety.

It is just absurd that this man was allowed no other option of protection from hungry critters on land that is supposed to be public. National parks are not bastions of safety; you go there to see wild animals. Sometimes wild people are there too which are just as dangerous. I'm not saying to hand out guns to park visitors, but the small amount of individuals who would carry arms for their safety should not be denied those tools that make them safe. And just in case you're wondering what happens to a fluffy bear that attacks a person:

Park officials track down bear suspected in attack and shoot it to death.

That's right. Armed men found the bear and killed it. If the park was so damn safe then why didn't the two Rangers go in with pepper spray and a net? Maybe because animals are dangerous, and as mentally superior beings we should have more sense then to go about sightseeing in the woods with nothing more than rocks and sticks to protect ourselves. Unarmed, we might as well fling poo at the beasts. From the story highlights:

Bear, for no apparent reason, pounces on boy playing in creek, park official says

Does a bear need a reason? - Bear pounces on boy playing in creek. It is known that the bear had a rough childhood and a nasty vicodin habit, park official says. Stupid, no? The reason the bear attacked is because it's a freakin bear! A person wonders into its habitat and it did what its primitive little mind tells it to. Because it's a bear.

Park Rangers need to stop meddling with our rights, and let the public protect themselves with modern defensive tools, because anything else is just primitive.