I can't pretend to a lot of wisdom on the topic of carrying injured
birds to rehab centers. I suspect that many of the birds transported
thither die underway. But I can understand irony, and I think the
posting by Greg Toffic was misunderstood. Irony is the art of saying or
writing the opposite of what you mean. When Antony gives the "Friends,
Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears" speech and says "Brutus is an
honorable man" he doesn't mean that. He means Brutus is a slimy
conspirator and murderer and Antony's listeners should drop by Brutus'
place and string him up. (Of course, we learn from reading the play that
Brutus was an honorable man, indeed -- but that's Shakespeare's irony.)
The key to understanding written irony is to look for rhetoric that's
overdone. And Greg's posting, which is full of overdone rhetoric, was
supposed to be a humorous commentary on the current debate about the
injured gull, and Greg might have really meant that people were getting
too riled up about people not dropping everything to help an injured
bird. Much ado about not very much, perhaps. It helps not to take
things too seriously.

But, to come back to the debate: if one finds an injured bird at, say
Ocean Shores or Leadbetter Point, is one ethically required to put away
the binocs, pick up the injured animal, and transport it to the nearest
bird hospital? (By the way, where is the nearest bird hospital to Ocean
Shores or Leadbetter Point?) What is the likelihood that the bird will
survive the trip? The Good Samaritan paid the innkeeper for the
injured man's stay to recover from his injuries. Who pays for the
injured bird? Etc., etc.

Paul Webster
PWebst25 at concentric.net