Society Help

 Recently a fin whale got itself stranded in Cork, Ireland. Having swum into such shallow water that it could not swim back out, the misfortunate whale died. And the news media aired yet another beached whale report. Why does a whale beaching make the six o’clock news? This isn’t a new phenomenon. According to Aristotle, who lived in the fourth century BC, whales have been stranding themselves for a very long time. What makes a whale beaching newsworthy is not the rarity of it, but rather its bizarre inexplicability. Why and how do whales manage to get themselves into such a predicament? Since whales are generally deemed to be quite intelligent mammals, it wouldn’t seem likely that they would just bumble onto the beach. Scientists have proposed various theories as to why whales occasionally do themselves in in this way. Some suggested suicide. Perhaps a whale just gets tired of living and chooses to end it all. This seems rather unlikely, especially in light of the fact that often it is not one distraught individual but the whole pod of whales that runs aground. For example, last year some 85  whales beached themselves en masse not far from Toyko, Japan. While whales are intelligent, it seems improbable that they are ‘smart’ enough to get involved in mass suicide cults like Heaven’s Gate. Another theory, based on postmortem studies showing some beached whales to have been mortally ill, suggests that they knew they were sick and were choosing to be out of their misery. If a couple of other whales joined the sick one in running aground, perhaps we could think of it as assisted suicide. Stranded people often can’t get themselves out of the dangerous shallows any more that stranded whales can. Are you feeling stranded, stuck in a shallow life that you want to get out of but don’t know how? Remember you don’t always have to fight your battles alone. Sometimes you can get the impression that ‘self-help’ should be within your grasp (it’s your mess so you should sort it). This is fine in theory but it doesn’t always work out that way, does it? Sometimes you need to reach out for help. That’s OK. Ring a friend or a help-line; don’t be afraid to ask for help. Just as whales can’t very well ask for help, so is often the case with stranded people. If you know someone who is stranded, step up and offer to help them get their fins back into the water where they can safely swim on their own again.