GREER PROVOKES A REPTILLIAN BITE

Sydney, Sept 8 NZPA - In his appraisal of academic Germaine Greer's attack on the late Crocodile Hunter, Steve Irwin, author John Birmingham didn't hold back.

"For the childless former Celebrity Big Brother contestant, the distress of Irwin's family was nothing when measured against the rightful vengeance of the animal world," wrote Birmingham in a column in The Australian newspaper.

"Less a harridan than a poorly sketched caricature of a harridan, she would be easy to dismiss as some unwashed and wretched bag lady who had somehow stumbled on to the opinion pages of The Guardian, were it not for the fact this feral hag does actually speak for a minority."

Crikey! It's strong stuff, but just a snapshot of the acrimony stirred by Greer in her column in the British newspaper, just a day after Irwin died from a stingray's barb close to his heart.

In her column, she described Irwin as a self-deluded animal tormentor who was an embarrassment to Australia.

"The animal world has finally taken its revenge on Irwin, but probably not before a whole generation of kids in shorts seven sizes too small has learned to shout in the ears of animals with hearing 10 times more acute than theirs, determined to become millionaire animal-loving zoo-owners in their turn," she said.

That triggered outrage in Australia from Prime Minister John Howard down as, Irwin was a much-loved, revered figure, particularly with children.

Queensland Premier Peter Beattie said he wished he could triple the tax on Greer's Queensland rainforest property in retaliation for her comments about Irwin.

"If I could do it I would double it or triple the taxation on it," he said in a sure vote-winner ahead of this weekend's state election.

Birmingham said Irwin's death may become Australia's "Kennedy moment" in that people would remember for decades what they were doing when news broke of his death, in the same way people remember what they were doing when President John Kennedy was assassinated and Princess Diana was killed.

He found it sad that Greer spoke for a minority of Australians in her assault on Irwin's wildlife philosophies.

"In one poisonous discharge of bile, Greer has condensed the ill feelings of a whole class of Australian sophisticates who found Irwin's cartoon imagery uncomfortable and even humiliating, given his global exposure."

Birmingham said that Irwin knew he was doing more for the planet than any number of self-styled green activists or sympathisers.

"Yes he was a showman but when he had your attention by slamming a headlock on some recalcitrant man-eater, he wouldn't let go until you understood just how close to annihilation was so much of the world's wildlife."

In response, Dr Clive Hamilton, executive director of the Australian Institute, said Irwin's death provided a trigger for a gratuitous outpouring of hatred directed at the "elites" who found his antics embarrassing, especially when they were represented as authentically Australian.

"In the present political climate every event is turned by right-wing cultural warriors into an excuse to attack the imagined enemies of John Howard," he said in the Sydney Morning Herald.

Hamilton said it was hard to see how Irwin's animal television shows, in which he provoked the most dangerous animals into extreme behaviour, could cultivate a conservation ethic.

He said there was a difference between an old-fashioned zoo, like the one Irwin owned in Queensland, "where the animals are poked, prodded and laughed at, and a wildlife reserve in which animals blend with their natural environment and humans are kept at a distance.

The attacks on Irwin's "real and imagined critics" were rooted in guilt because people were excited by Irwin's close calls with crocodiles and now that he had met a grisly end, they felt responsible, Hamilton said.

"In this turmoil and grief, what a relief it was to find a real target for bitterness in the form of Germaine Greer, whose only mistake was poor timing."

Poor timing? Atrocious would be more accurate.

There is a valid argument over Irwin's approach to conservation and its effect on animals, but there is a time and place for everything.

Greer's comments were designed to ram home her opinion on the issue at the time of maximum impact -- which happened to be when Irwin's wife Terri and children Bindi and Bob were grieving, trying to come to terms with his death, and a nation too was in grief.

She knew once again she would provoke outrage -- it's become a speciality of hers over the years -- but she is perhaps misguided as to the intense feelings she has generated this time.

Birmingham's "childless" sledge was irrelevant and unnecessary, but Greer was fair game for the rest of it.