Predator or Prey who do you root for?

In My Humble Opinion
1

When watching a nature documentary with my sweetie, when the cheetah caught up with the Gazelle that she was feeling sorry for the poor animal while I was feeling happy for the cheetah for achieving his goal. In a discussion that followed she also revealed that she roots for the Roadrunner over W.E. coyote, and tweety bird over Sylvester. Again I root for the other side but much like a die hard cubs fan, fully with the realization that it will be in vain.

Part of the reason I took the predators side is that I grew up with cats and so always took their side, but I’m wondering if there might be a gender component as well. Hence the poll.

So Dopers, which side do you take in the whole “Nature’s Way” rumble?

2

If I’m feeling hungry and desperate, I side with the cheetah.

Unless the prey is a cute little baby animal and you can hear them crying out for help.

3

Yeah. I don’t have a go-to side that I root for. Now I’m wondering if it depends on whether I feel hungry or not.

4

I used to root for the underdog, but I’ve just seen too many to care either way.

5

I root for the prey but mainly because they rarely show it getting away in nature programs. If they showed nature how it actually is, namely that most attempts result in the prey getting away (for that attempt, at least,) then I would root for the predator.

6

I’m wishy-washy and just root for the supposed “protagonist”. Usually nature shows present it from one point of view or the other – it’s either a segment about cheetahs or it’s a segment about gazelles and so I wind up rooting for whoever’s show it is.

Usually it’s cheetahs because gazelles don’t have much personality beyond being Africa’s Deli Counter.

7

I root for the predator. It’s the circle of life, baby. Especially if the predator is some kind of cat.

The only time I root for the prey is if it’s a larger predator against a small one (like a big dog chasing a puppy or kitten). Then I’m all about the prey. “Run, kitty! Climb the tree!”

Oh, and I’m female, for your gender demographic thingy.

8

Yup. If it’s about a cheetah momma trying to feed her kids I root for the cheetah. If it’s about the gazelle momma trying to outrun some asshole cheetah I root for for the gazelle.

9

Depends on my mood.

10

I voted for the last option, since it was the only one that doesn’t take sides, but it doesn’t really reflect my opinion, which is that I root for neither since they’re both doing what they’re “supposed” to do.
Somebody mentioned the prey being the underdog, but it’s not really.

11

If the prey’s Ahnold, I’ll take him. Otherwise, I’ll go with the aliens.

12

This. It’s all about who is being anthropomorphized.

13

Around here, Road Runners are famous for eating birds, small mammals and lizards. They will eat anything, but prefer the role of predator. They become unafraid of humans, and learn to come and peck (knock) on the backdoor for a handout of dogwood. They will follow families of quail to pick off the last chick, so most of our clutches of 10 - 12 chicks wind up with 1 - 5 chicks fledging.

Not the sweet character of the cartoon. I still pull for the Roadrunner in the cartoon though.

So the Roadrunner presents an interesting example of how we view the real thing vs the cartoon version. I think of it as the Bambi Effect, where folks don’t want deer hunting…but there has to be a predator, or deer populations get into trouble.

Much nicer to watch cartoons. Sorry if I’ve distracted from the actual OP.

14

I remember back in the day, when we were kids, getting into an argument with my sister about who the “good” guy was on Tom and Jerry. I thought Tom was the good guy. She thought Jerry was the good guy.

Now I can see that neither was all good or all bad.

Still, I feel bad for rooting for Tom. It’s not like he needed to eat Jerry. I guess I could relate to his constant frustration.

15

I voted for option 5, but now that I think about it, if the winners were allowed to kill & eat the losers, I might watch the Superbowl more often. I know that Survivor gets really interesting once people start looking at each other like they’re seeing huge racks of ribs & steaks sitting in the rowboat.

In reality, I root for the fittest. If the gazelle jukes just right and makes the cheetah faceplant into a tree at 50 mph, go gazelle! If the gazelle can’t outmaneuver the cheetah, I’m on the cheetah’s side.

16

I remember one time at college, a crowd had gathered outside one of the buildings, watching a hawk chase a squirrel through a tree. I think I was the only one there rooting for the hawk. But really, the hawk had more at stake than the squirrel did: If the hawk wins, we lose about one ten thousandth of the local squirrel population, but if the squirrel wins for too many days in a row, then we lose 50% of the local hawk population.

On the other hand, though, I’ll root for Tweety and Jerry, because Tom and Sylvester are both housecats; they’ll eat well regardless of whether they catch the little guys or not.

17

Usually, prey exists in huge numbers. Deer, rabbits, mice, gazelle, zebra. Herds and herds of them. No one’s going to miss a few here or there.

Go predator!

18

The predator

I wanna see some gore

19

I’m male. Voted for option #5.

I think, in terms of my strictly emotional reactions, that I have a sort of “Great Chain of Being” thing going on. I get sort of creeped out by a “lower” animal preying on a “higher” one. So, a cheetah can eat a gazelle–a cheetah is a fellow mammal, so it’s “allowed” to eat other mammals. (Heck, I eat other mammals.) For, say, a leopard eating a chimpanzee, I’d probably root for the chimp. For a jaguar vs. a monkey…I like cats, so I give all of them points, so despite the fellow primate status of the monkey, I might still root for the big kitty-cat.

Birds–like say an owl–eating rodents…still OK. Birds are technically dinosaurs, I guess, but they’re warm-blooded and provide a high level of parental care to their young; and on the other side of it, it’s just a rodent.

And of course birds and mammals can catch and eat all the lizards or bugs they want.

But something like a crocodile vs. a gazelle? Crocodiles are scaly and cold-blooded and sort of monstrously prehistoric. I don’t like to think of things like that preying on fellow mammals. And, while I’m not super-ophidiophobic, I definitely am not one of those people who could feed live mice to a snake, nor do I have any desire to keep snakes as pets. (It’s OK when cold-blooded scaly reptiles eat other cold-blooded scaly reptiles, though.) A shark eating some kind of fish? That’s OK. A dead-eyed, horrible-toothed, hell-creature-that’s-been-around-since-before-the-dinosaurs eating, say, a seal, is unacceptable.

Spiders eating insects is perfectly OK. (I was a big Charlotte’s Web fan as a boy.) But those spiders that catch birds?!? That’s just wrong, man! Or even a spider catching a frog or a lizard. Invertebrates are not permitted to eat vertebrates. And those giant cave centipedes that take BATS are clearly an affront to all that is right and proper.

All of this is mostly tongue-in-cheek, and intellectually I know perfectly good and well none of it really makes any sense. But emotionally…centipedes eating BATS?!? Brrr!

20

This. I’ll go for the scrawny lion who has just been kicked out of the pride and hasn’t eaten for days. But other times I’ll go for the cute leaping animal.