"Once there was a madman in Australia who was a black belt in karate. He wanted to prove himself against the lions. He lost. Badly. The keepers found only half his body in the morning."
- Yann Martel, The Life of Pi
It can be dangerous to believe your own press. In the 1980's, star boxer Mike Tyson (he of ear-biting fame) believed himself to be unstoppable and unbeatable. As such, he once offered a zookeeper $10,000 to let him into a gorilla exhibit to box a gorilla. The offer was declined (which now that I think about it, is actually pretty impressive considering zookeeper salaries. 10K is a lot of money to a keeper now, let alone in the 80's).
How would Mr. Tyson have fared against the gorilla? Assuming that the animal actually wanted to fight and didn't ignore or evade him, I suspect the answer is "poorly." Mike Tyson would have left that enclosure in several black trash bags.
Which doesn't mean that I haven't heard a fair share of people (many of whom probably have a lot less reason to be cocky about their fighting abilities than Mike Tyson. They generally feel safe to talk smack about the animals because they know that their bluff will never be called (though I could use $10,000). There's times I've been tempted to pretend to go along with it - just to see how close we can get to the door of the bear/ape/big cat exhibit before they make their excuses.
Fun tip, from someone who's had to wrangle a wide variety of animals, not always successfully, and sometimes against animals that you wouldn't think of as scary. If you're asking a keeper if you could win in a fight with ____ animal, the answer is usually, "no."
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