One shouldn't have to belong PETA to realize that ethical principles shouldn't be completely suspended when animals are involved, but Virginia's Department of Game and Inland Fisheries and its Health Department might need a complimentary membership.

Last month, an appallingly irresponsible parent took his four year old with him as he climbed a fence to enter a restricted area in Virginia's Maymont Nature Center. A black bear who lived in the restricted area bit the hand of the intruding child. As there were two bears in the section of the park and authorities couldn't determine which of the two did the biting, both bears were killed.

That's right: a dim-wit brought his toddler over a fence into an area forbidden to visitors in order to prevent contact with bears, and when a bear did what bears do, not only the bear, but the bear's companion (talk about guilt by association!), got the ultimate penalty. There was no reason to believe that the bear was excessively dangerous or behaving unreasonable according to well-established bear ethics. In fact, the bear showed admirable restraint by only biting the child on the hand, though it would have been more appropriate to bite the father so that he was reminded of his stupidity every time he tried to sit down for a month or so. When a public outcry arose over the vindictive double bear slaying, Virginia health officials said that they had to kill the bears to test them for rabies, which requires extraction of brain tissue. Was there any reason to believe the bears had rabies? "Well, er, no," the officials responded. But the family was concerned, and the Department didn't want to take any chances. Which means, in bureaucracy-speak, that some lawyer recommended that the bears be killed just in case the family was tempted to sue.

Here's the final ethics score in this wrongful acts competition: Humans 7 Bears 0.

But it's the bears who are dead. Let's recap the scoring:

1. The fence was only four feet high, which was not enough to protect the bears from marauding idiots. Score: Humans 1, Bears O.

2. The father willfully invaded bear territory by breaching a barrier and jeopardized his small son's life. Score: Humans 3, Bears O.

3. Authorities decided to kill the bear rather than tell the father that it was his fault, not the bear's, and to go get his son precautionary rabies shots (They are not anywhere near the painful ordeal of forty years ago). Score: Humans 4, Bears 0.

4. They then compounded the injustice by killing two bears for nothing, rather than just one. This won them a both a Wrongful Act point and a bonus point for special callousness. Score: Humans 6, Bears 0.

5. To complete the rout of the bears, the Virginia authorities released an obviously disingenuous explanation for the killing, suggesting that a rabies test was necessary even when nothing in the conduct of the bears suggested rabies. As one critic, Richmond Time-Dispatch columnist Ray McAllister, asked, "Then why not kill every bear - and every other animal in captivity, too?" Don't give these people any ideas, Ray.

Final Score: Humans 7, Bears 0.

The bears didn't have rabies, by the way.