“Snakes are not bloodthirsty monsters. They are often wrongly portrayed by the media to cause panic and paranoia,” Ed Taoka’s YouTube bio explains.
“These videos highlight the extremely placid nature of what actually happens looking after well-kept reptiles in a domestic setting. Also, how I have integrated and introduced my daughter to these animals,” Ed says of a series of videos showing his five-year-old daughter interact with the families two pet reticulated pythons, obviously named Sonny and Cher.
Ed’s five-year-old daughter is very comfortable around Sony and Cher.
This week, a video of Ed’s daughter gently patting one (the caption indicates it’s Cher) of the family pets was shared online and it immediately went viral.
People around the world were left awestruck not only by the little girl’s courage around the intimidatingly massive reptile, but at the fact her father is the one encouraging and filming the interaction.
“Aw! Friends for a lifetime,” Ed has captioned the photo.
“This blew my mind,” he says.
“My daughter gets to experience something really only experienced by a small few. A very rare event.”
Watch the full video at the top of this post…
These two really do seem to be friends for a lifetime.
“Interaction with any animal and child must always be supervised,” Ed says in another post.
Regardless of Ed’s intentions, people are not happy he’s letting his young daughter play with a snake.
“Hes sizing her up to swallow a snake is always a snake,” one person commented.
“Irresponsible parenting, putting a child’s life in danger,” said another.
Story continues after video…
Despite the negative comments, Ed, who seems to be an experienced snake handler, continues to advocate for his “very gentle and very calm” pythons.
In a statement on his YouTube page Ed compares the animal bites his daughter has received between 2012 and 2018.
Family cat (deceased) 4673 bites
Tortoise 1 bites
Reticulated Pythons x2 0 bites
