Hippo VS Human: The Never-Ending Debate

Hippo VS Human: The Never-Ending By Michael Levy Debate

Let me set the stage: you are in a grass enclosure about the size of the East Gym parking lot. On one side of the enclosure lies a male hippopotamus. On the other side, a group of average Americans await him and their only way to escape is by killing the beast. The real question is the true size of the group necessary to kill the hippo; how many people would you need? To begin this debate you need to know how deadly this African herbivore is, and how does the average American match up to it?

An average American male stands no chance against a hippo. However, if we are accounting for the American population as a whole, then we must look at the 50% female population. Females on average weigh 20lbs less than males, 3 inches shorter, and are, on average, slower. However, these differences are negligible when comparing them to a hippo’s numbers. Nevertheless, after arguing with people about this topic for weeks, I issued a survey to 40 people asking them the same question I had previously asked at the beginning of this article, and these were the results:

Figure 1. Hippo Survey results. 60% of respondents believe it would take less than 75 people to kill a hippo, meanwhile 40% of respondents believed it would take over 75 people.

These results perfectly demonstrate how much we as humans underestimate the magnitude and power of a hippo. There is no way 30 average humans would be able to take on a hippo, but over 32.5% of participants chose the range of 11-30 hippos. I pose the question: How would you be able to kill a hippo with your bare hands? The hippopotamus is quite literally bigger than a small car, is almost twice as fast as a human, has 2-inch thick skin, and can dismember limbs like a hot knife going through butter. So naturally, after telling participants this information, I asked the participants about ways they would kill a hippo. I most often heard: “Poke its eyes out,” “push it over,” or “punch it in the head while it is eating someone.” It seems almost impossible for an average human to be able to reach over the snout of a hippo and gouge its eyes out, assuming the hippo is moving around at speeds of 20mph. My response to “pushing the hippo over” is a short one: there is no way average people can push over 3000 lbs of hippopotamus, even if they coordinate together. Punching the hippo is even more of a lazy answer; the hippo will trample you before it even feels a thing from those measly human punches. Not only that, hippos don’t want to eat people, they just want to kill them. Remember that they are herbivores, so a hippo could simply kill someone via trampling. Realistically, then, how do you kill the hippo? I believe killing a hippo should be looked at as how the Russians beat the Nazis at Stalingrad: we send so many humans against the hippo that exhaustion kicks in. There is nothing a human can do to kill a hippo other than tiring it out. Eventually, dehydration and exhaustion will kick in, therefore ending the beast’s rampage.

After hearing my argument over why humans completely underestimate the pure dominance of a hippo, how many humans do I think could defeat the hippo? My answer would be in the 400-700 people range. I think if everyone runs from the hellbent animal, the hippo would only be able to get about 300 people max. Remember that a hippo can just trample humans to kill them, so if the hippo is decently smart then it won’t waste time biting people. It simply needs to run them over. In my estimation, after about 200-300 people fall, the hippo will be unable to continue. It will pass out, its energy stores will be depleted, and it will be vulnerable. If it is not dead already, the remaining humans have some options to defeat it. Firstly, the eye-poking method can be used. If you completely blind the hippo, then obviously it will be much less dangerous to you. Secondly, rip out the hippo’s teeth. If you can get a hippo fang out via kicking or stomping, then you may be able to cut the hippo on its belly where the skin is thinner and more vulnerable. If you can’t poke its eyes or dislodge a tooth, then it’s time to play round two against the good ole hippopotamus. Round two should be less deadly; without water, the hippo will be nowhere near as deadly as it was. After round two, I believe that the hippo will be completely shot, leading to a swift ending. Surely by this time, exhaustion will kick in and mankind will reign victorious.

Authors Note: Do not harm hippopotami in any way. They are beautiful species that are poached year-round. #SaveTheHippos

Figure 2. Hippo vs Human. The discrepancy between an average male hippo and an average male human is substantial. In fact, in all categories a hippo dominates a human male in strength and speed.