'Eaten Alive' host Paul Rosolie responds to backlash
Paul Rosolie with snake in Discovery Channel's "Eaten Alive." Credit: Discovery Channel / Mohsin Kazmi
Author and eco-tourism entrepreneur Paul Rosolie responded to criticism about Sunday's "Eaten Alive" special on Discovery in which he cut short a purported attempt to be swallowed by a giant anaconda.
"I mean, the whole reason we did this show is because I've worked in the Amazon, I've seen it being destroyed, and everybody knows the whole rain-forest-is-being-destroyed thing, but it's not stopping it from happening," Rosolie said on "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" Monday night.
Contending he did the stunt to raise awareness of deforestation and other ecological issues in the world's largest rain forest, he said, "We got millions of people talking about this stuff, going, 'Why on earth would this idiot wanna do this?' And this is the reason, to try and keep the place where these things live intact."
He maintained he was unfazed by severe criticism leveled by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and by social-media comments. "Naw, not really," he said in response to Kimmel asking if the backlash troubled him, "because I think they missed the point of the whole show, then."
