Chicagoans Are Petitioning to Rename a Park after Cincinnati Gorilla Harambe. It's Time We Let Harambe Rest.

WGN "CHICAGO —  A park in Chicago’s Humboldt Park neighborhood may be renamed to honor a fallen Cincinnati Zoo gorilla if petitioners get their way. The Change.org petition, already signed by nearly 700 people, is asking Alderman Roberto Maldonado to legally change the name of the park to “Harambe Park.” The petition seeks to rename the park, not the neighborhood. “Harambe” is the gorilla at the Cincinnati Zoo that had to be killed when a little boy fell into his enclosure. The petitioners say, Harambe’s death was unwarranted, and naming a park for him would give him some small measure of justice."

Ever since Pete Rose has been wrongfully kept out of the Baseball Hall of Fame, it is clear that the higher powers that be have it out for Cincinnati. That's why Marvin Lewis can't win a playoff but also can't lose his job. The Marvin Lewis Catch 22. Cincinnati is the city that America weeps for. They are our mistreated, helpless little brother, but we can't get home to take them out for ice cream and cheer them up because we're too busy crushing our middle-management job at a logistics firm out in some awesome suburb. 

However, just because it seems that God has it out for Cincinnati doesn't mean He does. In fact, God sees how unfair it is that baseball's greatest hitter is hated by his own kind. He sees how heartbreaking it is that Pittsburgh always gets to decide when the Bengals' season ends, playing God themselves, which angers but also flatters God. God sees all this injustice and thus took one Cincinnati's finest to join Him in heaven.

Yes, God took Harambe the gorilla to live a better life. A life full of heaven bananas and heaven trees and heaven Arnold Palmers. It's a little known fact, but gorillas love Arnold Palmers. Why wouldn't they? It's the perfect drink.

Cincinnati, I'm sorry Harambe is no longer with us. I'm sorry that parents are bad and children are sneaky and zoos are just slaughterhouses for the innocent. I'm sorry Harambe's kind smile and witty comebacks no longer can grace the monkeyhouse. I'm sorry Harambe doesn't get to finish that computer program he was working on where no matter what you type in it makes bananas dance across the screen. I'm sorry Harambe doesn't get to do sign language with Koko, that one other gorilla with the kitten, over Facetime. I'm sorry that man and ape can't coexist despite everything the movie series Planet of the Apes taught us. I'm sorry we all have these ridiculous men's haircuts now. 

But maybe Harambe is still with us. Maybe Harambe has his loving hand on your shoulder as you take the train home from work. His big, kind, monkey fingers guide your own as you throw Pokeballs at Drowzees. I don't need any more God damned Drowzees, you think. But then you feel a calming presence. A presence that seems to say to you: No, you don't need them. But you get them. Because life is a blessing. Life is a gift, a gift worth cherishing, the presence seems to say. You're right, Presence, you think in response. You're welcome, guy, says the presence. Also, why don't you get off at the next stop and buy a some delicious bananas, says the presence. What? you say. Bananas, says the presence. Go buy like two or three dozen bananas. Buy all of the bananas. Go bananas on bananas, says the presence. BANANAS!

That presence, is Harambe. You know, that dead gorilla. Harambe wants you to be happy. He wants you to eat a bunch of bananas. 

Cincinnati, you are not alone. You are shitty, but not forgotten. We are all here for you and we are sorry for your loss. But what you have to realize, Cincinnati, is this is Chicago. There is zero reason in the entire world why we would ever name one of our parks after one of your gorillas. A gorilla that was truthfully never even yours, anyway.

That's because Harambe is all of our gorilla.

We shouldn't name our parks or our zoos or our children or anything else after Harambe, because to do so would suggest he is gone.

Harambe isn't gone. He is just in heaven, playing hopscotch with Abraham Lincoln. Giving swirlies to Albert Einstein, that friggen' nerd. Stealing bananas from Jesus Christ in the Garden of Eden. Watching that scene on the train with the gorilla and the guy in the gorilla suit at the end of Trading Places over and over and over and over and over and over again.

Harambe is happy now. So let him be happy. Let him rest. Eat about a billion bananas.

Let it be.

Let Harambe be.

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Also, let's petition to rename a park after Pete Rose if they're not gonna let him in the Hall of Fame. It's the least we can do for an American hero. 

And the least we can do for such a sad, shitty city.