Is Nothing Safe?

The other night, during my regularly scheduled insomnia, I gave up and got out of bed. Time for a diversion. I just wanted to sit back, watch some pretty pictures, and drown out the thoughts in my head. PBS should be safe and simple, right? Oh look, there's a program about snowy owls.

The program was fine at first ... except that I forgot the part about how climate change might be a small problem for arctic animals (cue the ominous disaster music). But that wasn't the worst part.

The owls had chicks. One was born much later than the others, and because it was smaller, it never had the strength to muscle in and get its share of food. So it wasted away, slowly, over many minutes of the video, first shivering from cold and then finally not moving at all. The mother couldn't provide more food (remember that climate change thing?), but she lovingly gathered the chick under her wings and tried to keep it safe. It died anyway. And then—and this is where I LOST IT—the mother and siblings basically shrugged, said "oh well," and ATE the chick!

OK, I know that things like this happen. I'm normally not such a delicate flower. But it occurred to me that PBS / NPR often puts warnings at the beginning of stories that include, say, bad words that might offend someone. Well, where's my warning, PBS?!