This video, documenting the moments after David Humphlett was bitten by a diamondback rattlesnake, has been viewed over 38 million times across various media channels, mostly because of David's nonchalant reaction.
Check it out:
Welp. I'm cooked.
That phrase has been praised, mocked, and turned into a meme. It's even spawned multiple crypto coins trying to cash in on the viral wave — some of which have surprisingly contributed real dollars to help pay for David's hospital bills. Antivenin costs a lot of money, and he received over 88 vials of the stuff.
But the biggest question I had was how anyone could be so calm in the midst of a life-threatening crisis like this?
Was it just for the clicks, or was there more to the story?
I asked him to find out.
A member of the herping community and wildlife influencer, David loves finding snakes, amphibians, and other animals in the wild and filming them for his online audience.
Think of Steve Irwin for the next generation: a man whom Humphlett lists among his inspirations, along with Austin Stevens and Jack Hanna. Above all, he credits his parents for supporting his interests with toys and books in his youth.
His squad consists of his wife, Emma, best friend Aiden, and anyone else who wants to follow him into nature. On the day of the diamondback encounter, he had some people from his Bible study out with him who had never been herping before, which he told me partially explains the response in the video:
We had some new herpers with us, and some people from our Bible study who had never gone before, and I had to kind of play it a bit more cool. I didn't want to panic them. It wouldn't help no matter what if you're freaking out, so we tried to play it cool for a couple of seconds: doing like two different videos that were each about 40 seconds, and then we got in the car and started off, running off to the hospital, man.
David says that on the way his leg swelled up and felt like it was going to explode. On top of that, the hemotoxin of the rattlesnake bite caused him to go numb, and his throat started to swell from anaphylactic shock:
That was actually the real fear within the first few minutes of the bite. We were at least 30 minutes from an EpiPen right now, and I could suffocate and die.
I called my wife Emma quickly, just in case that was the last chance I got. I was really contemplating meeting Christ. In those couple of moments, it was scary. On one hand, I'm ready to meet you, Jesus. On the other hand, I'm scared to die.
And that explains the other half of his calmness: his relationship with Christ.
His wife Emma's reaction was much the same:
I think I was in a lot of shock but was trying to remain calm for you, but inside I was really scared, and I had tunnel vision when I first got the call, but then there was this weird sense of peace.
When I saw David in the emergency room, I really had to face the reality of the situation: if David loses his life, God is still good. If David dies, and I'm left on this earth alone without him, God is still good.
Unfortunately, the world decided to jump on the story with a heap of negativity, both in the comment section and in the newsroom. After David posted the video, the hate started rolling in:
I posted it on my own Instagram while in the hospital, and because I have a decent Instagram and some stuff that the algorithms kind of prioritize,
which is nice, so I threw it up there, and it was weird because it jumped up to like 38 million views in one night, but then it kind of plateaued from there which is very strange. Usually, videos build. That was kind of weird, but it just drew in a massive crowd of people in that first 24 hours it was up, sending me prayers and well wishes and death threats, and all the rest that you normally get from a crowd in Instagram.And then from there, we were kind of intentional about trying to get a GoFundMe out, so I was like kinda like are there any new sources I can contact: the local news here in Gainesville, Florida, and then from from there different stories and different news places started picking it up and re-running my story.
Then from there I've done a bunch of interviews — regrettably a Fox interview where they completely misrepresented everything unfortunately. That was a bummer, but everything else was pretty good and accurate.
David summarized the absolute state of the world with this statement:
We get a mixed bag of people who think I'd be better off dead for touching animals.
In the end, if the Humphletts have any overarching message to the world it's this:
Christ sustains his own. It doesn't mean everybody's guaranteed to live when they get bitten by a rattlesnake, but he sustains his own. I felt I have felt it in other people's prayer and through every moment in the ICU and afterwards. I have just felt Christ close at hand. Of course he tends to do use these situations: He's worked good out, over and above evil, and brought me closer to him, which I'm very very thankful for.
