I think a lot of people have a gross misperception of what "trophy hunting' is....they think that it's people going out, shooting a bunch of animals, cutting off the heads, and leaving the rest to rot. More importantly, they have never grown up or spent time on a farm (I'm talking in the U.S. now), so they have no perception of carrying capacity of a certain amount of land, what a "cull" is (they think chickens die of old age), etc. One of the first questions to me (from just about everybody) when I came back from Africa was "What happens to the meat?".....seems if you don't eat your kill, your a wasteful, trophy hunting bastard. I explained that we ate some of it in camp, that it was part of the land owners income (biltong), and that part of the worker's 'salaries" was payed in meat. I also told them that I would have NO qualms about bringing the meat back to the states, irregardless of cost, but that the USDA were the folks that weren't going to let that happen......not me or my pocket book!
Further, most people's conception of Africa is dark skinned natives walking around half naked in grass skirts, living in mud huts with palm fronds for a roof. I'm sure if I showed them a photo of Johannesburg, they would identify it as "Cleveland".
I'm sure if I asked them where Port Elizabeth is, they would say England.
The general population has to be shown not only that the money taken it goes to benefit wild animal populations as a whole, and that the deaths of a few animals is much, much better than the deaths of thousands......I've told people if they don't believe me, google "Kenyan elephants" and see if I don't speak the truth. People don't realize that Africa has been divided up into farms, much the same as the U.S., and that there aren't billions of acres for the animal population to "run free" as the movies seem to portray.
One other problem is that the general population has come to associate "hunter" and "poacher" as the same.........we need to make it
VERY clear that they are NOT one in the same, and as a matter of fact are at opposite ends of the spectrum!!! The idea of hunter=poacher is purposely manipulated by the 'news' media; look at the photo of the oil man in the National Geographic photo....it said all his trophies were "poached".....so was "Cecil the friendly lion".......consequently, we are all bad guys.
The main problem, as I see it, is not what the message should be, but how to get it out there............you can forget lame stream media such as CNN, BBC, ABC, NBC, CBS, Newsweek, Time, et al;they are no longer about journalism, but manipulation and entertainment. I don't know how to get the information out there so that the uninformed should be "forced" to watch (as they would be forced to watch a piece on a news report).
I also have to say that there are a lot of negative videos on Youtube and other social media showing hunting in a not-to-positive light: Hunters wounding animals and not following up, taking shots too far and wounding animals, filming animals as they hop or flop around on the ground instead of finishing them off, shooting deer off of bait piles, etc. While all of these things happen, it's the blaring heavy metal music and laughter that puts a negative connotation to the whole thing......and then all hunts are painted with that broad brush.
But if there is
ONE THING that I would like to see, it's an add campaign that shows what hunter's monies have done over the years: the reintroduction of black buck antelope to India because of them being bred on "canned hunting" operations in Texas, the return of wood duck populations because of hunters build and placing wood duck nesting boxes (when did PETA ever build a wood duck box, or a mallard tube....or any thing for wildlife), the return of the American alligator from the brink of extinction. The increase in
non game species, such as song birds, egrets, various reptiles, etc. because the money from
hunting and fishing licenses went to help maintain those properties......when was the last time a mountain biker, bird watcher, or anyone else had to pay to pursue their "sport" on state or federal land? Never!!! Because sportsmen and women are the ones who've footed the bill for all this time!
.....but what then needs to be done is to show how much money PETA and their ilk have taken in, in the name of "saving wildlife", and then show how much of it has actually gone to save habitat, reintroduce species, work with indigenous peoples to show them how to live with difficult species, etc.
.....I guess, in short,
We need to "toot our own horn" while at the same time exposing that the monies donated to the animal rights individuals is only used to fund lawsuits, and not help the animals themselves!!!!
.....and if anyone you talk to about hunting has a pet, you need to tell them to go to PETAs website and see what they say about pet ownership:
"
We at PETA very much love the animal companions who share our homes, but we believe that it would have been in the animals’ best interests if the institution of “pet keeping”—i.e., breeding animals to be kept and regarded as “pets”—never existed. The international pastime of domesticating animals has created an overpopulation crisis; as a result, millions of unwanted animals are destroyed every year as “surplus.”
This selfish desire to possess animals and receive love from them causes immeasurable suffering, which results from manipulating their breeding, selling or giving them away casually, and depriving them of the opportunity to engage in their natural behavior. They are restricted to human homes, where they must obey commands and can only eat, drink, and even urinate when humans allow them to.
Because domesticated animals retain many of their basic instincts and drives but are not able to survive on their own in the wild, dogs, cats, or birds, whose strongest desire is to be free, must be confined to houses, yards, or cages for their own safety.
So, in other words, if you train your dog to not pee in the house (i.e. house breaking), you are causing your dog to suffer........................if they don't see that and think "loony", well
Sorry..........starting to ramble; better quit now while I'm ahead.
