Slate.com reported that the CEO of domain registrar GoDaddy.com, Bob Parsons, shot an elephant in a sorghum field in Zimbabwe. (As in ‘hunting,’ I guess) As is predictable, there were a few people who took exception to Bob killing the elephant. So, Bob tried to spin it and claimed he killed the elephant because it was destroying the villages crops. Also, that he, magnanimously, let the villagers eat the meat.
I am not sure there is anything illegal about hunting marauding elephants in sorghum fields in Zimababwe. I am not even sure that killing some elephants is a bad idea. I wouldn’t do it, but, then, I am not in Africa and starving because an elephant is destroying my crops.
The problem I have with Parsons is his attempted impersonation of Teddy Roosevelt.
This happens up here where I live all the time. Out-of-state hunters show up, bursting with excitement and ready to embark on their week of killing to prove whatever it is they have to prove.
One time I was sitting in the airport in Minneapolis-St. Paul waiting for a connecting flight to Missoula. I saw a large bush moving towards the gate. As it got closer, I realized it wasn’t a bush. It was three overweight businessmen from New Jersey decked out with every piece of camo clothing and accessory that Cabelas sells. Instantly, I knew they were on their way to Montana to kill something. It looked like they got up that morning and were so excited to go hunting that they felt they had to wear camo to the airport so they wouldn’t have to change clothes after they touched down in Missoula.
One of them struck up a conversation. He was obviously excited. I tried not to laugh. Then I went back to playing Tetris on my laptop.
No doubt these three terrorized the Bitterroot Mountains for a week and then went home. After spending a pot of money – for which we are eternally grateful – they, undoubtedly, put back on their business suits and went back to Jersey where they amazed their office mates with stories of daring do over the water cooler. Their bloodlust now satisfied, they were able to return to riding their $5,000 lawn tractors over the ‘velt’ that was their front lawn in Piscataway.
I really don’t have anything against these people. In fact, before he died, my father was one of these people. [Associating my Dad with this group, probably maligns them unnecessarily.] But, they, like Bob Parsons, shouldn’t try to spin it into anything other than what it, actually, was - a blood sport. They came to Montana a to kill deer and elk. Bob went to Zimbabwe to kill an elephant.
It wasn’t an attempt to help villages save their crops or supplement their protein. He could have spent half as much as he did on the hunt and, most likely, fed the entire village for a year and helped them grow more crops. He went to Zimbabwe to kill an elephant.
So, Bob, like the moving bush in the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport, your adventure was about yourself. It was not altruistic. So, quit trying to spin it.
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