Love them or hate them, celebrities have the ability to broadcast widely and loudly.
Our concern for the treatment of animals often means we have to take a stand on issues that we feel negatively impact them. Trophy hunting is certainly an issue that we feel must be addressed. When a human animal chooses to kill a non-human animal in a Trophy Hunt it is for several reasons:
- Prestige-a way to enhance one’s own superiority over other people and over animals that were once a threat to primitive man. We are no longer that primitive man.
- Sport-the idea that competition produces winners and heroes. But how can it be called sport when it is between a man with a gun/guns, a pack of hounds, a porter to carry his gear, electronic equipment, vehicles to give chase in…and a lone wild creature?
- Revenue– exploiting foreign markets that value teeth, tusks, internal organs, genitals, horns, pelts and other parts of animals is cruel and unconscionable. There is more illegal profit in killing wildlife than in the worlds drug trade! When hunting puts value on dead animals, poachers are sure to follow…
- Conservation– the theory behind this is that trophy hunting kills animals to save them. Do we really need to explain this….?
- Altruism-Support for local communities or indigenous populations. Really? all the money it takes to kill something to hang on a wall could just be donated to the people that need help.
Cruelty will change when cultures change, and cultures can only change when the people that care, speak up against the cruelty. Celebrities are able to do this in the same larger-than-life way that they live their celebrity lives! Thank you for being a BIG voice for animals Ricky Gervais.