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The NRA head and his elephant trophies


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In the early fall of 2013, an export company in Botswana prepared a shipment of animal parts for Wayne LaPierre, the head of the National Rifle Association, and his wife, Susan. One of the business’s managers e-mailed the couple a list of trophies from their recent hunt and asked them to confirm its accuracy: one cape-buffalo skull, two sheets of elephant skin, two elephant ears, four elephant tusks, and four front elephant feet. Once the inventory was confirmed, the e-mail stated, “we will be able to start the dipping and packing process.” Ten days later, Susan wrote back with a request: the shipment should have no clear links to the LaPierres. She told the shipping company to use the name of an American taxidermist as “the consignee” for the items, and further requested that the company “not use our names anywhere if at all possible.” Susan noted that the couple also expected to receive, along with the elephant trophies, an assortment of skulls and skins from warthogs, impalas, a zebra, and a hyena. Once the animal parts arrived in the States, the taxidermist would turn them into decorations for the couple’s home in Virginia, and prepare the elephant skins so they could be used to make personal accessories, such as handbags.

The LaPierres felt secrecy was needed, the e-mails show, because of a public uproar over an episode of the hunting show “Under Wild Skies,” in which the host, Tony Makris, had fatally shot an elephant. The N.R.A. sponsored the program, and the couple feared potential blowback if the details of their Botswana hunt became public. 

How the Head of the N.R.A. and His Wife Secretly Shipped Their Elephant Trophies Home | The New Yorker

Edited by Ted E Hughes
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19 minutes ago, aztek said:

so? none of it was illegal. 

Legal does not mean moral.

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I could never understand why someone would kill an elephant. Beautiful giants. It’s like the Japanese killing whales. Like WTH?? 
 

I saw a YouTube video a while back of a large group of natives hunting an elephant. They must have had 30 guys run up on this poor soul and where throwing spears at it. At first it just seemed to p*** the elephant off. One spear landed between his shoulders and the elephant grabbed it with his trunk and pulled it out and threw it. I was like hell yeah Mr elephant. Fight the good fight. 
 

They took him down in the end though. So sad. 

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Kill kill kill.  Glorify killing.  As long as it's legal, kill.

Kill baby kill.

Filthy, degraded killers.

BTW   Was all the money the LaPierre's extracted from NRA and stashed into their personal accounts legal?

Filthy degraded embezzlers.

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The thrill of the kill! The power to extinguish a life. Often a timid herbivore that harms no human. I don't get it.

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Legal hunting protects stock from poachers who would decimate the populations. 

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1 hour ago, Sir Wearer of Hats said:

Legal does not mean moral.

morals are subjective,  

 

1 hour ago, Ted E Hughes said:

The thrill of the kill! The power to extinguish a life. Often a timid herbivore that harms no human. I don't get it.

 

For thousands of years humanity relied on hunting, aka killing something, deer, rabbit, fish, bird.... it was means to survive,  people did not celebrate killings, it was not so much about taking a life, but surviving, it was a joy of knowing you bringing food to the table, the game was respected, and eaten, not killed for sport,

But lately it evolved into tradition, there is no need for it, we farm animals now, and we still kill them. Btw, your country's contribution is most influential,  who build those elephant guns? marvelous things,  you created safaris in colonies.  it is strange you are from a country that made it all, and you do not get,

 

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Hunting elephants is nothing I would be interested in. However, properly permitted hunting is conservation. In Michigan they permit hunting deer as a means of controlling the deer population. Left unchecked, deer populations can become a nuisance and a hazard to drivers. Or become populated beyond a sustainable level.

In Botswana they permit elephant hunting because they have a sustainable elephant population. From what I’ve read to many elephants can likewise be a nuisance. They can wreak havoc on crops or structures or even pose a bodily threat to people. Also the money generated from selling permits can in turn be used for conservation and further protection of the elephants (I don’t actually know what Botswana does with the revenue though).

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2 hours ago, Ted E Hughes said:

The thrill of the kill! The power to extinguish a life. Often a timid herbivore that harms no human. I don't get it.

It's hard to understand how a civilised mind could find this an attractive pursuit. 

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I got no respect for you unless you fight it solo with only a sword and shield.

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3 hours ago, preacherman76 said:

I could never understand why someone would kill an elephant.

Because some bulls that are too old to be fertile, but are huge, will still fight and kill younger fertile males that are not as big.  There are now few enough elephants that destroying these bulls is a legitimate part of managing them. When an old bull needs to be culled to protect the lives of other males the right to hunt that bull is sold and the money goes to conservation.  It's not a bad thing but you can't easily convince Joe Dumbass Public who simply cries "They're murdering those beautiful animals!:angry:" while not considering it is to the benefit of the species that it is done.

Edited by OverSword
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3 hours ago, Sir Wearer of Hats said:

Legal does not mean moral.

See above.  It is moral.

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2 hours ago, Ted E Hughes said:

The thrill of the kill! The power to extinguish a life. Often a timid herbivore that harms no human. I don't get it.

Elephants kill people, each other, buffalo, hyenas, lions, etc...  

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15 minutes ago, psyche101 said:

It's hard to understand how a civilised mind could find this an attractive pursuit. 

I agree.  Although there are good reasons to do it I would never want to do it.  They should just leave the culling to Game Wardens IMO and not auction off the right to hunt the rogues.

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1 minute ago, OverSword said:

I agree.  Although there are good reasons to do it I would never want to do it.  They should just leave the culling to Game Wardens IMO and not auction off the right to hunt the rogues.

That's the difference here. Need and want. To want to do that is the immoral part of what they wanted hidden.

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12 minutes ago, OverSword said:

Because some bulls that are too old to be fertile, but are huge, will still fight and kill younger fertile males that are not as big.  There are now few enough elephants that destroying these bulls is a legitimate part of managing them. When an old bull needs to be culled to protect the lives of other males the right to hunt that bull is sold and the money goes to conservation.  It's not a bad thing but you can't easily convince Joe Dumbass Public who simply cries "They're murdering those beautiful animals!:angry:" while not considering it is to the benefit of the species that it is done.

Makes you think doesn't it.

How on earth did they not go extinct before humans came along and managed them? Probably what really sent mammoth extinct hey. Old mammoths.

:whistle:

 

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7 minutes ago, psyche101 said:

That's the difference here. Need and want. To want to do that is the immoral part of what they wanted hidden.

Morals are subjective in this case.

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11 minutes ago, OverSword said:

I agree.  Although there are good reasons to do it I would never want to do it.  They should just leave the culling to Game Wardens IMO and not auction off the right to hunt the rogues.

But that would leave a gapping hole in funding for wildlife conservation. Personally I am happy there are stupid millionaires funding conservation by trophy "hunting"

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9 minutes ago, Hugh Mungus said:

But that would leave a gapping hole in funding for wildlife conservation. Personally I am happy there are stupid millionaires funding conservation by trophy "hunting"

I guess it depends on how much they have to pay.

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3 minutes ago, OverSword said:

Morals are subjective in this case.

Indeed.

Although the Lapierre's weren't being terrorised by elephants, had not suffered loss of life or stock, and the elephant foot stools, rubbish bin and umbrella stand offer me the distinct possibility that conservation wasn't too high on their list either. 

Not sure that zebras, hyenas or a impalas need culling but hey, maybe they do.

Sure culling can maintain an ecological status quo. It's large scale farming really isn't it. I imagine the dinosaurs sent plenty of species extinct and didn't give two hoots, but that's nature for you. 

Culling is understood. It has a function. The mindset that people like this exhibit isn't on that level. More of a sickness. They are being used to perform a function, hopefully directed by actual African professionals who are considering wildlife culling over lust. Meh, at least they have a use properly steered, probably laughed at behind their backs, and hopefully are being ripped off spectacularly. Maybe karma is a thing.....

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I worked at a slaughteryard when in my twenties and later, at a packing house. I'm not very squeamish about such things. The elephants in question were designated for culling which means someone was bound to end their existance. They don't have any use for their earthly remains afterwards. i have no feelings for or against big game hunting. It just looks totally pointless to me and an incredible bore. There's no challenge to it, anymore. They take you out in the bush, point out the target, on which you unload with a very capable piece of technology. The only real danger is if you get too close for a selfie and the mortally wounded pacaderm falls on you. Rich people do a lot of expensive, unnesessary things a lot of people disapprove of and I guess they always will.

Edited by Hammerclaw
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8 minutes ago, OverSword said:

I guess it depends on how much they have to pay.

Well the average lion goes for 100k when I last looked into it. I imagine a bull elephant to be way more than that.

What the morally outraged folks don't understand is that the rangers who are paid to look after the animals are the same ones who will poach the animals for far less than 100k if they were not paid.

I'm sure you are well aware that without trophy hunting we would have probably lost some of these species to extinction by now

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