Go Daddy CEO under fire for 'elephant snuff film' Bob Parsons, chief executive of the market-leading domain name registrar Go Daddy, has come to blows with animal-rights organisation PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals), after he shot an African elephant and posted the video online. bobparsonselephantkillingscum Problem CEO Parsons on the prowl... PETA …
Pets Killed By PETA
Year Received Transferred Adopted Killed
2010 2,345 63 44 1.86% 2,200 93.8%
2009 2,366 31 8 0.34% 2,301 97.3%
2008 2,216 34 7 0.32% 2,124 95.8%
2007 1,997 35 17 0.85% 1,815 90.9%
2006 3,061 46 12 0.39% 2,981 97.4%
2005 2,165 69 146 6.74% 1,946 89.9%
2004 2,655 1 361 13.60% 2,278 85.8%
2003 2,224 1 312 14.03% 1,911 85.9%
2002 2,680 2 382 14.25% 2,298 85.7%
2001 2,685 14 703 26.18% 1,944 72.4%
2000 2,681 28 624 23.27% 2,029 75.7%
1999 1,805 91 386 21.39% 1,328 73.6%
1998* 943 125 133 14.10% 685 72.6%
Total 29,823 540 3,135 10.56% 25,840 85.9%
Official PETA documents (pdf) filed with State of Virginia:
http://tinyurl.com/PetaKillsAnimals-pdf
http://www.petakillsanimals.com/
Living in South Africa, I got to visit Mugabeland in 2005. In Hwange National Park, we saw elephants - huge amounts. Seeing them after a while got pretty damn boring, actually.
They are incredibly destructive, and the vegetation for mile upon mile was limited to stripped and broken tress, as they moved through the areas feeding. As I understand it, the balance of animals was way out, with little control of elephant populations and poaching of anything smaller being rampant.
In areas where people live (hopefully outside any recognised parks) rogue elephants must be immensely troublesome. Control of the populations (including culling) is necessary, but I disagree with renting out the opportunity to commercial hunters. There's no indication his shooting was sanctioned by any authorities with both the animal and the villagers best interests in mind, but lets hope it was. Unfortunately, money talks there, and you can hunt almost anything you want. PETA normally have the wrong end of the stick, but posting such a video was stupid on his part, undoubtedly.
As much as I would question anyone that shoots an animal for a hobby, these are licensed culls. They sell the right to shoot an animal that needs to be culled. One way or the other, the animal was doomed.
I cant comment on alternative ways of dealing with the problem. I know that licenses are often given for animals that need to be put down for humane reasons.
I am not pro hunting in the least, never having killed anything bigger than a wasp, but it appears that most game hunters are actually ecologist and ironically also love animals. Hunting to them is about doing the primitive thing and they are generally very big on keeping nature as it was.
Mind you, images from South Park are still engraved in my brain "Its comming right for us..".....
There can be many sides to every story, his reasoning I think is sound (downvote now) but I am undecided as to whether the publicity is itself justified, or it is justified and posting on YouTube is not the right way to go about it, or posting to Youtube is a reasonable way of making knowledge about herd culling available to a wider audience but you could at least show some remorse. In the end, man's encroachment on wild habitat is to blame. All I do know is that the elephants are still the victim, however you look at it.
It's one thing to travel around the world for culling/animal population control. It's quite another to effectively make an "animal snuff" film where you take pride of place in it and then publish it online to a global population.
It's like Jay Leno the US comedian quiped, "See, in America, we like everyone to know the good work we're doing anonymously!"
where? In the village you were visiting? or a 1000 km way? or are you just another white American who think that Africa is a single country where everyone is poor and starving?
what I find surprising about those "problem animals", is that they seem to appear right when some businessman feel like hunting.... and by pure coincidence those "problem animals" happened to be what the businessman wanted to hunt!
Some folks want to hunt things. Some areas have too many of a particular animal which needs culling (or have a specimen of that animal which is considered too dangerous). Putting the two together seems a natural combination.
Sure, across Africa as a whole, elephant numbers are well down. But in certain areas, there are far too many of them. And apparently you can't easily cart them around - quite apart from the whole size problem, elephant herds reportedly don't respond well to newcomers being dropped in by well-meaning humans.
Don't like the man, don't like his leisure activities. Don't like the tendentious nonsense he covers it all with. Hunting has place, of course. But this isn't it. Guy, you are not rescuing Zimbabweans. You're just a corpulent holiday maker who likes to shoot elephants, and pays a lot for the privilege. Just say that. Be a man.
Not that keen on PETA either.
Given the style of GoDaddy advertising his objectives here are clear:
He's trying to get some naked PETA protesters around the office.
Seriously though, drawing complaints from PETA, Greenpeace or any of the other anti-human, pro-stoneage eugenicist groups is always a badge of honour.
Uhm.... Fois Gras is a tricky topic. It involves force feeding a duck using a funnel several times a day. Its very very wrong.
No sane person would approve that type of farming. The tricky part of this is fois gras is incredibly tasty and people turn a blind eye .... me included. Hopefully someone will save my sole and have the whole process banned soon.....
In my opinion, it is hypocritical to oppose hunting in general unless you are a vegetarian. Hunted meat is _clearly_ more humane than factory meat. I've been in packing plants, and I'm sure there are enough scenes on the internet to give one a flavor of the environment. (sorry :) Failing that, read "The Jungle" by Sinclair or for a more modern take "Fast Food Nation" to get an idea of where your food comes from.
Personally, I'm a pro-hunting ethical vegan, and not surprisingly the only one in my gun club.
(note that I speak of hunting in general, there are legitimate arguments for and against hunting of specific species)
I just avoid using Godaddy anyway because their customer service was shocking, pulling my domain without notice because some unsubstantiated claim of copywrite infringment and not replying back to several emails sent over a period of weeks.
Surely if Bob Parsons was wanting to help save locals in Africa he could donate some of his bank balance to charity's working in the area instead of shooting elephants?
Is this the same Go Daddy that (reputedly) reserves domains when you check to see if they are available and otherwise holds domains hostage? Good to know that the money he uses on his machismo enhancing fantasy vacations is made the old fashioned way. I'd vote for him over Ellison, but it is a close call.
Somebody above mentioned that the fellow may view Africa as one massive place devoid of geographical or ethnic distinctions - a big, starving continent. Very silly - doubtful, albeit possible, that he was thinking along those lines. Regardless of other countries on the continent, many of which are doing just fine, Zimbabwe is not. Remember hyperinflation resulting in multi-trillion-dollar notes being worth pennies within hours of printing, followed by the abandonment of a distinct Zimbabwean currency? That country has been mismanaged and abused to the brink of collapse. There are a lot of starving people in Zimbabwe - using the term "village" to describe an African community automatically conjurs up the image of a demeaning stereotype. Regardless, people in villages, and towns, and cities, are starving. Elephant is edible. Even if the people are not starving, a few thousand pounds of meat freely given to a small community frees up a great deal of resources and will allow the people, and the community, to improve their lot.
It's entirely believable that he killed an elephant because he takes pleasure in killing animals. Human encroachment may be to blame for the "elephant problem" - regardless, that problem now exists and must be dealt with. If a wealthy foreigner wants to pay a substantial sum for the right to perform a neccesary function, and provide the meat produced by the action to people who will use it, I see nothing wrong.
He may very well be an ass - glorifying the death of an animal and posing with its corpse certainly doesn't seem like the behavior of a gentleman. Doing the right thing for the wrong reasons still entails doing the right thing. I am curious what elephant tastes like...
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