Spiritual Forum

American woman causes outrage by posing next to shot black giraffe.

An American woman named Tess Thompson Talley has sparked outrage online after images of her posing next to a slaughtered black giraffe while on a hunting trip to South Africa went viral.

Africa Digest posted the image of Thompson Talley on their Twitter feed with the following caption;

“White American savage who is partly a neanderthal comes to Africa and shoot down a very rare black giraffe courtesy of South Africa stupidity. Her name is Tess Thompson Talley. Please share. If our so-called governments can’t care for our wildlife then its time we stand up and responsibility of our continent, lands, resources, and wildlife…. share share share! and let's have a united voice against pillage of Africa, it’s the only home we have.”

These latest images of trophy hunting have sparked major debate on social media. In South Africa, the business of letting out land to tourists to hunt for wild and exotic animals is incredibly lucrative for the country and a major draw for the tourism trade. However, many local people do not believe that the money is good enough compensation for the loss of South Africa’s incredible wildlife, not to mention the cruelty that the creatures are subjected to by the hunters.

Trophy hunting is an incredibly big business across the world

It is estimated that around 1.7 million trophies were traded between 2004 and 2014. Of these trophies, approximately 20,000 a year were animals which have been classified as being threatened with extinction by the IUCN. 44% of the traded trophies were black bears which tended to be hunted in Canada and the United States. Mountain zebras, leopards, African elephants, Chacma baboons, and lions were also among the most traded trophies in the world.

In recent years, a number of countries have begun to give in to public outrage about trophy hunting. A number of countries including Brazil, India, Kenya, and Botswana have banned the practice altogether in their jurisdictions. Other countries such as Australia, France, and the Netherlands have also banned the importation of trophies of lions, and the United Kingdom is likely to follow suit.

Many South Africans are hopeful that their government will also follow suit and ban trophy hunting. However, others are more cynical pointing out that since the government does not seem to care too deeply about addressing serious human issues such as poverty, soaring crime, and human rights abuses, it is very unlikely that they will act to protect animals.