The alleged unlawful killing of two lions by two separate American doctors has caused an international outcry and demands for extradition to Zimbabwe for prosecution. (here and here). However, one American woman is using the controversies to taunt animal lovers and apparently drive up traffic on her Facebook site. Sabrina Corgatelli is believed to come from Boise, Idaho and is reportedly a university accountant at Idaho State University who also runs a clothing company called Racks and Ridges. She teased those objecting to the illegal hunts by saying “To all the haters. Stay tuned, you’re gonna have so much more to be pissed off about.” She then posted various photos from the “trip of a lifetime” posing with the corpses of a giraffe, warthog, kudu and impala during a trip to South Africa. To be sure to ignite those grieving over the death of Cecil the Lion, Corgatelli posted a series of pictures with such notes as “All you haters, This is for you!! Have a great day, cuz I know I will!!’
There is no indication that the killings by Corgatelli were illegal. However, the postings have deepened the debate over trophy hunts in Africa and other countries. What is most interesting in this public debate is the total disconnect in how both sides view the experience. Frankly, as a lifelong hiker, I journey great distances to see animals in the wild and could not imagine shooting them and posing with their dead bodies. Yet, this precisely the “beauty” that people like Corgatelli refer to in such “trips of a lifetime.” After shooting a large African antelope called a kudu, she wrote “Yesterday, day 1 an amazing day!!! Got my beautiful beautiful Kudu!! It was my #1 want on my list and I got him on the first day!!! Loving it there!!” Likewise, after killing a giraffe, she wrote “Such an amazing animal!! I couldn’t be any happier!! My emotion after getting him was a feeling I will never forget!!!”
Those postings leaves animal advocates and many environmentalists seething at the notion that one sees such an “amazing animal” and then extracts joy from killing it. After killing a huge warthog, Corgatelli rejoiced in killing “one of Africa’s icons.”
I am truly fascinated by the cultural and emotive divergence in such stories. Many hunters are in fact committed environmentalists and love and respect nature. The current debate has not seriously raised questions over deer, duck, and other common hunting game which are plentiful. It is focused on “big game.” Moreover, places like South Africa make a huge amount of money on eco-tourism, particularly photo safaris. These countries risk a backlash if they are also hosting people who want the joy of killing the very same animals. Notably, giraffe hunts are allowed for trophies despite the fact that the giraffe population has been reportedly falling. A package for wealthy hunters allows them to kill multiple animals for $5,400 while the giraffe carries a ‘trophy fee’ of $2,600 by itself.
Corgatelli has become the target of outrage but her postings have also generated more than 7,000 “likes.” In response to those leaving irate messages, she posted a biblical reference from Genesis 9:3 in which God tells Isaac: “Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything.” It is not clear if she ate warthog and the hundreds of pounds of meat that she killed or gave the meat to locals.
When actively seeking such notoriety, there is also a possible backlash at a university for an employee. Idaho is a big hunting state so the backlash is likely to be far less than at many other universities. Some people have posted demands that she be fired. As I have argued in the past, I do not believe that it is appropriate for universities to take action. Corgatelli has free speech rights and what she is doing appears perfectly legal. We have a disagreement for what is fun. Where some of us see the beauty in watching animals in the wild and leaving them in pristine locations, others like Corgatelli long to kill those animals. We disagree but that is no reason to seek to punish Corgatelli because she is open about his passion for big game hunting or her desire to participate in the international debate as a hunter advocate. I certainly believe that it is inappropriate for a university to chill such speech and punish those with different values. Ironically, the taunts of Corgatelli likely embarrass most hunters and work to the advantage of animal activists calling for new laws barring such trophy hunts in Africa.
For my part, I am still in Yosemite hiking with the kids in some of the most beautiful locations in the world. I would be thrilled to see a mountain lion today and enjoy not just watching it but leaving it in this wonderful place. Indeed, knowledge that it is still up in these mountains is part of my “trip of a lifetime.”
“Don’t the girls all get prettier at closin time?” -Mickey Gilley
or maybe I meant
CENSORSHIP
oops….please censor
Arrrrggghhhhh!!!
CENSHORSHIP
This chick is fugly. It hurts my eyes just to look at her.
Ben – you know that after 6 beers she is exactly your type. 😉
What’s all of this about some nut picking her off? I am absolutely shocked. Being morally superior and enlightened, I thought liberals loved everyone.
Paul – definitely. I did not mean to imply that they rode into the middle of the stampede, because then they would just die.
“Nearly all the fees go to corrupt politicians.:”
Of course!
What part of Socialism don’t you understand?
It is a myth that hunting licenses in Africa support the community. Nearly all the fees go to corrupt politicians.
A license to hunt should not be conditional on the applicant hunter providing an acceptable reason for wanting to hunt the game. There is not a valid government interest in judging generally whether a hunt should be allowed for trophy or consumption. It can argue that numbers of tags may be limited due to population metrics of the herd however.
And this made me laugh aloud:
Who cares, really, if no BadWhites are involved?
In Zimbabwe, “the private sector has shrunk since 2000. That was the year Mr Mugabe launched his controversial land reform programme, which saw the seizure of white-owned farms and triggered the collapse of the economy.
Zimbabwe’s manufacturing industry, which once employed more than 200,000 people, now accounts for 93,000 jobs. Some 4,600 businesses have closed in the past three years, according to the central bank.”
AND…
“Latin-American countries with governments that claim to be pursuing a “socialist” agenda come out the worst in the [2015] Institutional Quality Index published by Argentina’s Freedom and Progress Foundation, with several regional nations ranking alongside countries such as South Sudan, Zimbabwe, Eritrea, and Gabon.
The report …takes an average of eight indicators used by recognized international organizations. Among them are the Index of Economic Freedom, Doing Business, the Rule of Law (the World Bank), and Corruption Perceptions (Transparency International).”
Delicious.
How I love socialism.
VICTROY!
FROWARD!
How I love my job as well.
It’s good to be the Chief Bootlicker of the Chief Boot on the Human Neck.
And to get some of that hateful capitalist dough, Zimbabwe lures white trophy hunters in for “legal” big game hunts, only to blame the white devils for decimating their national treasure.
Ha ha ha!
Absolute genius.
But, however, the thing is, that trick only works once,
Then, like taking the white devil’s farms, no more white devil money and skill.
http://dailysignal.com/2015/08/03/forget-cecil-legal-hunting-benefits-africa/?utm_source=heritagefoundation&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=dailydigest&mkt_tok=3RkMMJWWfF9wsRohuq3AZKXonjHpfsX56%2B0uX6axlMI%2F0ER3fOvrPUfGjI4ATMBmNK%2BTFAwTG5toziV8R7jHKM1t0sEQWBHm
Gigi – Thanks! I actually really like rodents, I do think they are cute. Had hamsters, mice, gerbils, maybe about 20 or so over the years growing up. Last thing I had was a lagomorph, a dwarf bunny, who was so awesome but still a stretch to a dog. We would insult him by calling him a rodent. Being a bunny, he had thick skin so it was OK. 😛
Paul – 🙂
DBQ – I hear ya. Living in suburban NJ, everything is close, so I don’t need range. Also I’ve known my neighbors long enough that they won’t freak if they see me with a realistic looking handgun.
Karen – Those friggin’ squirrels… so sad about your trees! We only have one apple and one walnut, which are referred to lovingly as the squirrel feeders. I try my best, and I think this year I am sort of making a difference. Don’t know that we’ll get a walnut, but I think the apples have a better chance!
As I’ve heard again and again as I grow more food, “The life of a farmer…”. Anyone who feels lovey dove-y about cute little rodents should put some serious effort into a garden. They will see the light.
—
Also, back to this post- I’ve got no problem with trophy hunting where the meat is donated and used. If it is a hunt where the animal is wasted, awful. But what is ‘waste’? If we are talking about humans, meaning- we could have fed starving populations with that meat- then this subject is directly comparable to the PP atrocities. They are both instances where a human life could benefit from an action. Now if we take waste to mean ‘No humans beyond the hunting party will benefit’- the hunter gets their trophy head, and the carcass is not even skinned but left in the wild were it was killed- no HUMANS will benefit from the meat, but nature’s scavengers will surely be ecstatic at the find. Micro flora and fauna will not waste any part of any dead thing. The earth is 100% self recycling. I believe before it had a known use, gasoline was a byproduct, a waste product, dumped into rivers. Something is not a resource until you know how to use it. One man’s waste is another Condor’s resource.
As I understand it the hunts are a large part of African economy. Also, it has been noted- animals in the wild sometimes eat other animals while they are STILL ALIVE! Talk about brutal! Nature does not give a flip about anyone’s sensibilities. See Game of Thrones producer’s friendly chat with a lioness. Didn’t the big cat know she had a right to not have violence committed against her? Put that lion in jail, or fine it 20,000.
STEG–Loved your squirrel story. Very funny! I used to have trouble with gophers.
To those that think Big game hunting is despicable–Big game hunting has been around since the beginning of time. One person pays humongous bucks to hunt (guide and many helpers are able to feed their families). He has the head mounted and some more mouths are fed. The animals skins are turned into rugs, clothing, or upholstery fabric, many more mouths are fed. The meat is given or sold to villages, and still more mouths are fed. It’s a cycle of life for the people of Africa. Now you want to take their means of living and eating away. What seems horrible to us is acceptable in other cultures.
Remember, we had presidents who game hunted–Teddy Roosevelt, for one, was a big game hunter.
So let these people do their Big Game Hunting. You all keep smoking your pot and be selective in your Pro-Choice attitudes.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/07/romney-bain-abortion-stericycle-sec
Earlier this year, Mitt Romney nearly landed in a politically perilous controversy when the Huffington Post reported that in 1999 the GOP presidential candidate had been part of an investment group that invested $75 million in Stericycle, a medical-waste disposal firm that has been attacked by anti-abortion groups for disposing aborted fetuses collected from family planning clinics.
But the company had its woes, accumulating a troubling safety record along the way. In 1991, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration cited its Arkansas operation for 11 workplace safety violations. The facility had not provided employees with sufficient protective gear, and it had kept body parts, fetuses, and dead experimental animals in unmarked storage containers, placing workers at risk.
In 1995, Stericycle was fined $3.3 million—later decreased to $800,000—by Rhode Island for knowingly exposing workers to life-threatening diseases at its medical-waste treatment facility in Woonsocket. Two years later, workers at another of its medical-waste processing plants in Morton, Washington, were exposed to tuberculosis. In 2002 and 2003—after Bain and its partners had bought their major interest in the firm—Stericycle reached settlements with the attorneys general in Arizona and Utah after it was accused of violating antitrust laws. It paid Arizona $320,000 in civil penalties and lawyers’ fees, and paid Utah $580,000.
********************
Oh my.
But, by all means, please secede.
Ah Mark if only it were so, that you fruit loops in the central and southern part of the state would let us be free. Jefferson State!!!
Antonio is correct as well in that it will likely resolve to an issue of force. Not just in California but nationwide as the rural states rebel against the urban states and the predominately ethnic Hispanic areas decide they have had enough. This is why they need to teach the real history of the War of Southern Succession. Doomed to repeat history. I’ll be dead.
Antonio should come to our end of the state. The hunting and water is good.
Dust Bunny
Thanks for your kind words! I am a proud American of Latin descent. That being said I can honestly say the only time I play the ethnic card is with Anglo liberal types. They aren’t sure how to react. Treat you as an endangered species (pardon the pun) and ‘save’ you or hate you as a traitor. I get more grief from white liberal types than I do any Hispanic. That is the truth.
My father’s family spent over 30 years in Mexico as legal residents. We spent every summer in either Mexico City or Tequisquiapan and some other areas where they owned property. Aunts and Uncles all went to elementary, high school and college in Mexico. My Grandfather died while living in Mexico, in the State of Hidalgo. My godfather was a rather famous soccer player in the 1950’s and we have family from South America…….So I have a great affinity for the Latin and Hispanic cultures.
I would not be surprised to eventually see a strong secession movement, especially in the southern part of California to secede from the US. It might not be such a bad thing.
It is the same liberal mindset that is creating such a huge drama over a lion that is unable to grasp that people have different cultures and different ways of looking at things. Hunting as a life style is something they just can’t understand. I don’t mean big game trophy hunting, which I also do not like as I think it is immoral, cheating, wasteful and is just an ego trip. The regular hunting bitter clingers who like to hunt, fish and enjoy the outdoors get the liberal snooty down the nose treatment because we don’t act as expected. This is quite funny to me since my background and early childhood IS from that uber politically correct mindset. I guess I just got warped somewhere along the way. Good 😀
I’m always fascinated by the amount of vitriol and hate all the love, peace, and tolerance folks can direct against those who don’t believe as they do. If only they took as much positive action towards improving the lives of human beings as they do nasty hatefulness in supposed defense of animals.
Mark
Do you mean it, do you REALLY mean it?
Don’t worry, the La Raza types (of which I am not) will take you up on it in about 40 or 50 years. I wonder if your descendants will try to keep them in by FORCE. It is coming and this is these rumblings are only a small inkling of our future (unfortunately).
http://www.vdare.com/articles/john-derbyshire-cecil-the-lion-and-the-goodwhite-badwhite-cold-civil-war?utm_source=8%2F3%2F2015&utm_campaign=UA-18706545-2+&utm_medium=email