We recently followed the controversy over the shooting of “Cecil the Lion” by an American dentist Walter Palmer from Minnesota. There were other trophy hunting stories that enraged people around the world. (here and here and here). Now, a trophy hunter appears to be vying with Palmer as the most hated man on the Internet after he filmed and posted his killing of a black bear with a homemade spear. Josh Bowman has been denounced around the world for his video from Alberta, Canada as he celebrated the slow killing of the bear.
Bowmar, 26, is a bodybuilder and a former All-American javelin thrower at Heidelberg University who apparently dreamed of stabbing a bear to death with a spear. The Columbus, Ohio native is shown with the dead bear with its intestines falling out of its stomach. He is shown dancing and cheering the kill. Other hunters have denounced him for a kill that might have taken up to 20 hours for the bear to finally die.
Bowmar killed the bear a day after his wife Sarah killed another bear with a rifle. Bowmar can be seen gleefully celebrating what must have been an prolonged death of this bear, saying “I just did something I don’t think anybody in the world has ever done.” There may be a reason for that. Hunters have said that they are disgusted by the videotape and Bowmar’s thrill kill.
Bowman was able to lure the bear with the help of guides John and Jenny Rivet, who run livinthedreamproductions and features scores of dead black bears and other animals on their website. I will admit that I have never understood trophy hunters. I have been a hiker and backpacker for decades and love seeing bear in the wild. I could not imagine seeing such majestic animals in the wild and then wanting to kill it to some how possess it for myself. I recently discussed how the famed East Pack of Denali National Park has been likely lost after a hunter waited just outside the park to shoot the last male from the pack. Nevertheless, I know many hunters who are some of the most serious environmentalists and respect their sport. However, the glee of slicing open the stomach of a bear makes most hunters and non-hunters recoil.
Here is the video:
What this guy did is neither wrong morally or legally. Objections come from people thinking that wild animals are cuddly critters who are just like us. Black bears are dangerous and kill people, but they are not as aggressive as grizzlies. So it still takes some guts to kill one with only the kind of weapons our ancestors had. Of course, lots of our ancestors wound up dead from doing this too. I also noted that the guy had a pretty hefty spear that would kill the bear more certainly if he tagged him with it. So his choice of weapon showed he had concern about actually killing the bear quickly, rather than having a light spear which would more than likely cause only a wound. I think that if this guy had tried this with a grizzly, we would not be seeing this since they would not have survived the encounter.
I also have to say that it was the premier big game hunter Teddy Roosevelt and progressive who was the leading conservationist of our country and did more for wild life than any urban citizen or anti-hunting partisan. Wild life has to be conserved and the interests of humans and must be managed properly since we have the means to do so. That also means culling herds, and managing hunting of predators. Not doing so results in cruelty to people and wild life. Killing is good under the right circumstance and for the right reasons. This guy put his own life on the line, and his critics can only see the plight of a “poor” bear who would just as easily kill those who sympathize with it. Let those bear multiply, and I hope that the critics families will lose some members or pets to the bears. Then we will see a major change in how they view this video.
Paul
You have defined it; exhibitionism, willing to say anything if it gets attention, typically, simply and inanely going against common sense, kind of like Trump. Cheap thrills, no grey matter to speak of, I believe it’s called sociopathy bordering on psychopathy.
This guy has a screw loose as do his wife and friends. He is probably a Trumpster and goes hunting with the little Trumps. There is the act, which is despicable, then there’s the jubilation. There’s hunting for meat, sport, but this is of another mentality altogether. The only thing worse than watching this video-couldn’t make it all the way past the jubilant thanks to heaven or god or whatever-would be to meet this guy. He makes my skin crawl all the way through the video. I can imagine what it would be like in person.
What do we do with mentally ill humans like this celebrating bear killer? Jail and prison is too expensive. Mental hospitals can not cure. Death is against the Sixth Commandment. So: chain gangs.
One of my favorite sayings kind goes like this:
“There’s nothing wrong with extreme pleasure as long as you are careful about what thrills you”.
This asshat obviously was not very careful💩
Is this where our narcissistic society ends up? Good call Darren. Paul, I think you might just want to ask “why” once in while.
slohrss29 – I appreciate people who think or work outside the box. A guy who is willing to go bear hunting with a spear, like our ancient ancestors, deserves my admiration. I do not like that he left it over night, but I would not track a wound bear overnight with a howitzer.
Paul: I got cut off. You were the one spewing all that mantra about lee Harvey Oswald getting a raw deal. “Cut off at the pass”, you said. I was the inmate with the BLM button on my shirt. I was the only dog on the ward.
BLM Dog – getting shot before you see you attorney is a raw deal, you will have to admit.
Paul: I remember you from the psych ward that we were both on.
“I especially find it especially hypocritical when they condemn this fellow but support abortion or euthanasia.”
Bears aren’t inside women’s bodies. The only person who decides whether someone shall remain pregnant is the person who is pregnant. (With reasonable restrictions such as terminating early.)
And individuals, once born, have the right to decide when to die: not you or anyone or the government.
I can easily turn this around on you by the way. How can someone who is pro-life defend the pointless and unnecessarily brutal death of anything living, why because it’s not human? Talk about hypocrisy.
I grew up hunting and fishing but would never take a animal in such a gruesome manner. Seems over the top and unnecessary.
But I think it a bit hypocritical when people condemn such while munching on McDonald’s.
I especially find it especially hypocritical when they condemn this fellow but support abortion or euthanasia.
Don’t worry, in another 20 years sport hunting will be outlawed along with other nonconforming behaviors and hate speech.
I have no problem with legal hunting. People don’t realize when you do it legally, tags and licenses must be purchased, at a very high price. Wildlife needs to be culled. Sorry, but it is a fact of life, just like forests need to be cleared. Taking down a bear with a spear is quite an achievement. In certain parts of the country, bears are reaching nuisance proportions, thanks to people who don’t approve of hunting. It is necessary to make sure the populations are controlled or they start killing people. Also, if the populations are not controlled, it is detrimental to the health of the animal, itself.
Where I live, we are now plagued by mountain lions, to the point where I can’t even move into my mother’s home until a specific portion of her yard is completely cleared. Mama Mountain Lion likes to keep her babies in the wildlife culvert which connects one side of the highway to the river. They roam the entire are. Unfortunately, not enough females have been killed each year, for the past few years. Humans are now seriously in danger from them. We lived in terror that my father, who had Alzheimer’s, would get out and become a victim to one.
Bears, wolves, javelina, coyotes, and mountain lions are so common where I live (and I live in town) that we cannot take our small dogs out once it is dark. During a recent snow, I found six inch mountain lion tracks in my carport. Everyone took to feeding elk who were hanging around in town. Now there is a herd of at least a hundred. They attract predators.
Bears are predators. They are an apex predator. They kill people. If there is an over-population of them, they become a total nuisance, moving into the suburbs. My best friend woke up, one morning, to find a juvenile brown bear in her kitchen. It could have ended in disaster.
And, my family has a 2300 acre ranch in Lincoln County, NM. I make about $5000 a year from hunting leases. I also work directly with Game & Fish to make sure everything is completely legal.
What a piece of shit this guy is!
Paul:
I wouldn’t need the nerve because I have heart that says that you don’t wound a bear when you cannot take it immediately. And, I would have a brain that tells me not to wound an animal like this without having a long gun to take him out if he attacked. If this man cannot handle what would happen when using a spear perhaps it might be better for him to not use a spear and instead use a shotgun or a rifle. To do otherwise is foolish.
This guy, his wife and the Rivets will hopefully be called out and shamed on social media which will affect their lives and livelihoods. I have many friends who hunt and are appalled by jerks like these folks.
And then we call savages the natives that used to hunt to feed and clothe their families. We were supposed to bring our cultural values and society mores to them. But we took their land and killed most of them and the ones that survived we discriminated against them and enslaved them.
Our society and our mores are the ones that create aberrations like this man and his wife. God help them and their children!
Darren – you have the nerve to follow a wounded bear at night with a spear???
This is what happens when big-city boys go hunting. He should have followed the bear and finished him off right then instead of allowing the bear suffer all night because he was afraid of the dark. I suspect he is the type of person who might find a road-killed elk, take its antlers to mount on a wall, then brag about how he shot it at 800 yards using iron sights.
Anyone who has the intestinal fortitude to go bear hunting with a spear has all of my admiration.
He’s a sick psycho not a hunter. Allowing the bear to suffer for 20 hrs is beyond the pale.
You’re right that this is the type of behavior that most hunters condemn.
I have never hunted, but I have a lot of friends and family who do. There is a certain pride in filling your freezer with game and fish you caught yourself. Plus, the animal is spared the filthy conventional feed lot, GMO feed, and the horrors of the slaughterhouse. It lives wild and free, and eats the original organic diet as long as the environment is not contaminated. When killed correctly, it is dropped quickly, compared with the gruesome slaughterhouse mistakes. Most hunters are also conservationists, understand the tragedy of the commons, and care about the environment. They want a quick, clean kill specifically to feed themselves and their families.
This guy seems to have the hallmarks of the psychopath – enjoying the suffering of an animal. Canned hunts are pathetic. I suppose he believes he is like the mighty paleolithic hunter, slaying a danger to the tribe with his bare hands. In reality, this was a canned hunt and he botched it so badly the bear lingered in pain. This wasn’t a cave lion he prevented from mauling a kid. It looks like a small black bear which he made to look bigger by putting the camera up close with him far behind the bear. I could be wrong about the size.
We’re a nation of hypocrites. Thousands of babies killed every day in abortion mills, but we want to plea bargain with our consciences by pretending to be lovers of nature.
BPM– Black Bears Matter. I won’t watch the video. I would like to see a bounty put on this dork’s head and then see the head on the end of a spear and hung out to dry in Ohio. If someone murders him in retaliation I will celebrate.