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How Hunting Signals the Psychological Need for Power Over the Innocent
In September of this year Idaho Fish and Game Commissioner Blake Fischer emailed and posted photos showing him smiling over the kills he had made during sport hunting in Namibia, Africa. It caused an uproar. When he was asked to resign his post by the Governor of Idaho, he apologized for sharing photos of what he called his “harvesting” of the animals. He indicated that part of his purpose had been to impress his wife and give her a “feel” for Africa. The hunt was legal. That is, it was legal to kill the creatures who moments before their death were living free in their own habitat, unaware of the hunter who needed the kills to satisfy something deep inside him — an emptiness of spirit he thought he could fix by exerting power over innocent animals. He used the word “harvesting” as if the animals in the wilderness were plant food, though he had no intention of consuming what he had destroyed: these animals were trophies.
In the wilderness, the lion does not always catch the gazelle, the wolf does not always bring down the moose or deer. They go after their prey in a fair fight, and sometimes lose their life trying, when the long legs of their prey kick at them in self-defense.
Guns have nothing to do with a fair fight. Guns always win. In Alaska hunters have been known to fly in small planes over the protected wilderness and shoot at wolves traveling with their pack, killing wolf pups as easily as the adults. These hunters believe they are justified in doing this, even knowing that the wolves rarely attack humans. There have been few documented cases in the U.S.— between 1950 and 2002 there were only three. The aerial shootings do not represent a fair fight — they reveal the willingness to slaughter innocents.
While carrying out her groundbreaking work with chimpanzees, Dr. Jane Goodall developed and supported research on baboons in Tanzania at her Gombe Stream Research Center. A wealth of material shows the intelligence of baboons and the intricate and extended family relationships of these primates. Baboons, who were among the prey Fischer sought out in Africa, rarely attack unless their family is threatened.
In the photo that opens this article, an adult baboon in a natural habitat sits looking out at the sea. Two other…
