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GoDaddy.com CEO Bob Parsons under fire for Zimbabwe elephant-hunting video

March 30, 2011 | 11:21 am


GoDaddy.com Chief Executive Bob Parsons has been drawing angry comments and threats of boycotts and cancellations after he posted a video of him killing a problem bull elephant during a hunting expedition in Zimbabwe.
The video (viewer discretion advised due to graphic content) shows the CEO and his hunting party looking over a farmer's damaged crops, shooting at elephants at night, and Parsons posing with the dead bull. It also shows crowds of villagers field dressing the carcass the next morning.
"I kind of figured that this might happen. So be it, I'm not ashamed of what I did," Parsons, whose Scottsdale, Ariz.-based company provides domain and Web hosting services, told myFoxPhoenix Tuesday. "All these people that are complaining that this shouldn't happen, that these people who are starving to death otherwise shouldn't eat these elephants, you probably see them driving through at McDonald's or cutting a steak. These people [Zimbabwe villagers] don't have that option."
While a preponderance of the comments posted on Parsons' website blog were negative, he has his proponents.
"As long as it goes to good use as food then it's all good," posted Chad from Texas; "I'm sure local villagers appreciated the protein," wrote Alan Dean Foster of Arizona; and, from Jonathan Mackenzie of Zimbabwe, "As a Zimbabwean who has worked in ... areas where the necessity to kill [rogue] animals takes place I appreciate your actions regardless of your motivations."
Parsons posts an explanation on his hunts -- this was his second -- to take out problem elephants:
I spend a few weeks in Zimbabwe each year helping the farmers deal with problem elephants. The people there have very little, many die each year from starvation and one of the problems they have is the elephants, of which there are thousands and thousands, that trash many of their fields destroying the crops. The tribal authorities request that I and others like me, patrol the fields before and during the harvest -- we can't cover them all, there are just a few of us -- and drive the elephant from the fields. The farmers try to run the elephants away by cracking whips, beating drums and lighting fires. All of this is ignored by the elephants. When my team catch elephants in a field (there are never just one) we typically kill one of them and the rest leave for good. After we kill an elephant the people butcher the elephant and it feeds a number of villages. These people have literally nothing and when an elephant is killed it's a big event for them, they are going to be able to eat some protein. This is no different than you or I eating beef. If at all possible we avoid elephant cows and only kill mature bulls. By just killing bulls it has no effect on the elephant social structure (as it is matriarchal) as well as the herd size. The reason is another bull quickly steps up and breeds in place of the bull taken.
Parsons said that the hunts and helping the starving villagers is the most rewarding of everything he does, and that he hopes to go again next year.

my god ...... and all of this by people who probably eat meat as well......i think we should rather start at the conditions at local slaughterhouses. I am not pro meat or pro hunt, but i do think considering the ethical questions of hunting i think slaughterhouses are worse. Its much less hazardous to kill an animal in the wild and shoot it. (Except you are too dumb to hit it right, but even then its better then those meat mass production companies. Its interesting to see people`s reactions:
I wonder if all boycotts (no threats though) would be adressed where they REALLY belong, how much of meat production would be surviving?

A cable show was devoted to this woman (from America) trying to kill an African Bull elephant. She had to stand not too far away from it, where she was endangered if it charged, and shoot it in the middle of the head with a large caliber rifle. She went on about what a privilege it was to kill such a magnificent creature, yada yada. She finally fell the huge beast.

Then something disgusting came to light. They revealed that this was the second elephant she had killed. The first one she had killed on a trip with her husband, a high powered CEO. He had died and she 'had to prove that she could do it without him.' What an ego trip. She took the money her husband had earned, bought a guide and safari to Africa and killed a second elephant under the delusion she was stronger than the elephant.

I'm pro hunting and pro meat but I almost thru up. Seriously.

Parsons posts an explanation on his hunts -- this was his second -- to take out problem elephants:
I spend a few weeks in Zimbabwe each year helping the farmers..... and that he hopes to go again next year. Originally Posted by Marshall

"I spend a few weeks....each year...."


Twice isn't a tradition....he makes it sound like he's been going with his Pappy since he was knee high....

Then something disgusting came to light. They revealed that this was the second elephant she had killed. The first one she had killed on a trip with her husband, a high powered CEO. He had died and she 'had to prove that she could do it without him.' What an ego trip. She took the money her husband had earned, bought a guide and safari to Africa and killed a second elephant under the delusion she was stronger than the elephant.

I'm pro hunting and pro meat but I almost thru up. Seriously. Originally Posted by gnadfly

I understand your notion on the throwing up part. Yet i do see such things as a matter of portrayal of the right proportions. I don`t support hunting, i think hunting would not be necessary if humans would not destroy systematically enviroment for animals. But that is a different story.

What i don`t understand - its psychologically proofen though - is that people seem to be outraged by incidents that are rather rare and are happening far away from them. No one finds the happenings in a slaughterhouse worth to throw up, althought they most likely are FAR more worth throwing up.

I think its easy to turn your head and your focus on to something that is absolutely not related to yourself and your actions and then put the fionger towards it. Its much harder to look yourself in the eye and see what is happening around you every day.