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Godaddy chief murders an elephant
SERIAL ANIMAL KILLER Bob Parsons, the not publicity shy boss of the web hosting firm Godaddy, has shot an elephant while in Africa, posted a sickening video of the event and claimed he did it for the greater good.
Before anyone jumps in to point it out though, The INQUIRER has no doubt that this was a disgusting act, but one that apparently Parsons feels very proud of.
Freshly back from his holidays, Parsons uploaded a video of the kill to the Vimeo website under the headline "Hunting Problem Elephant". Yes, 'problem elephant'.
The killing, you see, was a purely altruistic one and saw the Godaddy CEO board a plane, load up with ammo and hunt a majestic creature not for pleasure, although he does enjoy it, but because it was causing a problem. Thus, we are expected to believe, there is no shame in his [big] game.
"Each year I go to Zimbabwe and hunt problem elephant. It's one of the most beneficial and rewarding things I do. This video shows a typical day of this year's trip", he wrote underneath the video, which shows him take revenge on the animal kingdom for daring to walk around eating vegetation while paying no heed to signs made by farmers.
After sitting around in the dark to exact swift vengeance on animals that come out at night to feed and must be located by walking through thick plants in the pitch blackness, Parsons and his team of hunters open fire on three elephants, killing one and causing two to find a new picnic spot.
The video carries on, though not in the sort of vein you would expect from a promotional 'feelgood' video.
The next scenes, after some photos of Parson's standing next to his dead trophy, are shot in daylight and show a field full of Godaddy baseball cap wearing 'hungry villagers' hacking away at the dead animal with knives and running off with its meat, all the while accompanied by an AC/DC soundtrack. That's an image that is unlikely to be repeated in any other web host marketing material, but it apparently is regarded as very rewarding by Parsons.
Godaddy customers are voting with their feet, in some cases all four of them. PETA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, was a customer, but after seeing the video it has pulled its website from the web host.
"Bob Parsons, the CEO of GoDaddy.com (a major Internet domain-hosting company), has killed at least one elephant and a leopard for his personal enjoyment. PETA is closing its account with Go Daddy and urges everyone to follow suit," said the organisation.
"Parsons is hiding behind the lame claim that killing elephants helps farmers in Africa whose crops are damaged by the animals... Instead of coming up with flimsy excuses for killing these highly intelligent and social animals, Parsons should use his wealth to fund humane solutions to human/elephant conflicts."
Suggestions that he might fly to Libya next to sort out the population's problems there are in bad taste and unfounded. µ
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How easy it is to kill for sports with a rifle. If parson would have some honour and decency, at least he'd be trying to kill the animal with something else then a fire weapon. Maybe a bow, a knife or a spear. At least the odds would be more equal like a bull fighter and a bull. Anyway, I don't think animals should be bread and killed for things other then food.
Bloody townies should keep their traps shut on, it's how to treat animals in rural areas, let alone rainforests.
Go fix a computer somewhere, and leave the difficult squishy bits to the experts.
What will he hunt next?
In the northern reaches of The States you can feed the bears one summer and when they are addicted to Fast Food come back the next year and get a permit to kill them because they disturb camper (looking for Fast Food usually not counting the campers as food. However when you have a permit it is a Brave and Manly thing to do because it protects innocent humans from natural consequences. Go figure - it's not that easy to find a balance when some think it is OK for humans to change it all the time.
Bob Parsons having a brain tumour is the only excuse for not fighting like a man. He should retire to Zimbabwe to fulfill his life style dream. Shooting animals for pleasure makes Bob Parsons the worst kind of shark and humans hunting sharks is pure survival.
I totally agree with "African conservationist" , Feral pigs and buffalo plus other species including native animals are regularly hunted via rifle and bow here in the Top End of Australia because growing numbers of these animals cause immense damage to normal pristine bushland and wetlands. Hunting is sometimes necessary.
Firstly, you cannot, by definition, "murder" an elephant.
Secondly, elephants, through the successful control of ivory trading, have grown significantly in numbers and are causing problems to both human agriculture and devastation of national parks vegetation. Unfortunately, elephants and other wild animals can no longer traverse millions of square kilometres freely. This means that they need to be managed in order to preserve their herds, the vegetation they feed on and human agriculture.
The most effective way of managing them is to have professionally monitored hunting groups that go out to shoot pre-selected elephants or herds. Because of the danger, foreigners pay fortunes for this privilege and this money is then used to employ local people that manage the conservation of the national parks.
By employing these people you are preventing desertification through cattle overgrazing or bush clearing and you are protecting all animals because they would all end up being poached for meat.
The solution is not ideal as it is not nice having to shoot an animal because it is no longer needed, but it does work and everybody wins, including bunny hugger nitwits who can still come to Africa to see it and all its animals in the rugged majesty of this awesome continent.
This is about a rich white guy going to africa to kill animals using any flimsy excuse he can find, this isn't about africans dealing with their own issues.
If that's too hard for you to understand you should perhaps leave the internet as participator.
I switched my domains gymgoal.com and smaltek.com to iWeb 2 years ago and I'm happy with that. I bet the iWeb guys in Montreal don't kill elephants :-) besides they have better prices :-)
So when did fat Westerners have the right to tell Africans how they should to run their country?
I know South Africa have culled hundreds of elephants because they were becoming "to many" because of the moratorium on ivory exports.
Tanzania, Kenya and Zambia have had hunters employed to kill problem animals, mostly lions and crocks that eat people.
Sweden had 5 wolves and they were killed because they were a danger to people though there is not one case here in Canada the last hundred years were a citizen have been killed by wolves and we got them everywhere. Where were PETA and all you righteous people then?
If there were any wolf or lion left in little England I bet, they would be dead before nightfall. So while I dislike GoDaddy and would never use them for complete different reasons and I do not have an opinion about its CEO. What he did would have been routine if any animal larger than a cat was any threat what so ever in most European countries!!!
I saw Bob Parsons interviewed on CNN today and he was totally unapologetic - and indicated he would continue killing elephants. As consumers, we have the ability to take down his company, which is what I suggest we do. Cancel you service with GoDaddy and advise your friends to do the same. Parsons doesn't know it yet, but the world can survive quite nicely without his bloody company.
I've been a longtime reader of the inq and have sadly watched it deteriorate since Mike left.
The final straw is to see you seriously using the word "murder" to apply to killing an animal at a time when people are being slaughtered in many areas of the world.
Goodbye, Inq. You were once worth reading, but now you can keep your obnoxious ads and juvenile, senseless, retarded rants to yourself.
The video is on youtube not vimeo.
If you MUST watch it please also vote it down, thanks.
If the people were truly starving and there were really such a big elephant problem, I'm sure the villagers would be killing elephants for food.
The explanation just stinks of a lame excuse. But the only thing I'm sure he'll learn is not to post a video the next time.
Godaddy hosting already stink enough that unfortunately I don't an account to cancel.
I generally support most things that irritate or annoy PETA.
This is a great example of hunting for the right reason. Not just a trophy hunt, the meat was used and I bet the villagers used everything else too.
Go Parsons. If you need another guy to help or just another IT guy, I'm your man.
Whatever the convoluted reason Bob Parsons gives for killing elephants, the bottom line is that he enjoys killing animals, and apparently the bigger they are the more enjoyment it brings him. He and Michael Vick should do lunch!
Please inform yourself about a country before you make ridiculous claims. People in Zimbabwe do not have huge problems with elephants, in fact most of the wildlife has been killed off for no apparent reason. Breeding of cows, sheep and pigs can also feed them a lot more than a once a year killing of an elephant. Elephants do not venture far into your land unless they have no where else to graze, this does NOT give you the right to kill one.
If the people were so concerned about their land they would come up with better solutions to protecting them, and if you want to know I have lived in Zimbabwe for 11 years. People always want the easy solution, not the humane one.
I am the copy editor who had the honour of editing this story at The INQUIRER.
I'll say that some rather stronger words were proposed in our internal editorial discussion of this story, which I can't repeat here but you readers may surmise.
How convenient that there just happened to be a rogue (problem) elephant hanging around the village while GoDaddy's CEO was visiting there. And, of course, he just happened to have his hunting rifle with him! THERE ARE BETTER and MORE HUMANE METHODS OF DEALING WITH THESE PROBLEMS. Parsons could have used the opportunity to demonstrate some real brain power while he was in Africa instead of simply confirming that white man is a jerk(off) with a big gun.
I totally agree with what was done to the elephant. I don't believe in trophy hunting but this was a problem elephant and the meat was used to feed people who need their crops to survive. We would relocate or kill any animal in us but the meat would probably be wasted. I'm so glad all that meat went to help people.
If memory serves, he's something of a jerk anyways. Good job reminding the planet of that. Now if only he would go leap off a tall building...
I just love April Fools day! It brings out all sorts of crazy stories. The tie-in with PETA is a nice touch, I must say.
Would have been nicer had there actually been a video by that title on Vimeo.
Did you actually use the word "murder" in relationship to shooting an animal? Wow. How absurd. Do you also rant about how lions murder gazelles and how sharks murder sea lions?
The overpopulation of elephants is causing destruction of farmland, which results in starvation for villagers in some African countries. What's needed is better resource management, and that sometimes means culling the herd.
Elephants are truly beautiful animals, but I'm not going to save one to the detriment of human life.
And no one cares if PETA's "using" a site. They're so far out there that the mainstream basically regards them as completely out of touch with reality.
Bob parsons is a complete and total a**hole.