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OPINION: Lion hunter Melissa Bachman vs the internet vs the facts

Last week Thursday, American professional hunter Melissa Bachman became the subject of some unwanted attention. Her tweet posted on the 1st of November, in which she poses next to a dead male lion, was picked up by local Twitter users and attracted the ire of almost all who saw it. A beautiful lion killed for sport, right here in our back yard.

Since then, a petition has been set up on Change.org urging the South African government to deny Bachman future entry, and it’s garnered 150 000 signatures. There’s no word, yet, on whether the government will react to the request.

Others have  taken to their various soapboxes to air their opinions on the matter. 80s journalistic icon Jani Allan writes on her blog in defense of the lion, invokes Gandhi (albeit with a quote not found in his work), and is generally condescending towards the hunting crowd.

Internet-famous cartoon artist and brains behind The Oatmeal, Matthew Inman, came out in support of the petition. After all, nobody likes seeing the king of the jungle falling to something as cheap as a bullet. British comic Ricky Gervais also aired his opinion in a roundabout way, on Twitter. The same Twitter where thousands of South Africans – usually negative in their outlook for the country – were united by one lion’s death and a sprinkling of misogyny.

Arguably the most informed and balanced opinion of them all comes from Ivo Vegter, over at Daily Maverick. He tempers his point of view with facts like the income derived from international hunters visiting the country, jobs created by the private game industry, and how certain species have come to thrive under legalised hunting laws. That’s not to say we have to agree with animals being killed for fun – but his facts show that it is a necessary evil that could even prevent extinction.

The internet is a big place that’s brought the whole world together. Most other trophy hunters are either not as famous or don’t take to Twitter and Facebook, and have until now been spared the hatred of users on those services. Ironically, the very same tool that has enabled this collective outrage for citizens fighting against sport hunting and lion execution, is also the tool that could have been used to fact check all of this.

Bachman’s mistake? Using the internet a bit too much. The rest of the outraged population? Using it too little.

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