Finding Feathers.

Remember this: The smallest seemingly non-valuable object can speak volumes to you if you only listen to what it says to your heart of hearts.

**I wrote this Nov. 27, 2012. I thought of sharing it because it's interesting. Trust me...it leads to somewhere else.**

Last night. I was canning some broccoli leaves in wide mouth mason jars. I was thinking about this website I had read about finding a feather. it says you are put on the path. I can't lie, I feel like I have fallen off the path hard, or maybe it's my righteous indignation and blatant unwillingness to move forward. For the past year, I fell like deja vu is eating me up and I am looping back around in some weird Groundhog Day event.

As I was canning, I had a bright green stink bug fly up onto the white piece of plastic I was using for a cutting board. I thought that rather strange, it being November, and stink bugs are suppose to be gone. Here it was. The nature of the stink bug is to mind its own business. When something comes along and tries to mess up the stink bug's life it puts off this rather smelly odor akin to the taste of an unripe persimmon. Then again, it could be that smell from the chemicals put on tobacco in a curing barn.


This morning, I decided to go to the park for a morning walk. I stopped and spoke to my son as he waited for the bus because it was late. I walked on. As I was going up the dirt road to the short cut, I was mentally in the crapper. I looked down in the ditch I was crossing over and there was this black feather. It looked like a crow feather. I picked it up. It was really pathetic let me tell you. The shaft of it was all torn and stripped. It kind of repulsed me that it wasn't beautiful. Then I thought.....that feather is just like my attitude: all battered and uncomely. I pondered this. I decided I just needed to change my attitude. I could change that if not the feather. I didn't want to carry the feather with me because it was all out of juju but laid it on the fence to remind me before I leave that my bad attitude needed to stay with that out of sort feather.

I walked around the park and saw this really bright red bunch of leaves from a faux pear tree. The leaves were flaming red. I would later draw them to pass the time. I at least created something. I walked on to see the water tower covered with crows. Crows really run their mouths. They never shut up, run in packs, and menace society. They can remember your face. Yet they have their place in life. They moved to a tree. Eventually the crows disappeared.

I finally decided as I walked that I felt like I was shrinking into the ground. It really felt like under my feet was a strong magnet pulling me downward into the Earth. I thought about sitting under a tree but everyone had ant hills. I wondered if I were to have a sacred place to get right with the world that this wasn't it. Later it wouldn't leave my mind that I should take spray paint that glows in the dark and make a medicine wheel around my deer stand in the pine woods. I know that sounds weird but that was what my mind is tell me to do. I was looking for stuff to make a pipe because it would seem someone thinks that is needed but that's Sioux. I am not Sioux. Not everyone has Sioux blood.

I know how that whale feels. The one called Hertz 52. I feel like there is something I have to do, but I am not sure what it is. As I was walking home, I was traveling down the road that I was still on the right path, even though I had a moment of bad space in my head. I also feel like someone, or something has left me, and I don't know what it is, but believe that it should come back to me, but I am not sure that it left? How confusing is that? Without guidance, I am going to do all this ritual and ceremonial stuff to get to the bottom of what the universe is actually trying to tell me that I am to inept to decipher. I have felt like this past year has been one looping deja vu trip. There was one person that I really did want to connect to but other people just have to butt in when they should butt out.

I was sitting shaving a gourd to make a rattle or something else. I scrapped it and all I could thing of was this person. I don't even know them that is the strange part. Maybe there is something about this person that is like me? After I shaved the second one down to the hard part like deer horns, I finally looked at the sky and said, "I give up on this." I then went in the house. I figured that this being some illustrious mystery placed on me to let it go and see how it turns out. I thought as no one is here to glare at me with stern eyes to say anything about what I am doing, I am going to write about it. Besides it's supposed to help you heal and the people. As far as I am concerned my small wad of friends are my people so learn something from it. If it gives you something you best take it with a smile and be glad you got 'the message'.

~Written by: W Harley Bloodworth

~Courtesy of the AOFH~

The Hunting of Original Sin: Tale A Bite

Find Bosch's Unicorn.

Remember this: A sin was committed in the Garden of Eden. One bite was all it took.

Recently I was watching True Detective and Matthew McConaughey’s character Rust made a comment:

“It’s a form of meditation,” says Rust. “I contemplate the moment in the garden, the idea of allowing your own crucifixion.” (Screenwriter Nic Pizzolatto); Episode 1: Somebody’s Memory of a Town.

Which upon seeing this, the center piece for this little drama is a dead woman strapped to a tree in prayer position with a set of buck horns attached to her head.

Previously I was inspired to mull over the idea of Original Sin because the world is fraught with meat eaters or vegans fighting all the time. Just having this whole cycle of viciousness swirling around my plate at dinner time made me feel there truly was evil in the air. I noticed when you see cooking shows or food photos no one ever comments negatively on those. The food is already on the plate but let someone post something pre-pot and the guacamole flies. It is almost or non-existent on cooking shows. You just don’t see it. Andrew Zimmern can eat all he wants and no one complains. Maybe they write secret caches to these chefs no one knows about. I doubt people write critical letters about food choices in literary cookbooks with meat photos or that section on butchering.

Original Sin could have been "not being able to take instruction or general nosiness". I then thought as I ate my food, it had to be eating itself.

Meditation on topics of interest have always brought a sense of the 360 view of the world but only being able to look at one view at a time with bias seemed relevant. You have to give it the old college try. For all intents  and purposes, we will set aside the fact eating is a biological function where you slice, dice, cook, chew, digested and excrete; moving on.

I have for some time thought about man’s sin in the Garden of Eden. Life for man was pretty much sealed when Eve bit into the mystery fruit of the tree of knowledge. “Just a little bump”, as Wang would say.

I did reference out several sacred texts but for all intents and purposes is sourcing from my Archeological Bible.

Enter nakedness and Veganism.

Meditation: A snake convincing you to eat something you are not supposed to then suffering the consequences.

Genesis 3: 1-7

1 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, “You must not eat from any tree in the garden?”

2 The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden,

3 but God did say, “You must not eat fruit from the tree in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.”

4 "You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman.

5 "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

6 When the woman saw the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some an ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.

Here we have Eve in the Garden conversing with a snake, who cons her into eating the apple from the tabooed tree. Yet after they eat, Adam and Eve do not die, but see they are naked. Up till this point, there was no meat involved but the beginning of a quest for knowledge and hunger ensued. Did I mention the Holy Dictum of Curses? Even in this day and age man has a voracious appetite for knowledge and food.  Human kind quest pass the horizons of Earth, into the depths of space, so we can pretty much know everything that an omnipotent being would know. At the same time, totally eradicating the idea of a higher power. There is the idea no creator exist; just biological and universal hiccups and brain farts. You have haters of creationism and Darwinism. It almost compels a person to believe you have to be on team A or team B, unless you’re taking the job of referee. There is no end to it.

As I read along, the Curse of Veganism was uttered by the All Mighty.

Genesis 4: 17-19

17 To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, “You must not eat of it,”

“Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.

18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you and you will eat your food until you return to the ground since from it you were taken for dust you are and dust you will return.”

Sounds pretty dire to be cursed then all your offspring be-damned to eating plant life. Not that plants are bad.  I read some in the Qur’an and there were paragraphs where someone complained about eating quail. This is probably where we could assume agriculture began. Someone in time yelled, "I hate quail!"

Along the way, people acting badly came onto the scene. God flooded the world but before he cried all over the lands, directed Noah to build an Ark. Everyone knows the Ark was this big boat and animals of every kind were on board; two by two. When the waters receded, the rainbow hit the sky and those same animals were now on the menu. White dove of peace on top.

Enter those blood thirsty Meat-eaters of every course and kind. If it moves, it dies.

Genesis 9: 3-5

3 Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.

4 But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it.

5 And for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each man, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of his fellow man.

Conditions, Conditions.

As always, with being given everything, there are “conditions”. Always read the fine print. It would seem the Devil is not the only one trying to pull a fast one between the lines.  He’ll give humans everything but you can’t eat meat with lifeblood in it. It has to be Kosher. The quicker and humanely you can dispatch an animal, the better off you and the animal are. At the same time, it’s kind of sad when you see an animal hand-raised by a person, the animal trusts them with no idea of the harm that is coming, and they are butchered for the plate. People scarf the food down and move on to the next.

If the belief in curses (as an uttered curse) is intended to cause harm, or a form of judgment with punishment, then a body could deduce:

a) We have to kill something we grow to love to survive.

b) God slipped another instruction into the mix and if we don’t obey will be cursed further, killed or go to Hell and be tortured for all eternity.

c) Humans are constantly hungry and never feel satisfied.

d) No matter how much we eat there will be no end until we go back to dust.

e) The animals are going to report on us at Judgment Day for being overzealous Pac Men on planet Earth and the Holy Ghosts are in hot pursuit.

f) All this mumbo jumbo is wrong and Darwin is right. 

That is how curses work. The punishment usually fits the action that caused it. Take a bite today curse you tomorrow. That bite will follow you through eternity and all your ancestral lines. Snow White bit an apple then fell asleep and the Prince had to kiss her on the lips. That crap is situated around the mouth where all the trouble started, so keep your mouth off of things you know are bad for you. (Mild creepy laughter inserted here).

I guess people might need to start watching out for hairy palms and the symbol of the pentagram.

What does this have to do with hunting? Hunger is the punishment for the original sin of eating mystery fruit and going against God's conditions of anti-nosiness. Don't have dreams of grandeur either because you'll get slapped down eventually. (I am sure the Pope will argue this but he's taking selfies). As people who hunt, we go out into the world and seek sustenance to bring home in the form of dead animal carcasses, plants, root, mushrooms, whatever won’t kill you, is not nailed down, or outside the law. I forgot road-kill.

Eating is a never ending requirement for being human. People get so desperate for food that they put manufactured poisonous garbage in the ole pie hole to make things better. Empty calories stacking up by the minute and an ever expanding waist line compensated by the Fashion World’s stretchy jeans or pictures of unhealthy people being sold as an ideal. That’s a curse because it makes us blind and we just consume more and more till eventually diabetes, cardiovascular disease, renal failure, or some form of cancer gets you. It would be more poetic to choke on a chicken bone, a crust of bread with no corner to weep in, or even die for that matter.

It’s the same thing for people who fish.  Something has to go on the plate at the end of the day, whether we rip it up by the root, pluck it from a tree, or chop it's little head off. God that sounds awful! Once cursed as a vegan then rewarded as a Meat-eater. Don’t forget the Devil is in the details; read carefully. There is still Judgment Day ahead so don't get comfortable. Hail and brimstone await. 

 

Hunting is an activity to combat the toils of hunger. God’s curse on us all along was female menstruation and childbirth but that is another story; a dangerous one.

 

~Courtesy of the AOFH~

 

Written by: W Harley Bloodworth, Gypsy woman selling curses.

 

Cited Sources:

“Somebody’s Memory of a Town.” True Detective. Screenwriter: Nic Pizzolatto. Dir. Cary Joji Fukunaga, HBO, 2014. Series.

Hunting the Unicorn: It's a Trap!

Remember this: Perfume and love songs are romantic but it could cost you…..your horn.

After reading about the black rhinoceros hunting permit auction, my mind was at the pointy end of a horn. What is it about hardened tissue on the head that drove people to madness, turn on their family, or put them in harm’s way?

I decided to walk the perimeter of my social media, checking for holes that would-be creepy bandits could breach. Trust me. There is always someone trying to get in. On my excursions to public pages owned by exhibitionists, I had come across a question some person asked. How do you trap a unicorn? What motivation would drive a person to perform such an act in the first place? I thought the folly of this idea interesting because of the fact that there is tapestry art depicting the hunt of a horse-like creature with a single horn on its head. These works of art are referred to as the Unicorn Tapestries, which are interred in the Cloisters in New York.

In the spirit of one horned beasts, this seemed an appropriate subject. After all, the tapestry themselves, either true or fiction, are of a group hunting a mythical beast. It has the formula; men questing to catch or kill a beast, an innocent woman, and the ever-present shadow of deception or manipulation. Let us not forget death because this is how the story ends. Something has to die in exchange for something else.

What I needed was some kind of formal documentation. At what point did the unicorn first come into the reality of man? The list of historical names came into view. There was Ctesias, Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Prester John and Genghis Kahn. Yet no women?

This tapestry work could be symbolic of historical events from a bygone era. It could also be some strange documentation of a beast that lived once but now is extinct. We don’t know. There is no actual proof of a unicorn horn, skeleton, or other. Somewhere it would physically have to exist, unless it’s truly magical and evaporates back into the Ether from which gives the creature birth. This thought would require the person to believe in some kind of supernatural event or magic. This becomes like Bigfoot. Until you catch Bigfoot squatting in the woods, it’s still a pipe dream; possible but still improbable until there is proof.

If you took the tapestries literally, a mythical beast with one horn was hunted. Someone thought enough to create the work, otherwise it might be a fictional depiction of fanciful thoughts. Only mean unbelieving people want unicorns to not be real.

The physical description of unicorns vary depending on geographical region. The single horn on the forehead is the one factor shared over areas.

The misuse of Chinese Medicine has taught us that running from your mortality through the use of alternative medicines to prolong life can exterminate species or resources to extinction. Chinese Medicine has been blamed for the extinction of certain species. It would not be a large jump to believe back in medieval times, there was a one horned beast that could magically ward off evil, keep one from dying of poisoning, or eating its meat to rid one of demons. There are references in the bible about the Unicorn, but when documents were edited, it remains a mystery. It’s a sad day when sacred texts are rewritten to serve current agendas.

The question remained: How do you trap a unicorn?

I looked up several references to find that it was either by a woman, not necessarily physically pure like a virgin,  but pure of heart, perfume, or treachery.

The first example is take a good hearted woman, sit her down in the woods where a unicorn might be and bam…….unicorn comes over and puts its head in her lap. This could be elaborated on with some sort of perfume.

The second example is a man disguised as a woman, perfumes his clothes, wears a crown of flowers and sings a love song. The perfume yet again is what puts the unicorn to sleep on the treacherous pretender's lap. How awful! The unicorn is collared or trapped where by incarcerated or has its horn whacked off. Nothing good ever came from a trick. It is destructive to the tricks end. Reminds me of someone saying, “Ah, look over there.” Only to have you look at nothing then says, “And thus ends the trick.” A person can learn to distrust the trickster when one too many tricks are to be had. It’s the boy who cried wolf all over again. The only exception is Jared Leto.

I then went back to the question of: what motivation would drive a person to perform such an act in the first place? There are good and bad motives. On reflection, this endeavor I am sure is for selfish gain. Why would a man want to trap a unicorn? I give this person kudos for believing in the first place. Well played. I did some research. Most obvious questions were: Is there fear of poisoning? Does the unicorn hunter want immortality? Is there something else I am not seeing? Is the person looking for a spiritual experience outside the mundane into the sacred? Is there a more maniacal motive behind this endeavor? Is the man the unicorn who wishes to put his head in the maiden’s lap but fears the collar? Is the person feeling polluted and unclean yet wants to experience a form of baptism via the purity of what the unicorn represents? Questions. Questions.

The quest was in full swing.

As for love and spiritual experiences, we have the following passage.

“The unicorn’s meaning increased with pictures that interpreted it as symbolic of Christ or love. Christ was pierced on the cross as the unicorn was pierced by hunters. The analogy could not be extended any more than that, but another analogy with Christ presented itself; as the unicorn allowed itself to be tamed by a young woman, so Christ’s divine nature allowed itself to become a baby in Mary’s womb. In some 15^th century depictions, the unicorn could symbolize a man’s love, which permits a young woman to tame it and slip a collar on it. When a unicorn is shown tamed, in a collar or within an enclosure, love is more likely the meaning than Christ.” (Johnson 516)

Some would perceive this as a man’s moment of weakness because he falls in love with a beautiful woman that scares the shit out of him. For whatever reason he can’t make the decision to give it up. If we do as Angelia and turn the knobs of our viewing glass a mere 1/8 we might see this as an emotionally immature person’s moment of crux where he truly grasps the unicorn by the horn and becomes a man. Not literally speaking. I could say bull but it's turning out to be a bunch of bull anyway but the message is between the lines. Drink deeply of it. The man becomes brave…….without exerting himself other than deciding to do what he must or wants to do. Self-realization of a part of his manhood he hadn’t attained before. The person no longer has to be treacherous and deceive thus being himself and aligning with his sacred profane self; at peace. A unicorn is not necessary for this but people need their motivators. There will always be treacherous people attempting to lead you off the path. The good news is they might one day step out the dark onto the path themselves. It could happen.

How did hunters get a bad rap in the unicorn story? Those damn tapestries.

First off, the hunters killed a sacred beast. As the story goes, the unicorn  would come to important people during their life or death. That represents obstruction of the sacred and impeding on the timeline of world events to the negation of humanity. Through man’s treachery, a woman is used to capture the beast. Nothing much has changed down through the centuries. Women are either used by force, coercion, lies, or out of their own neediness to please and become a part of some group. One could also take this as the less force you use on gentle creatures the better the result because some animals and people do not require a heavy hand. To be fair men are used by women to. After all, there are female hunters that are not nice at all. Most assuredly every time the trick leads to the death of the unicorn; Evil’s desire to possess, conquer, and kill. No good comes from this desire even if there is some evil in the hearts of men. Some just have more than others.

In conclusion, if a hunter wants to trap a unicorn be weary of the motive. If the hunter is pure of heart and well-meaning then by all means pursue. If the hunter is truly unworthy, it is only through treachery that the physical laying of hands on the mythical beast will end in death. To project the sense of worthiness onto the hunter by besting the mythical beast is to attempt to attain God-like status or be as Achilles. Even Achilles had a heel. Anyone doing this wants to have God status and needs a reminder of humble humanness.

The unworthy hunter has malice in his black heart.  Yet again, maybe a gaping hole where a heart might have been?

“I have captured you and conquered the unicorn. Therefore the unicorn is beneath me because I am truly elevated above its divine purity and rite.”

This is not an honorable person and only through subjugation could make the inner malignancy of his heart fooled to elevation by over-powering something out of one’s comprehension. That is the test of a unicorn: to find a worthy person that does not need to capture, subjugate, degrade, or destroy the symbol of the profane and the sacred.

As for those tapestries, people like to mount heads on the wall for their conquests in hunting. It would be funny if some woman in time wove herself out a tapestry depicting her conquest of a man because she couldn’t put his literal head on the wall. She couldn't  make it obvious to people she was gloating over the conquest of a man, who laid down his sword. Maybe I should rethink the way that last sentence is written. Nope. There is more than one way to skin a knight.

In closing I conjured a poem in my own tacky fashion:

When Midnight Blue

Meets Twilight Night

On Moon Beams dust

Weigh your heart,

O Hunter of Horn,

If treachery filled,

Deceit shall fail

If purity reigns,

Your love song sonnet shall prevail.

~W Harley Bloodworth, poet~

~Courtesy of AOFH~

Written by: W Harley Bloodworth

Works Cited:

Johnson, Ruth A. All Things Medieval: An Encyclopedia of the Medieval World. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO.  (2011). Print. Pg. 516

Knowlton and the Black Rhino: A Faustian Tale.

Remember this: A Fool and his money soon parts ways.

Disclaimer: This is a critique of humans acting badly and questionable deals that are made on the not so shady sly.

I recently read about the shenanigans of Corey Knowlton, the Dallas Safari Club Auction and the Namibia government. Out of general interest I wanted to look at certain aspects of this controversy. As for the animal in question I have seen it stated as a western black rhinoceros.

In the beginning there was a hunter who made a bid….then Hell broke loose. Down in Hell the devil was dancing a gig. The devil knew there was no chance of snow that day; or was there?

Corey Knowlton bid on a chance to hunt an extinct creature in South Africa. The devil’s minion was reporting on how well things were going. There was coveting, lust, dissension, and other things escaped from Pandora’s box and the week was not even out. There was more than one thing burning in Dallas and it wasn’t the death of JR Ewing or the oil rigs.

Online sources are publishing Knowlton is saying his family and life are threatened because of his decision to pursue such an activity with his winning bid even though there are online sources that state he realized there were others bowing out of the bid as the auction proceeded. This should have been the moment when the smell of sulfur came to his nose but he was seduced by a dream, a longing, an illusion of grandeur with a promise of doing good when in fact it would only do harm. A man could sale his soul for a moment and the bid was up to $350,000. The devil was about to punch his ticket and yet there was still more to come.

I didn’t want to bore the general read with black rhinoceros extinction facts or other biological details. You can clearly Google that and find what you want in detail or better yet talk to a biologist that works with them or conservationist. I have hunted the internet for some kind of conservation plan for the remaining members in South Africa for details but there doesn’t seem to be any as of yet but I will look on.

The pinpoint light that I would like to inspect, as always, at closer inspection or from afar is the behavior of Knowlton and the people that are involved or even yet the groups that are participating in this fiasco.

At first read the declaration that Knowlton was ‘outed’ on social media appears. Use of that term almost harkens to misdeed or wrong doing but not to take it literally someone was sitting on the fence waiting for that moist would be buffalo chip to drop. Your best publicist is always your enemy or better yet someone from your own camp.

Corey Knowlton spent $350,000+ for the chance to hunt a black rhinoceros in the southern African nation of Namibia. I really would like to see the end ticket for this because I can’t imagine that this is an all-inclusive hunting vacation without the other travel particulars. I see the dollar signs stacking up. Something like this you know he’s going to tape it and it will most likely land somewhere for public viewing. Where do you get that much money anyway to drop paperback like that for an excursion that is truly and blatantly an excessive guilty pleasure. People with money (not all) can do whatever they want. Not that I would be one to tell him how to or what to do with his money but that is a lot of frequent flyer miles. If you have been poor before and have that kind of swag lying around you are not going to waste it only to end up in poverty again. Unless you have become drunk with power and excess to think it would go on forever and start to abuse the privilege of a cushioned financial pocket. Keeping up with the Jones will do that to you. I can’t even buy tampons and this blows my mind. I am lucky to get a new pair of shoes every year. Personally I don’t hate him or his money but sometimes having too much is trouble because you start to misuse the money instead of using it wisely. You lose your ability to be humble.

Knowlton is a co-host on the Outdoor Channel called Jim Shockey’s The Professionals” and he is an avid hunter. I am sure Shockey enjoys all that publicity. If Knowlton is a professional I would speculate that he has online dealings and knows very well what kind of dark things are attached to high profile hunting. For him to now sit inside of a hotel and whine about his life being threatened and the FBI helping him is truly ridiculous. Why would you do that to your kids and wife? Doesn’t sound like he thought this little mission to Mars through.

This guy has either knowingly or unwittingly become part of the Anti-hunting and Hunting’s establishment’s three ring circus as the pivot monkey. My mind toyed with the idea of the sacrificial lamb because this is going to draw lots of publicity for these high profile hunters and the Outdoor Channel. Oh wait. We have two sacrificial lambs: Knowlton and the Black Rhino. Sounds like a shady children’s book.

Its public knowledge there has been online fights and instigation between Anti-hunting and Hunting groups since social media was installed and before.

**This is actually another Melissa Bachman except the name has changed and the animal is denoted as extinct. **

On to the animal in question: The ??? rhinoceros.

Let’s look at the animal. If the auctioned animal is alive how can it be extinct? Namibia has one to spare. Looking back there was a paper in Pachyderm where the last member was poached and so in 2011 was considered extinct. Namibia, you’ve been holding out on us. What else are you hording there in those lands? Is this really even a black rhinoceros, a subspecies, zoo animal, or park animal? Did this animal come from a Rhino Trust Camp or a national park? Is the media misrepresenting the true animal…….what a debacle!

Red flags are going off all over the place.

Insert: It really pisses me off when the media rushes to expose a story with little or no details either than hearsay.

In all of this I have yet to see where the said black rhinoceros originated. Where does this auctioned off extinct black rhinoceros make birth for the American bidder to hunt? Who actually has this rhino? Why is that not being pursued? What was the deal with the South African government and the Dallas Safari Club? Someone had to slap old Horny up on the auction block but the media sensation is going completely to the hunter with the winning bid? Let’s blame it all on him. I smell camel shit; no way, bullshit.

There was the argument that this rhinoceros for trade (we give you shot at rhino-you give us big paycheck) was being done to help save the species or improve conservation in Namibia.  In brief what could this mean for the animal itself? Let us turn our eyes on why this one animal is no longer a breeding valuable past its bid fee. In a breeding program it would have to be old or something wrong about the animal to make it an undesirable breeder if it breeds at all.  There could also be a numbers of reasons to keep things at a certain herd number or standard. Either way this is pretty much a euthanasia mission at cost. If a man is paying $350,000 he better bring back something from that trip. I can’t see a breed-able animal in good health being sacrificed for someone’s fancy. I am sure there is something amiss here.

Why would Namibia take a known animal that is denoted as extinct and intentionally auction said animal out to a known safari club for money when the general consensus of the world at large is to rigorously conserve animals that are deemed extinct especially when its high profile on the internet?

Even though by standards extinct means when the last member of that species is dead; there are times when a species is considered extinct with living members. The numbers are extremely low and the hope the herd or species will recover is non-existent or extremely unlikely. There is also the possibility they are being hidden.

If you are going to conserve you have to have a plan.

I looked an only found, from the KOEDOE site, a proposed conservation plan for the black rhinoceros Diceros bicomis in South Africa. Surely if there is survivors that are hidden from poachers there has to be some kind of conservation plan. This should be part of their argument not just the mass believing in the words of a group of people that say, “Trust me I am a……..”.

Let us swing back over to Knowlton. There is a quote where Knowlton says per CNN’s post entitled Winner of Black Rhino Hunting Auction: My $350,000 Will Help Save Species, “I’m a hunter. I want to experience a black rhino. I want to be there and be part of it. I believe in the cycle of life. I don’t believe that meat, you know comes from the grocery store. I believe that animal died and I respect it,” Knowlton said Thursday night on CNN,’s Piers Morgan Live.”

Here I thought why drag meat into this. People knew immediately it had nothing to do with meat and here a hambone was being brought to a knife fight for protect. Come on?

The article states it is an “old rhino”. It does read that the money is not going specifically to rhinoceros conservation solely but to other species around the world.  Wait a minute? I thought this was the South African government. Since when do they take vital money and distribute it around the world? There is also the acknowledgement that it’s emotionally dire conversation so don’t cry foul when people threaten your life. He already knew what was coming. No virgin in the woods this one.

This is so Faustian. Knowlton is highly successful yet he makes a pact with the devil (aka the Dallas Safari Club and the South African government) to give a portion of his own soul in exchange for the worldly pleasure of killing a rare animal that is already considered extinct through money. To some degree his meditation could be suggested as surrendering moral integrity to achieve the power to do something other people do not get or want to do because he can. Also how money corrupts even the best of souls that on later reflection realize that maybe they themselves were hoodwinked by selfish desires or corruption from within because you hung out with people that whispered in your ear.

After all I have come to the conclusion for myself that this act was not one of hunting but more of a man trading in his hunting ethic, morals, and values momentarily to be the euthanasia guy while paying a hefty price tag out of his pocket to do someone else’s dirty work just so he could say he got to kill a black rhinoceros. On the other hand let this be a cautionary tale of how an organization can woo you with the fulfillment of a dream when in reality they are only taking advantage of your desires and sucking you for your money like a leech or tick sucks the blood out of you while getting fat. Slow and steady.

Then again the reality of life is the animal can die a natural death or someone has to be the bullet or ax man. I guess Knowlton acquiesced to the cheapness of being the bullet man and not a hunter. Overall I suspect he was willingly taken advantage of.

As for anyone threatening to kill women and children, crazy is as crazy does. The FBI should finally arrest people for doing such. There is no need for it. I heard a quote from the movie The Help, “All you do is scare and lie to try and get what you want.” People really should be ashamed of their behavior but the opening to Hell is wide and deep. Just look inward. It’s right there inside your ugly heart. Trading one cruelty for another is hypocritical.

A prediction: After this little shit storm is over. There will be this lovely well written piece on all the efforts being made, where the money will go, and why there is validation for such a thing. Until then let the media circus with its assorted clowns from both sides walk a tight rope of hoopla because there is no business like show business. Maybe this should be on E-Entertainment.

~Courtesy of the AOFH~

Written by: W Harley Bloodworth

Bachman In Narnia? The Lion, the Witch, and the African Lady.

Remember this: In the Narnia Chronicles, Aslan is tied on a mound, clipped  and sacrificed in Edmund's stead. The children watch from afar as the White Witch mocks Aslan and slays him with her knife.


Recently, I read the exploits of Melissa Bachman's African lion hunt. This story is making the rounds, but I  could swear this is not a new picture. There is also this lady that wants her banded from hunting in Africa ever again. 5000+signers...... Am I suffering Deja vu?

Let us look at the facts. Bachman entered Africa, went to the Maroi Conservancy, shot a lion during an African government approved legal lion hunt. Took some photos and posted on Twitter. Outrage ensued. Enter enraged African woman that wants Bachman banned from hunting in Africa. Petition ensues. Online drama commences. Bachman shuts down and goes into the Bachman Witness Protection program.

Here I say to you, in my personal opinion that I in no way share the same mentality of Bachman. I do not like or dislike Bachman. I don't condone or judge the way she lives her life which is her's to live for fair or foul. I do not ever desire to hunt African wildlife---ever. My life and hers are two totally different landscapes with different consequences. I see Bachman's life as entitled and excessive, but like Marilyn Monroe, she has built a hunting persona that is displayed to the world. Whether that is the real person; viewers will never know because she is after all a television personality. I don't understand why, as a woman, she gets more refuse than the men thrown at her.

Marilyn Monroe became entrapped in a persona of her own making to please the populace and made her way in Hollywood, at the expense of her life quality. This eventuated in her suicide due to the personal and public pressures from herself and other people. Bachman is no different. On one hand, she is tormenting herself, satisfying the reputation and relationships in the hunting community, trying to be strong and take it like a woman, fight for what she believes, and stand against a legion of people en masse that want to crush her for their belief and that she is a total, vile creature that kills, kills, kills. I bet if they had a wooden pyre and a match you'd see people stomping around crying, "Let the witch burn". This I find very disturbing. We are suppose to live in a civilized society, yet there are online words that indicate threat of bodily harm, rape, and aggression towards Bachman that is unprecedented. If I went by the posted words of others, they are guilty of something just as insane as what they accuse Bachman of doing. Both are in the wrong to some capacity yet are oblivious to the  fault in the self, or others.

This is a good example of unintelligent drivel from a person that is looking for a few post hits.
http://bentrovatowhippingboy.wordpress.com/2013/11/17/an-open-letter-to-melissa-bachman/

What this person is typing is more like two steps from showing up at her house to sexually accost her or rape her dead body after a couple of people have made the rounds with her. Truly what is wrong with people? This and the behavior online of people shows in the deep recesses of peoples' hearts they feel vindicated at threatening another person even before there is a trial. Just on Peter Allison's Facebook page people are lining up on it saying they are going to or want to kill this woman. One woman has so many haters. Just one woman mind you not 100,000. 1: (some odds) is insanity by insanity standards yet there it is. The world police at its worst.

Our world has become nothing more than an online lynch mob aimed at ruining the life of one unimportant person that is the size of a flea on this huge world. Yes, Bachman in the eyes of the universe is a flea as is everyone else. Yet there are people that spend all day long trying to eradicate her like HIV with plenty of researching and online forays. I can only imagine that energy fueling some impoverished country. Threatening this lady into conforming is not what those that try to enforce this aggressive threatening behavior would want done to them. Yet they feel impervious to the implications of bad societal behavior because they feel justified.  Must be nice to stand outside of the body and judge the acts of another when poor decisions and judgments are made every day by less than saintly people. Here I am not so much defending Bachman outright but don't throw stones at glass houses unless you are going to proclaim yourself the Second Coming and bring on the Rapture.

What is this trouble that follows Bachman?

The trouble with Bachman is she has the means to finance hunts, kills the animals then displays the footage as entertainment. This can be taken as a waste of life in order to make a show otherwise why are you taping it to show on television?  Every move she makes is to support her employ and way of life but at what cost? Her problems come from the way in which she chooses to drive her constructed persona without consideration for how the public at large would receive the imagery or her attitude about the way she kills. It is never unheard of that a person can lose site of their audience especially when there is an unintended audience. When it comes to viewers that are totally against Bachman,  there is a clear clash of worldview both on a personal, spiritual, and international scale.

I was conversing with an artist about his work and the work of a man he was enamored with. Both artists' work is considerably different in context, tone, and subject matter. The latter artist,  I found to have rich colors, but very repulsive imagery that made me think painful hidden thoughts and fear from within my psyche. The artist I was speaking to used soft tonal colors with imagery that was slightly scary but displayed in a way to take away the fear. After all,  art is made to bring out the emotion in your hidden consciousness or subconscious. It conveyed that for me,  art could either be accepted or rejected based on the image the artists painted and the general mind of the viewer. The viewer will either cry that the work hits a chord in your soul, or run from it like a blazing building; never to look upon again.

This is the case with Bachman. If she were a work of art you would either have a happy crier or a shrieking banshee. Unfortunately, the banshee lived in Africa and couldn't live with the image of that dead lion. This also brings up the point that as children we see stories on television, read books, or make up things in our minds. The Chronicles of Narnia by now is an embedded set of images in the minds of people. As well as the symbolic image of a lion as a king on a banner, C.S. Lewis's metaphor for God, or a dying species. People that are not into hunting or have an aversion to it could possibly see Bachman as the White Witch looming over the dead body of a lion called Aslan on the mound while she mockingly smiles over the destruction of the beast which is the same as the image a reader could get from C. S. Lewis's book or the made for television movie back in the day. (Not the movie set currently). When Bachman killed that lion I don't think she could imagine that someone somewhere in the world could see the contrasting imagery of two separate events; one real,  the other a bit of fiction but so eerily similar. Yet, the emotion of how the event is absorbed makes all the difference in the world to how the consequence will develop. Bachman is being turned into a cold-hearted pariah that kills for mindless killing sake, even if that may not be what she is in truth. There are people that would argue, "If it sqwaks like a chicken....." Last time I looked, Bachman doesn't have superpowers. She is a human being, with failings, and one day could change her whole worldview. No one knows if she might, in her old age, decide her perspective on the way she lived her life was right for her or wrong. That is Bachman's road.

I began to think of this situation and knew there were some truths about this.

Bachman was getting unprecedented advertising for her show and her life,  Ergo, she does shut down all avenues to her and her websites upon public outrage every time she throws a flaming hunting cocktail via the trophy photo. These online trophy photos are displayed because the poster knows it is going to cause controversy and aims the attention at them. (Let us not forget how Miley Cyrus completely distracted the world from the Syrian debacle and the Blurred Lines of Alan Thicke's Beetlejuice pants). It is a truth when negative situations go down your colleagues act like they don't know you and the instigator hopes the shitstorm will blow over. (Sorry Russia...I cuss therefore I am.......very truthful.) In the long run, I don't see how this is going to hurt Bachman even though she was ousted off NatGeo for the Alaskan show. I am sure there are hunters out there wanting to hold her up on their shoulders while proclaiming she is the best example of what a female hunter should be. That is second to the women that are all but nude while holding a gun. Wait a minute? Maybe Bachman is second, because male hunters like the fantasy gun-toting huntress with the big bazingas and a piece of string up the crack. Hard call that one.

I considered the lone African animal activist on the grassy knoll.This Scarlett O'Hara type drama that unfolds via the animal activists does absolutely nothing for the animals. It just feeds more online wars, donation requests from hunting and animal activism so both sides can tell you how it feeds the economy. Hell this could be no more than a publicity stunt. I guess the one where the hunter shot the elephant on NBC wasn't working out so well so they moved on to a female. Bachman for some time has pissed people off and intends to do it. The lion is dead. There is a legion of animal activists feeling surges of power as they mount their online armies to fight against one lone woman.

I am more mystified by the behavior of all involved. If Bachman shoots an animal legally what is there to say? If you stop Bachman from going to Africa then everyone else that is going there to shoot an animal dead shouldn't be allowed on African soil. Is Bachman so important or threatening that as one woman, she must be punished or eradicated off the face of the African landscape. I guess for a hardcore extreme huntress there has to be a hard-assed animal activist with the idea to punish Bachman to the worst extreme possible--African Hunting Outcast. I conclude that the African lady against Bachman is of the same mentality; both want to exert control over the living and the dead.

As far as lions, I believe if you are going to conserve the species make a better plan. Spend time on that idea. Do the work and stop standing around an imaginary fire pissing on it with poor aim. People need to spend time on the things that matter that actually make a difference for the positive. If you don't want hunters killing lions, go to your government, speak to them, lobby, do what you have to do; spend time on that. Learn about conservation and get a job doing the work. Make the world a better place and become the thing that is right in the world. I do not believe in killing off numbers of animals to extinction. Nor do I believe that if you aren't going to put it in your mouth and eat it, don't kill it. I do believe that I can wake up in the morning and do something right like plant a bunch of trees, breed fish in a pond,  raise froglets, understand my world, when people in the world don't understand me, and encourage more life than what I take. Being dirt poor will do that to you and the myth of the Welfare Queen is a blatant lie.

Don't waste time on one unimportant  person when there are millions that deserve a foot up and not their face in the dirt. People cruising the internet looking for people to crush do not seem to be people out to uplift anyone. If you are tearing a person down that is all you are doing; tearing them down. You will not stop at one because people back up to the buffet of life and shove as much to eat in their little pie holes as they can stand, vomit, then shove some more.

5000+ people trying to stomp down one woman is not what is right in the world either. There are countries with people fighting disease, poverty, political, racial, and life injustices yet 5000+ people spend time trying to step on one piss ant.

I was thinking on this article as I walked down a dirt road today that seemed endless, but alone I tread. Sometimes you have to meditate and go it alone. The world is a cruel, hard place with lots of judges, and very little justice. On you must walk.

Written by: W. Harley Bloodworth

~Courtesy of the AOFH~