As I think I’ve said, I would hunt any animal so long as it is legal. All animals exist on the same moral plane, and to elevate some species over others is - in my view - both morally wrong as well as logically indefensible.
Having said that, I get, and have no problem with, people who don’t want to hunt particular animals, as long as the justification is no more or less than “I don’t want to.” ‘Doesn’t float my boat’ is the same, and entirely ok. We are free to do, or not do, what we want. It’s when we try to justify our decisions by a resort to something more than emotion that we start trouble. I get that some find elephants ‘magnificent’ and won’t shoot them. I think they are magnificent too and I shoot them.
As for meat? Not a big reason for me to hunt, and I don’t think anyone going to Africa can legitimately use that as a reason. Even if your cook will use some of your animal, there is no way you can eat enough to have this justification be valid. You can’t say you hunt for the meat if you ate half a bongo backstrap.
I prefer to say I hunt for many reasons, and out of respect for the animal, I do my best to ensure that nothing is wasted. Since I won’t be eating (much or any of) it, I prefer that someone does. But even that falls apart from time to time. No one I’ve seen eats hyena, and in Muslim countries unless they can kill the animal in a halal manner (which requires that it be alive when they get to it), it may well be that no one will eat it. But that wasn’t a conversation I had before I shot a lesser kudu in Ethiopia.
