Haven't listened yet but did they bring up:- Auctioning off legitimate culls as hunts to fund operations
- 'Hunting' as a major support for conservation
Those are the two pro-hunting I'd accept even if I were ideologically opposed.
I would say that if it's only about money, with the trophy hunting functioning as an excuse to give money, that means it's not really trophy hunting that's helping. It's about sucking up to rich bastards. Which we don't need to do.
If they have that kind of money to throw away on what is a luxury to them, it means they can pay more in taxes, and our governments can fund the programs directly. There are some things we shouldn't leave up to the free market to sort out, and conservation is among them. Including global conservation. It should be in all of our interest to preserve as much of the global ecosystem as possible, barring a few parasites.
I agree that tourism isn't the answer, which apparently was part of what Cara heard them compare it to. Instead we should actively reduce the amount of tourism to both reduce global emissions, and the damage tourists can do directly. Such as running over animals by accident, killing animals in "self-defense" because they react violently to you being somewhere you have no reason to be, or drowning tortoises because you have no idea what you're doing. And leaving garbage everywhere that animals can choke on or be cut up by.
Let local professionals take care of the conservation aspect, and let trophy hunters hunt trophies in the form of something other than animals that there's nothing impressive about killing.
