An open letter to Walter Palmer

I got into a fight on the internet a few weeks ago. It sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? I can’t stand all these keyboard warriors you read about – teenage bullies name calling and threatening each other on Facebook with not so much as a sideways glance at each other in the corridor the following day. It’s not really my cup of tea. Apart from the fact I’ve been brought up believing if you have nothing nice to say, then don’t say anything at all, the last twelve months alone have taught me that silence can be just as powerful as words.

It all started with me scrolling through my Facebook newsfeed and seeing that a friend of mine had commented on a photo. The photo was of a beautiful zebra. My stomach lurched when I saw that the zebra was dead. It lurched even more when I saw that the stunningly pretty blonde girl with a smile to rival the Cheshire Cat’s was proudly propping up the zebra, as a trophy of her handiwork.

Call me old fashioned but it’s not something one likes to unexpectedly stumble across. Particularly not during my lunch break at work. In fact, it turned my stomach so much that I binned the majority of my tomato soup and felt strangely flu-like all afternoon. Perhaps I was getting ill. Or perhaps I was realising, yet again, how much I have come to despise the human race.

I could have left it there. I get very poor internet signal in work, you see. I couldn’t have commented anything on the photo from where I was. But I couldn’t shake this image from my mind. I thought about it all afternoon.

Was it the fact that it was a photo of a beautiful animal, cut down in its prime that had shaken me? Yes, but I’m no stranger to seeing unexpectedly vile images on social media. It’s a daily occurrence to come across a video someone has shared or an article someone has commented on automatically splashed across your newsfeed. I’ve seen a lot of things I wish I hadn’t, from people’s racist views on different cultures to a video of someone’s zit being popped to an image of a child black and blue from the hands of an adult.

Was it the fact that the animal in question was a zebra – an exotic, beautiful and innocent creature? Yes, although it wouldn’t have made me feel any easier if it had been a mouse, a badger or a cat, for example.

So, what was it that made me feel so shaken?

It was the girl. She was pretty, skinny, tanned and well dressed. She had nice hair, good teeth and a cracking pair of legs. She was young. She was the sort of girl I stare at wistfully on Instagram and fantasise about her life in California with sunshine and an all year round tan. Yet she wasn’t lying on a sun lounger or posing in a bikini or driving a convertible like my Instagram crushes. She was holding a dead animal which she had killed. And she was proud of it. It didn’t sit well with me.

I got home from work and immediately went back to the photograph. I saw a link to the original page the photo had been shared from and, hesitating slightly, clicked on it. Photo after photo emerged of the same girl – whose name I learned was Kendall Jones – smiling away next to various animals she had killed. Look her up. I bet she's right up your street.

It was spookily fascinating. Not the dead animals, I’ll point out. But the fact that this girl, with a life not a million miles away from my own, could be so different to me.

At this point, you’ve probably made a few assumptions about me. I was upset by a picture of a dead animal, I’ve spoken about various aspects of social media and the flavour of soup I mentioned I was eating was tomato. You think I’m a vegetarian. You think I’m an organic fruit and vegetable eating, environmentally friendly, allotment owning vegetarian who, let’s face it, is probably a lesbian to boot.

No. I’m not. I eat meat. I enjoy eating meat. I know where it comes from. I know how the meat is produced. Oh and for the record, I’m straight.

I’m the first to admit that I sigh and roll my eyes when I hear a vegetarian preaching about how their Linda McCartney sausages and soy bean stew taste just as nice as a Big Mac Meal. Credit where credit's due, I think vegetarians are marvellous. It’s just not something I could do. I’m not a huge meat eater but I think I would find it a struggle to enjoy a meal in a restaurant when my only choices are macaroni and cheese or nachos.

The point I’m trying to make is although I’m very much an animal person, I’m not someone who thinks you’re a monster because you choose a bacon butty to remedy your hangover.

It’s strange. My mother is a vegetarian and my father is a big meat eater. They are two very different people, in many ways, but particularly with their attitudes towards animals. My mum is an animal person. In fact, she’s just this second walked through the door and said “I’ve just helped a woman reunite a lost dog with its owner” and this is perfectly normal behaviour for her.

We’ve always had a houseful of animals. Our own little menagerie. Dogs, cats, hamsters, birds, fish – we’ve had them all. We took in a rescue dog who growled at us every day due to a background of being hit, kicked and having scalding hot water poured over her with her previous owner. We were patient. We gave her space, love and time. She grew to be the most loyal and faithful dog in the world. Our pets are like our family. I can’t understand people who say they have to get rid of their dog because they don’t have time for it anymore. (As far as I’m concerned, you made a commitment to that pet. It’s yours. Make time, you selfish bastard.)

But my dad has no time for animals. Not even our own pets. He’ll stroke the dog and play with her but he has no real understanding of what it is like to love or respect an animal. He has no patience. He can’t fathom why I would want my cat to be sat on my lap while I watch TV. When discussing foxhunting with him, he told me he thought it was a fantastic sport and given the chance, he would love to take part, whereas my mum’s eyes fill with tears when she sees an RSPCA advert and she goes out of her way to feed stray cats.

They are two very different people. Incidentally, they’re in the middle of a divorce.

I decided to leave Kendall Jones a message on her Facebook page, telling her that no matter how good looking she was, she was hideous to me. Within minutes, the abuse began pouring in. Perhaps I was asking for it.

“Says you, you look like Aladdin”

“She’s worth ten of you”

“It’s no wonder you’re defending animals when you look like a whale”

I kid you not.

Kendall herself responded telling me she had millions of YouTube followers and therefore, my point wasn’t relevant. Oh, I’m sorry, having millions of people following you on a website means you automatically must be a good person? You know who else once had millions of followers? Hitler.

Needless to say, the whole experience ruffled my feathers.

Can you imagine my horror yesterday when I stumbled across a link shared from a friend showing a photograph of you and a dead lion, charmingly named Cecil? Yes. You guessed correctly. It sent shivers up my spine.

I spent a good few minutes toying with the idea of clicking on the article to read it or just scrolling past it. Not because I didn’t want to know what had happened. But because I was frightened of what I might read. I’m the sort of person who will perform an emergency stop for a bird – and on one occasion, I slammed on for a leaf which I thought was a bird. I cried watching Marley and Me. I can’t bring myself to kill a spider. So, as I clicked on the link and began reading about what you did, I felt as if my soul was leaving my body.

It wasn’t just that you killed a magnificent animal. It was the way you did it. You lured him away from safety, from his home, with the scent of another dead animal. You did this on purpose in order to get Cecil to step outside the boundaries of his safety zone. To get him into a zone where it is legal to kill him.

In another world, we might call that grooming. Manipulating the innocent to take advantage of them and bring harm to them.

You shot him and then pursued him for forty hours until, thoroughly exhausted, he gave up. You then beheaded him. Did that make you feel good? Did it make you feel like a real man? Is it the same feeling as when you get a hole in one when you play golf or when you get through six sets of traffic lights without a single red light? Did you feel euphoric? Were you proud of yourself? You had a photograph taken with his lifeless body. You look thrilled. Did you smile like that on your wedding day?

I find it absolutely inconceivable that you not only did all of that but also paid the equivalent of £35,000 to do so. That’s more than I earn in a year. In fact, it’s just over double what I earn. Think what you could’ve done with that money, Walter. Given your children a private education. Bought a brand spanking new car. Saved a wildlife conservation park from closing down. Anything. Yet you chose to spend it on persuading some other sick minded individuals like yourself to allow you to kill a beautiful and innocent animal. How cruel.

There was no purpose in killing Cecil. You aren’t a hunter in a famished area, trying desperately to feed his starving family. Cecil was simply involved in your twisted little game. Only he didn’t volunteer to play.

I’m speechless at your small mindedness. For such a well educated man, you are surprisingly stupid. You went through years of medical school to better yourself, created a worthwhile career. I feel saddened for your family. Do your children still think you're their hero? Or have they been taken out of school for fear they will receive the backlash for your cowardly actions?

I hear you’ve gone into hiding. I imagine you’ll resurface again in a few days with a carefully prepared speech about how you deeply regret your actions. Perhaps you’ll disappear off the radar permanently. Maybe that’s not such a bad idea. Bad things happen to bad people, remember.

At the beginning of this letter, I said I felt silence can be just as powerful as words. So, why have I written this? Will you read it? Probably not. Will it stir any emotion within you? Definitely not. But I couldn’t not say anything. And I didn’t think sharing a link on Facebook slagging you off or joining a long list of comments on a forum discussing your behaviour was enough to rid me of this overwhelmingly sad feeling. I wanted to write it all down. To get it off my chest. In this case, silence is not more powerful than words.

After all, as they say, the pen is mightier than the sword.