After hearing so much chatter on this forum and elsewhere about Mr. Mark Sullivan, I decided to see for myself what makes this safari personality so polarizing. To do so, I watched his video “death at my feet” figuring that it would be the best representation of his values, body of work, hunting style, and persona. Considering that Mr. Sullivan is the PH in the video, the narrator, the producer and the distributor, I accept as gospel that he believes what he says and does since he has full creative control of the entire process.
The first thing that caught my attention is the name of the title “death at my feet”. It appears to sensationally captivate the target consumer with the term “death” as a lead-in for what is about to be watched as opposed to “fair chase”, “sport”, “safari” or any other terms. I did a cursory look at Mr. Sullivan’s body of work located here http://www.nitroexpresssafaris.com. It appears that Mr. Sullivan has made about 16 DVD videos of which 13 of the titles have “death” as part of the description. The only exceptions I could find were “Mbogo”, “Simba” and his "Dangerous Game Compilations”.
The second thing that I noticed is that the production quality was quite high and the content was pretty entertaining. I did notice that it was very pandering in the same way that a documentary by Michael Moore or Al Gore documentary may be construed by some viewers. Mr. Sullivan’s emphasis was fairly nuanced so I’ll attempt to deconstruct it further below, but his repeated leading questions and communications with clients were that he is doing hunting “the right way” by inducing charges from the animals. This I believe is the primary source of contention that creates mixed feelings from some viewers about his body of work although I’ve never seen anyone logically and morally deconstruct his beliefs to make clear what his “world view” actually is.
It is clear that Mr. Sullivan passionately believes that animals have differential value (monetary or intrinsic) based on the variability of what he considers an ethical hunt for one species of animal versus another in this video.
In several instances during the video Mr. Sullivan deferred or delayed the “coup de grace” on a wounded animal in order to protract the hunt in the hopes of inducing a charge (my opinion) or “letting the animal decide how he will die” (his quote). This was a common thread in this particular picture.
On several occasions in the video it was clear that the client (hunter) was not prepared to make the shots on the charges. This resulted in Mr. Sullivan taking the shot personally. On several other occasions Mr. Sullivan shot simultaneously with the clients on the animals. On a couple of occasions Mr. Sullivan admonished his clients not to shoot as they animals were too far away (15-20 feet) from the client.
As I slept on what I saw I tried to understand why some people would find some of the above objectionable and yet others would find it completely acceptable. After retreading the events over and over in my brain it sort of hit me as to why people galvanize on this personality in a manner that they would not on most other professional hunters. I believe Mr. Sullivan does not have a consistent system of values that can be applied consistently or logically across multiple situations. It is not that he is unprincipled, it is that one would not be able to infer his beliefs about situation B based on what we saw and heard from him in situation A on the video. Some viewers wouldn’t care much about such a dilemma and yet other temperaments would be troubled by this realization.
The things I personally concluded about Mark Sullivan through this video are as follows:
-Mark Sullivan believes in some of the charter of animal rights and is actually much closer aligned to the value system of ALF, PETA and HSUS than he would be to many conservation organizations. I realize that sounds inflammatory but that is why I had to deconstruct what he says and does to figure out what is going on in his head. Mr. Sullivan continually emphasizes that an animal “must decide how he will die” so he is implying a number of things it seems he truly believes.
A.) Primarily, he believes that the animal is endowed with a free will and a sentience to elect for a particular course of decisions on how its life will end. I would say that many people would say that there is an evolutionary “fight or flight” innate response in an animal so the animal is not “deciding” or “contemplating” death at all but rather is trying to determine if escape is possible until it feels so pressured that it must attack. Mr. Sullivan is endowing the animal with a specific right which many scientists would say is not understood by the animal that is actually just acting to stimulus in a predictable manner. In short, Mr. Sullivan believes that an animal should be given choice and has a right to make choices about its life and death to paraphrase his frequent comments.
B.) Secondarily, Mr. Sullivan believes that animals are so deserving of this particular suite of rights, the right to self determination of one’s death, that he does not believe in killing the animal without putting himself and his client in a hazardous situation at point blank range of a charge. This is an important point because to some, they would say that Mr. Sullivan has elevated the worth of the animal to that of a human, or has lowered the value of a human to that of an animal in this “life bargain” he describes frequently. In essence, it would not be moral in his worldview to kill the animal if the animal did not have the opportunity to attempt to kill him and his client. The aforementioned philosophy was exemplified as he passed on a charging hippo on land at 20' only to allow the animal to die in water in a more impressive charge. This would be a reasonably similar point of similarity between Mr. Sullivan and HSUS as it comes to animals rights and worth in that he endows the animal with these rights, but he robs of them of these rights using his own self-made moral compass by killing the same animal a few moments later because death in H2O is more moral to him than death on terra firma. This set of unusual moral principles could be viewed as inconsistent.
C.) Mr. Sullivan believes that humane dispatch of animals to end suffering is not the primary impetus for the hunter’s action or inaction on a hunt for a wounded animal. Many hunters believe once an animal is wounded that the absolute primary driver is to locate and humanely kill that animal expeditiously. Such a notion or worldview would be consistent with a Judeo-Christian-Muslim orthodox worldview that suggests man is superior to animals and that humanity that elevates humans should be focused on respect for animals as lower life forms. (only humans as predators possess an innate desire to prevent undue suffering to animals…animals don’t really care in such a manner) In short, Mr. Sullivan’s esteem and value that he places on an animal's right to choose its death is placed on a higher echelon than the human’s obligation to expeditiously end an animal’s suffering. This particular behavior from Mr. Sullivan opens up a pandora’s box of potential questions that could be the subject of a scholarly paper of its own.
D.) Mr. Sullivan’s desire for an animal to die in a charge also suggests he believes that the animal’s right to charge outweighs his client’s right to hunt and harvest their own animals. Because of the frequent intercession by Mr. Sullivan on the hunts providing the killing shot its clear that either he really wants to hunt for himself, or that he desires to induce a charge more than he wants to afford his clients the ability to take the first and the final shot on an animal. Some may find this curious.
Overall, the video was entertaining and illuminating to see what this personality does on his hunts and how he chooses to present his safaris. There is an extreme emphasis on the killing (mostly by him) of the animal, a repetitive mantra that the animal has a right to “choose how he dies” and an emphasis on human/animal parity in that he does not believe it fair to kill an animal unless the animal is in a position to potentially kill Mr. Sullivan or his client... or at least to give that impression albeit Mr. Sullivan always has the tactical upper hand. Many would find this to be a false impression because Mr. Sullivan in fact doesn't give the animal that equal chance or a full suite of rights, but instead sets up the animal for a death in a manner that Mr. Sullivan decides (enticement to charge), not in the animals primary initial desire (evasion and survival).
I think the idiosyncrasies of Mr. Sullivan and his inconsistent views of man and animal’s worth coalesce to make him a larger than life character perceived as a loose cannon with an illogical mind. It makes great reality television. On the other hand, it creates in the minds of some, a troubling hypocrisy as he claims to instill rights in dangerous game animals (right to self determination in death) that he does not instill in them moments earlier (right to self determination to live). It actually seems like he wishes to instill only as many rights in the animal as a cat instills in a mouse caught under paw; the personal pleasure of the dominate party must continue until the dominant party is bored with the situation. (whether housecat or Mr. Sullivan) He claims to want to give the animal equal footing to create an ultimate sense of “fairness” but carries such formidable weaponry (.577NE and .600NE) that it isn’t fair, he is going to obliterate the animal as was seen when he blew the jaw off a cape buffalo at 8’ that was standing in suffering ready to be dispatched calmly at 30’ until incited to charge. Many hunters would have preferred the animal be humanely dispatched with haste so as to keep the human beings in a position of safety and to reduce the animal's suffering but with Mr. Sullivan's hunt in the video neither of those two moral concerns were held to a higher value than getting the wounded buffalo to perform aggressively. I personally did not see the animal being given the choice "of how to die" that Mr. Sullivan speaks of so frequently, I saw a forced stimulus being thrust upon an animal that resulted in an instinctive response to charge as there were no other options remaining.
It is these world-view inconsistencies that jostle between Judeo-Christian, Kant-moralist secular hunter, animal rights activist and what appears to be narcissistic hedonism that surely rubs some people wrong because Mr. Sullivan cannot pick from just one system of values. I personally would have more thoroughly enjoyed the 8 hours of hunting footage that was cut more than the final 15 minutes of his productions.
Death at my feet was produced by Mark Sullivan in 2011 with a run time of 75 minutes. Available for purchase from his website for around $40.00.
The first thing that caught my attention is the name of the title “death at my feet”. It appears to sensationally captivate the target consumer with the term “death” as a lead-in for what is about to be watched as opposed to “fair chase”, “sport”, “safari” or any other terms. I did a cursory look at Mr. Sullivan’s body of work located here http://www.nitroexpresssafaris.com. It appears that Mr. Sullivan has made about 16 DVD videos of which 13 of the titles have “death” as part of the description. The only exceptions I could find were “Mbogo”, “Simba” and his "Dangerous Game Compilations”.
The second thing that I noticed is that the production quality was quite high and the content was pretty entertaining. I did notice that it was very pandering in the same way that a documentary by Michael Moore or Al Gore documentary may be construed by some viewers. Mr. Sullivan’s emphasis was fairly nuanced so I’ll attempt to deconstruct it further below, but his repeated leading questions and communications with clients were that he is doing hunting “the right way” by inducing charges from the animals. This I believe is the primary source of contention that creates mixed feelings from some viewers about his body of work although I’ve never seen anyone logically and morally deconstruct his beliefs to make clear what his “world view” actually is.
It is clear that Mr. Sullivan passionately believes that animals have differential value (monetary or intrinsic) based on the variability of what he considers an ethical hunt for one species of animal versus another in this video.
In several instances during the video Mr. Sullivan deferred or delayed the “coup de grace” on a wounded animal in order to protract the hunt in the hopes of inducing a charge (my opinion) or “letting the animal decide how he will die” (his quote). This was a common thread in this particular picture.
On several occasions in the video it was clear that the client (hunter) was not prepared to make the shots on the charges. This resulted in Mr. Sullivan taking the shot personally. On several other occasions Mr. Sullivan shot simultaneously with the clients on the animals. On a couple of occasions Mr. Sullivan admonished his clients not to shoot as they animals were too far away (15-20 feet) from the client.
As I slept on what I saw I tried to understand why some people would find some of the above objectionable and yet others would find it completely acceptable. After retreading the events over and over in my brain it sort of hit me as to why people galvanize on this personality in a manner that they would not on most other professional hunters. I believe Mr. Sullivan does not have a consistent system of values that can be applied consistently or logically across multiple situations. It is not that he is unprincipled, it is that one would not be able to infer his beliefs about situation B based on what we saw and heard from him in situation A on the video. Some viewers wouldn’t care much about such a dilemma and yet other temperaments would be troubled by this realization.
The things I personally concluded about Mark Sullivan through this video are as follows:
-Mark Sullivan believes in some of the charter of animal rights and is actually much closer aligned to the value system of ALF, PETA and HSUS than he would be to many conservation organizations. I realize that sounds inflammatory but that is why I had to deconstruct what he says and does to figure out what is going on in his head. Mr. Sullivan continually emphasizes that an animal “must decide how he will die” so he is implying a number of things it seems he truly believes.
A.) Primarily, he believes that the animal is endowed with a free will and a sentience to elect for a particular course of decisions on how its life will end. I would say that many people would say that there is an evolutionary “fight or flight” innate response in an animal so the animal is not “deciding” or “contemplating” death at all but rather is trying to determine if escape is possible until it feels so pressured that it must attack. Mr. Sullivan is endowing the animal with a specific right which many scientists would say is not understood by the animal that is actually just acting to stimulus in a predictable manner. In short, Mr. Sullivan believes that an animal should be given choice and has a right to make choices about its life and death to paraphrase his frequent comments.
B.) Secondarily, Mr. Sullivan believes that animals are so deserving of this particular suite of rights, the right to self determination of one’s death, that he does not believe in killing the animal without putting himself and his client in a hazardous situation at point blank range of a charge. This is an important point because to some, they would say that Mr. Sullivan has elevated the worth of the animal to that of a human, or has lowered the value of a human to that of an animal in this “life bargain” he describes frequently. In essence, it would not be moral in his worldview to kill the animal if the animal did not have the opportunity to attempt to kill him and his client. The aforementioned philosophy was exemplified as he passed on a charging hippo on land at 20' only to allow the animal to die in water in a more impressive charge. This would be a reasonably similar point of similarity between Mr. Sullivan and HSUS as it comes to animals rights and worth in that he endows the animal with these rights, but he robs of them of these rights using his own self-made moral compass by killing the same animal a few moments later because death in H2O is more moral to him than death on terra firma. This set of unusual moral principles could be viewed as inconsistent.
C.) Mr. Sullivan believes that humane dispatch of animals to end suffering is not the primary impetus for the hunter’s action or inaction on a hunt for a wounded animal. Many hunters believe once an animal is wounded that the absolute primary driver is to locate and humanely kill that animal expeditiously. Such a notion or worldview would be consistent with a Judeo-Christian-Muslim orthodox worldview that suggests man is superior to animals and that humanity that elevates humans should be focused on respect for animals as lower life forms. (only humans as predators possess an innate desire to prevent undue suffering to animals…animals don’t really care in such a manner) In short, Mr. Sullivan’s esteem and value that he places on an animal's right to choose its death is placed on a higher echelon than the human’s obligation to expeditiously end an animal’s suffering. This particular behavior from Mr. Sullivan opens up a pandora’s box of potential questions that could be the subject of a scholarly paper of its own.
D.) Mr. Sullivan’s desire for an animal to die in a charge also suggests he believes that the animal’s right to charge outweighs his client’s right to hunt and harvest their own animals. Because of the frequent intercession by Mr. Sullivan on the hunts providing the killing shot its clear that either he really wants to hunt for himself, or that he desires to induce a charge more than he wants to afford his clients the ability to take the first and the final shot on an animal. Some may find this curious.
Overall, the video was entertaining and illuminating to see what this personality does on his hunts and how he chooses to present his safaris. There is an extreme emphasis on the killing (mostly by him) of the animal, a repetitive mantra that the animal has a right to “choose how he dies” and an emphasis on human/animal parity in that he does not believe it fair to kill an animal unless the animal is in a position to potentially kill Mr. Sullivan or his client... or at least to give that impression albeit Mr. Sullivan always has the tactical upper hand. Many would find this to be a false impression because Mr. Sullivan in fact doesn't give the animal that equal chance or a full suite of rights, but instead sets up the animal for a death in a manner that Mr. Sullivan decides (enticement to charge), not in the animals primary initial desire (evasion and survival).
I think the idiosyncrasies of Mr. Sullivan and his inconsistent views of man and animal’s worth coalesce to make him a larger than life character perceived as a loose cannon with an illogical mind. It makes great reality television. On the other hand, it creates in the minds of some, a troubling hypocrisy as he claims to instill rights in dangerous game animals (right to self determination in death) that he does not instill in them moments earlier (right to self determination to live). It actually seems like he wishes to instill only as many rights in the animal as a cat instills in a mouse caught under paw; the personal pleasure of the dominate party must continue until the dominant party is bored with the situation. (whether housecat or Mr. Sullivan) He claims to want to give the animal equal footing to create an ultimate sense of “fairness” but carries such formidable weaponry (.577NE and .600NE) that it isn’t fair, he is going to obliterate the animal as was seen when he blew the jaw off a cape buffalo at 8’ that was standing in suffering ready to be dispatched calmly at 30’ until incited to charge. Many hunters would have preferred the animal be humanely dispatched with haste so as to keep the human beings in a position of safety and to reduce the animal's suffering but with Mr. Sullivan's hunt in the video neither of those two moral concerns were held to a higher value than getting the wounded buffalo to perform aggressively. I personally did not see the animal being given the choice "of how to die" that Mr. Sullivan speaks of so frequently, I saw a forced stimulus being thrust upon an animal that resulted in an instinctive response to charge as there were no other options remaining.
It is these world-view inconsistencies that jostle between Judeo-Christian, Kant-moralist secular hunter, animal rights activist and what appears to be narcissistic hedonism that surely rubs some people wrong because Mr. Sullivan cannot pick from just one system of values. I personally would have more thoroughly enjoyed the 8 hours of hunting footage that was cut more than the final 15 minutes of his productions.
Death at my feet was produced by Mark Sullivan in 2011 with a run time of 75 minutes. Available for purchase from his website for around $40.00.
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