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The problem with his argument is that tourists spend far more money to take pictures of elephants than hunters spend to kill them. Even in the United States wildlife watchers spend more money than hunters. Americans Spent a Lot of Money on Hunting, Fishing, and Wildlife Watching in 2011 | Outside Online
I am not saying that there are times when problem elephants must be killed or herds must be culled due to overpopulation, but that is largely not the case in Zimbabwe.
Like I said, I don't know a lot about what goes on in Zimbabwe. If I had that kind of money, I might be interested in hunting an elephant (that needed hunting, for population management reasons/etc), but I wouldn't knowingly go after one at a mismanaged park where the population wasn't being properly maintained.
I don't doubt that they are among the smarter land animals on the planet, but to me they are still animals. Pigs, for example are a lot smarter than they're usually given credit for, probably far smarter than cows, but we hunt wild ones here as "varmints" (no bag limit or season/etc) due to their negative impact on the local ecology. Coyotes ditto, and they're pretty clever buggers.