We’re pretty certain most of our readers aren’t currently glued to the winter version of Love Island, so we thought we’d alert you to an interesting story that has bubbled out of the villa that has ramifications for anyone who is potentially in the public eye and is fond of bloodsports.
Ollie Wiliams, Cornish Landowner and serial gym bunny (by the look of it) left the series voluntarily after a brief 3 day sojourn in the tropical paradise. The reason for his departure was a campaign of “vilification” (his word –5 syllables!!!) in the media . Part of this campaign majored heavily on Ollie’s penchant for big game hunting, and the papers had lots of photographic evidence to prove it. Here’s one we found earlier.
Now, we’re not going to pass judgement on whether having a pop at a warthog is an ethical thing to do. People feel very strongly about this subject of course, which is the whole point. And for this reason, the existence of trophy photographs represents a serious reputational risk - as poor vilified Ollie has discovered to his cost. Love Island presented a golden opportunity for him to launch his career as a ‘C’ list celebrity - and now this is in tatters. It’s very sad to see, unless you’re a fan of warthogs in which case the schadenfreude must be delicious.
A cursory search of Twitter shows a number of people (who aren’t in themselves in the public eye) posing with a large dead something or other and who are being destroyed by hundreds of thousands of very nasty tweets indeed. It is clear that 999 times out of a thousand, social media supports the dead animal not the person who shot it. If Joe Bloggs from Arkansas can have his life taken apart over this, the risk for people who are in the public eye – CEOs, members of prominent families for example - is even greater.
So. If you must shoot something, here are some guidelines