On Carson Wentz’s IG:

Hoo boy!

Here’s a sampling of the comments:

  • You bible thumping idiot. You’re gonna suck off “god” but you kill beautiful beings? I’d love to be in a room with you and a shot gun 
  • Next time try it without a gun, bud (editor’s note – he used a bow, not a gun)
  • Such an incredible animal you felt you needed to shoot it and pose with it’s corpse. I’m not even particularly vocal about animal rights and even I think this is fucking pathetic.
  • “christ follower” yet ur killing his création for sport
  • What a waste of life. And the fun was stalking the animal. Disgusting.
  • Poor bear… big game hunting is for pussys, killing one of gods creatures for sport is unacceptable.
  • I bet he tore both ACLs trying to shoot that bear

There are some defenders in the comments but it seems to be skewed significantly towards negative responses. There were about 1,120 replies as of publication.

This has been a thing with Wentz going back to his Philly days. He’s a North Dakota guy and a hunter. A few years ago there was a similar picture where he had a bunch of dead ducks strung up against what looked like a 1776-era cabin at Valley Forge. There was definitely a portion of Eagles fans who thought he was some sort of redneck who didn’t share their values.

It’s a summer Friday afternoon so we don’t need to get into a big debate about hunting. In some cases it’s necessary, i.e. deer population control in our region, where the culling helps alleviate environmental problems (not enough food/maintaining forest land) and public safety as well (jumping out on the road and running into cars). Most people seem to accept that side of it. The more controversial stuff centers around big game hunting, for example uber-dickheads who pay a million dollars to go to Namibia to shoot an elephant for no reason other than to bring the trophy home and put it on their wall. That’s not exactly the same as some guy up in State College legally bagging a buck and then making use of the venison.

We’d probably need more detail on Alaskan hunting rules to determine where Carson’s bear capture falls on the spectrum between legal/necessary and dickish/pointless.