# Does "human hunting" actually exist? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 16, 2012, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163 "2012-11-16T06:07:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Atakapa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a8b319/32.png) [@Atakapa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atakapa)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/1 "2012-11-16T06:07:07Z")
I’ve heard the odd rumor that real life cases of _The Most Dangerous Game_ occur from time to time. According to an acquaintance of mine in law enforcement, police in Idaho and Alaska have found evidence of small groups of psychopaths and thrillseekers arming up, then splitting into teams and hunting each other in remote wilderness areas. In other cases, “hunting accidents” were suspected to be the work of serial killers targeting isolated game hunters. Sounds like garbled rumors sparked by the Robert Hanson case, but I wouldn’t put it past someone to have done it before. So what’s the straight dope on people participating in such acts? ---
**Author:** ![rogerbox](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/76d3ee/32.png) [@rogerbox](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rogerbox)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 6:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/2 "2012-11-16T06:41:58Z")
There really was an alaskan world-class hunter who hunted prostitutes before one got away by flagging down a trucker. I’ve never heard of any groups of hunters hunting each other though. > **[Robert Hansen](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Hansen)** > > Robert Christian Hansen (February 15, 1939 – August 21, 2014), known in the media as the Butcher Baker, was an American serial killer. Between 1971 and 1983, Hansen abducted, raped, and murdered at least seventeen women in and around Anchorage, Alaska; he hunted many of them down in the wilderness with a Ruger Mini-14 and a knife. He was arrested and convicted in 1983 and was sentenced to 461 years without the possibility of parole. He died in 2014 of natural causes due to lingering health Han... ---
**Author:** ![FuzzyOgre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@FuzzyOgre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FuzzyOgre)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/3 "2012-11-16T07:12:35Z")
There would be way more missing/death by misadventure hunters if this were true. ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 7:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/4 "2012-11-16T07:49:03Z")
The claim has been made that pygmies in Congo have been hunted and butchered for meat during wartime. > **[Congo rebels are eating pygmies, UN says](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/jan/09/congo.jamesastill)** > > UN officials are investigating allegations of cannibalism in Ituri province, where fighting between several rebel groups has displaced about 150,000 people in the past month. ---
**Author:** ![JKellyMap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jkellymap/32/15880_2.png) [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/5 "2012-11-16T08:01:26Z")
Wasn’t the hunting of Aboriginal Australians legal until something like 1970? Or did I just dream that? That can’t be right, but I swear I read something along those lines once, in some supposedly reputable source. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 8:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/6 "2012-11-16T08:10:57Z")
> [@JKellyMap](#): > > Wasn’t the hunting of Aboriginal Australians legal until something like 1970? Or did I just dream that? That can’t be right, but I swear I read something along those lines once, in some supposedly reputable source. Killing human beings in Australia was a capital offence until the 1960s. It has never been legal in any conceivable sense. ---
**Author:** ![Atakapa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a8b319/32.png) [@Atakapa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atakapa)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 8:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/7 "2012-11-16T08:23:10Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > Killing human beings in Australia was a capital offence until the 1960s. It has never been legal in any conceivable sense. Perhaps the colonial government offered scalp bounties on Aborigines at one point? I suppose that practice by the American and Mexican governments could be counted as “human hunting.” ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 8:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/8 "2012-11-16T08:34:03Z")
> [@Atakapa](#): > > Perhaps the colonial government offered scalp bounties on Aborigines at one point? I repeat: Killing human beings in Australia was a capital offence until the 1960s. It has never been legal in any conceivable sense. ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 8:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/9 "2012-11-16T08:36:51Z")
> [@Atakapa](#): > > Perhaps the colonial government offered scalp bounties on Aborigines at one point? I suppose that practice by the American and Mexican governments could be counted as “human hunting.” Well if that is so it continues even today, remember how Osama Bin Laden was wanted dead or alive? ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/10 "2012-11-16T08:42:05Z")
I recall reading how the Tasmanians were systematically hunted down by the British, in a fashion pretty much identical to how they’d hunt animals. They didn’t eat the Tasmanians, but I understand they did make leather goods like tobacco pouches out of their skins. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 9:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/11 "2012-11-16T09:31:18Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > I recall reading how the Tasmanians were systematically hunted down by the British, in a fashion pretty much identical to how they’d hunt animals. I assume you are misremembering Charles Darwin’s account. Darwin described the human chain, used in an attempt to take Aborigines as _live prisoners_, as similar to the chain of beaters used in a hunt. He never even hinted that it was used to \*kill \*Aborigines, simply that it was similar in construction to a [hunting chain](http://www.cartoonstock.com/lowres/csl3360l.jpg) used to flush game. Nobody ever recorded any event even remotely like you describe. The locals reported all sorts of other dealing with the natives, including reprisal attacks where people were killed. And they described them with all sorts of perspectives ranging from shock and outrage to calls for more native blood, so it’s not like there was any sort of censorship on events or social pressure to remain quiet. But not a single account of Aborigines being “systematically hunted down by the British, in a fashion pretty much identical to how they’d hunt animals”. > [@](#): > > They didn’t eat the Tasmanians, but I understand they did make leather goods like tobacco pouches out of their skins. Rumours of such have been made, by unreliable witnesses. Just as they have been made about US troops in Afghanistan and about police officers throughout the US in the past 10 years. No evidence of such an event exists. It was the [Nazi lampshade](http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2511/did-the-nazis-make-lampshades-out-of-human-skin) of its day. If such an event ever had occurred, it would have been pursued by the courts and resulted in hanging of found to be true. The killing of human beings was simply never tolerated in Australia. In cases where an attempt had been made to bring natives to trial for multiple murders, and they had eluded the police, then very rarely a magistrate or governor would issue a permit for a reprisal attack. But even those specified how any men could be killed, and people were tried and hanged for killing women and children in such raids. Even in Tasmania, where there were constant attacks by Aborigines upon Europeans (and vice versa), the death penalty for killing Aborigines was strictly enforced for decades. Eventually, under public pressure and pressure from England, the the governor authorised the use of violence against Aborigines, but even then reluctantly and stressed that it could be used only when the Aborigines were encountered within settled areas, only as an absolute last resort, only after a bona fide attempt at imprisonment had been made and only after violence had been offered by the natives. The natives could not be pursued into the bush. Even under a state of Marshall law, anyone killing an Aborigine outside a settled area was tried an hanged if found guilty. Considering the situation in Tasmania was basically one of guerrilla warfare, the lengths the authorities went to to prevent Aboriginal deaths and punish murderers was surprising, and contrast sharply with the US situation where both soldiers and civilians repeatedly massacred towns full of peaceful women and children with no repercussions and often under orders from the authorities. The idea that any court or government official in Australia would have tolerated killing people and using the skins for trophies is totally incongruous with the evidence of the times. Plenty of Europeans were tried by their peers an executed for killing Aborigines. The idea that the same government was sanctioning hunting them or making souvenirs from their skins is as bizarre as making the same claim about the Obama administration. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 9:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/12 "2012-11-16T09:35:08Z")
> [@grude](#): > > Well if that is so it continues even today, remember how Osama Bin Laden was wanted dead or alive? But the British never tolerated such an attitude towards innocent people. The only bounty offered for Aborigines was for live capture of aggressive guerrillas (and their families), and stressed that anyone killing any peaceful Aborigine or capturing Aborigines outside settled areas would be tried and imprisoned if guilty of kidnapping and hanged if guilty of murder. That’s all completely incompatible with suggestions of government sanctioned \*hunting \*Aborigines. ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 9:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/13 "2012-11-16T09:54:33Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > The killing of human beings was simply never tolerated in Australia. In cases where an attempt had been made to bring natives to trial for multiple murders, and they had eluded the police, then very rarely a magistrate or governor would issue a permit for a reprisal attack. But even those specified how any men could be killed, and people were tried and hanged for killing women and children in such raids. ???😕 ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 10:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/14 "2012-11-16T10:10:19Z")
Blake your view of British treatment of aborigines is pretty rose tinted, its no where near as one sided as you have painted it. There is plenty of claims and evidence that the government turned a blind eye to shooting aborigines for any or no reason. Heres one incident: > **[Cape Grim massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Grim_massacre)** > > The Cape Grim massacre was an attack on 10 February 1828 in which a group of Aboriginal Tasmanians gathering food at a beach in the north-west of Tasmania is said to have been ambushed and shot by four Van Diemen's Land Company (VDLC) workers, with bodies of some of the victims then thrown from a 60-metre (200 ft) cliff. About 30 men are thought to have been killed in the attack, which was a reprisal action for an earlier Aboriginal raid on a flock of Van Diemen's Land Company sheep, but part... “Historian Ian McFarlane has said that the responsible Magistrate, Edward Curr, a manager of the Van Diemen’s Land Company, disputed the numbers killed, did not initiate an investigation into the massacre, and also did not report the incident to Lieutenant-Governor Arthur.[” ---
**Author:** ![HoneyBadgerDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/honeybadgerdc/32/1033_2.png) [@HoneyBadgerDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HoneyBadgerDC)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 10:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/15 "2012-11-16T10:33:21Z")
Several years ago I was talking with two very drunk and very wealthy Japanese business men. They told me of a hunt I believe was in Borneo, I could be wrong. The said they would pay the tribe for a volunteer who would be given a head start, not sure how much time they had. If the hunt was successful a souveneer from the body would be taken and then returned to the village for consumption. He knew of only one successfu hunt. I know nothing of the details. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 11:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/16 "2012-11-16T11:57:45Z")
I don’t know about Australia, but in South Africa, the Boers definitely organised groups (“Kommandos”) to hunt down [Bushmen](http://books.google.co.za/books?id=_ooA8Jln5ioC&pg=PA75&lpg=PA75&dq=Thomas+Pringle+bushmen+genocide&source=bl&ots=NSb3jGH2IW&sig=nHPLvZTkAjWFTz8CkECnqHt_BkA&hl=en&sa=X&ei=cSmmUIeTHMKQhQfy5IHwCw&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=Thomas%20Pringle%20bushmen%20genocide&f=false) like animals - sometimes taking heads, and murdering indiscriminately. ---
**Author:** ![sidecar\_jon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@sidecar\_jon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sidecar_jon)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 12:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/17 "2012-11-16T12:09:32Z")
> [@HoneyBadgerDC](#): > > Several years ago I was talking with two very drunk and very wealthy Japanese business men. They told me of a hunt I believe was in Borneo, I could be wrong. The said they would pay the tribe for a volunteer who would be given a head start, not sure how much time they had. If the hunt was successful a souveneer from the body would be taken and then returned to the village for consumption. He knew of only one successfu hunt. I know nothing of the details. The idea that a business man could in any way hunt a native through his own environment i find very hard to believe, gun or not the guy would end up in the sharp end of a stick pretty soon. ---
**Author:** ![JKellyMap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jkellymap/32/15880_2.png) [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 12:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/18 "2012-11-16T12:20:47Z")
Thank you, all, especially Blake. I regret having even suggested such a thing, but at least my ignorance has been fought. Like I said, I had trouble believing the account, or my memory of it. Thank goodness it was bunk. Either the account I described was wrong, or a lie, or never existed (and I did dream it)…or maybe it was a reputable source, I just failed to notice it was the “April 1 edition.” Carry on, then. ---
**Author:** ![hberi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/82dd89/32.png) [@hberi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hberi)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 12:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/19 "2012-11-16T12:32:10Z")
Do tribes still head hunt in nuigini? ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [November 16, 2012, 12:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163/20 "2012-11-16T12:45:04Z")
Some agressive tribes go on regular wars, that are little more then raids by the men on each other. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/does-human-hunting-actually-exist/641163.md?page=2)