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Poachers for Dinner...

smartcooky said:
gotten
North American

past participle of get

Usage

As past participles of get, got and gotten both date back to Middle English. The form gotten is not used in British English but is very common in North American English. In North American English, got and gotten are not identical in use. Gotten usually implies the process of obtaining something, as in he had gotten us tickets for the show, while got implies the state of possession or ownership, as in I haven't got any money

What's the matter? The use of Americanisms beneath your class level are they?
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We often disagree elsewhere, but here it's almost total agreement. One nitpick though - in British English we do use a few phrases like "Ill-gotten wealth", which confirms the 'obtaining' meaning of 'get'. I believe the Brits sent 'gotten' to the USA but then changed their own usage towards 'got' over the years. If anything, 'gotten' has a better pedigree ;)

One thing that drives me up the wall is people being dogmatic about elements of language usage - especially when they're not correct about it - so I'm happy to get dinged here for being o/t.
 
GlennB said:
We often disagree elsewhere, but here it's almost total agreement. One nitpick though - in British English we do use a few phrases like "Ill-gotten wealth", which confirms the 'obtaining' meaning of 'get'. I believe the Brits sent 'gotten' to the USA but then changed their own usage towards 'got' over the years. If anything, 'gotten' has a better pedigree ;)

One thing that drives me up the wall is people being dogmatic about elements of language usage - especially when they're not correct about it - so I'm happy to get dinged here for being o/t.
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Agree.

Pre-14thC English origin, and likely came over with the Vikings as "geta" is Old Norse and the origin of "get" in the English language.
 
It's a linguistic peculiarity that colonies tend to undergo linguistic changes slower than their homeland. Apparently American English retains more of the style and structure of Elizabethan English than British English does. (Which has the weird side effect of common American speech tending to use more of the British "U" vocabulary than it does of "non-U".)
 
MikeG said:
Your fantasy about poachers' options is just silly. Years of training go into being rangers in game parks, one of the most sought-after and prestigious jobs available to rural Africans, and an entry requirement to that training is the ability to read and write. You might want to take a quick look at literacy levels in rural Africa before making any more ill-informed comments.
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MikeG said:
Rangers are often from the same village as the poachers. Sometimes the same family. Rangers often know who the poachers are, (we're generally talking bush-meat type poaching now), so will only shoot them if they absolutely have no choice. Rangers are often poachers themselves. Blue Lagoon National Park, Zambia, was just about poached out by the rangers stationed there 10 years ago.
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I just thought I'd put these posts together for funs.
 
PhantomWolf said:
I just thought I'd put these posts together for funs.
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Funny-men-laughing-cartoon-you-want-it-when.png
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
:boggled:

OK, wait a minute, I get it. You really need to learn the rule about antecedents before pronouns.
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I try to be literate but fail a lot of times. Thank you for the heads up.

smartcooky said:
These types of poachers, that is, those who poach for rhino horn and elephant ivory, are in it for one thing, and one thing only....The money. Massive amounts of money. They are not poor villagers living in grass huts trying to eke out a living for their families. They are well paid professional poachers who are well equipped with high powered rifles, expensive vehicles and sophisticated tracking and communications equipment.

They are also known and proven killers that can, and have, murdered Wildlife Rangers. Between 2009 and 2017, 740 rangers have died in the line of duty, most of them murdered by poachers, who will pretty much kill anyone who gets in their way. Diane Fossey was probably murdered by poachers.



"The greatness of a nation can be judged by the way its animals are treated"
- Mohandas Karamchand "Mahatma" Gandhi -
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Do you know for a fact that these poachers were "these types of poachers"?
 
PhantomWolf said:
Poachers don't care for human life, they are more than willing to kill any rangers they see, even carrying hand grenades to use against them. If they don't care about human life, why should we care about theirs?
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Because every poacher carries hand grenades and kills rangers, right?
 
RolandRat said:
Because every poacher carries hand grenades and kills rangers, right?
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Pretty much all the ones that go after elephant ivory and rhino horn, yes. They are supplied with their weapons by the criminal organisations they work for.

https://www.theatlantic.com/interna...tarization-of-africas-animal-poachers/260534/

With an estimated global value of at least $8 billion annually, the trade in endangered species has long been linked to organized, transnational crime. However, as demand escalates and prices rise, the poaching that supplies the trade has become militarized in ways that pose a serious security threat to weak governments, particularly in Central Africa. This was dramatically illustrated earlier this year when one hundred Sudanese raiders stormed across the border from neighboring Chad and methodically slaughtered as many as three hundred elephants for their ivory in Cameroon's Bouda N'Djida national park. The Sudanese raiders were believed to be Janjaweed militiamen who, armed with automatic weapons and grenade launchers, were more than a match for unarmed park guards.

Increasingly, militias, insurgents and even terrorist groups are using the easy money from wildlife crime to buy arms and fund insurgencies that claim lives, hurt economies, and sow instability in states that lack the military capacity to respond.

And you have sympathy for these people? OK, fine, whatever floats your boat, but can you at least understand why others do not?
 
smartcooky said:
Pretty much all the ones that go after elephant ivory and rhino horn, yes.
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I just spoke last night to a friend who runs a lodge in Kafue NP, Zambia. The lodges, as you probably don't know, are the bases for ZAWA anti-poaching activities (and tourist lodges are a serious anti-poaching deterrent). He has been involved in the struggle against poaching for 30 years. They lose the occasional elephant in his area to poachers, maybe one or two a year, and almost every time they capture the poachers. They have never yet found one with an RPG or hand grenade.

Did anyone note that you attempted to ban me from speaking about anything other than rhinos, and now you yourself are speaking about elephants?

They are supplied with their weapons by the criminal organisations they work for............
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At last, you've not just pulled something out of thin air. Well, other than the fact that as usual you are absolutist. If you used the word "generally" more often then your accuracy would increase vastly.
 
I feel sympathy for Somali pirates...poachers not so much.

Though in both cases poverty might be a driver.

I won't laugh like the OP, but I chalk it up to the wages of sin.
 
I think we have a new heavy favorite for the Darwin Awards this year.
Mother Nature is pretty ruthless;she often deals out the death penalty as pujnishment for incompetence.
 
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