Images of hunters: Double standards, dignity, hobby hunting

A man kneels laughing beside a dead deer, his weapon at the ready, blood on the grass, accompanied by the hashtag "Waidmannsheil" (a German hunting slang term for a successful hunt). Imagine the same scene with a police officer posing next to a victim and posting the picture online: it would be a scandal, a breach of duty, grounds for immediate dismissal. That a society tolerates this kind of staging of wild animals demonstrates how deeply ingrained the double standard is in our handling of life and death. This dossier, using legal foundations, studies, and concrete cases, examines why these photos of hunters are not a harmless custom, but a litmus test for our understanding of dignity.

What awaits you here

Animal dignity in Swiss law: How the Federal Constitution, the Animal Protection Act and Art. 135 of the Swiss Criminal Code protect the dignity of animals, why these norms also cover violence against animals and why images of hunters nevertheless remain in a gray area.
Police and army as a benchmark: What happens when nationals pose with dead bodies, which cases have led to dismissals and prison sentences, and why different standards apply to hobby hunters.
Studies and figures: What a representative study on the perception of hunter images by Generation Z shows and why even the hunting lobby speaks of "communicative landmines".
Psychology and ethics: What the staging with dead bodies reveals about empathy, desensitization and self-presentation, and why the reference to "tradition" is ethically untenable.
International comparisons: Namibia's ban on hunter photos, Walmart's decision, European trophy import bans and what Switzerland is missing.
Ethics of dying: Why fear of death is not a photo subject and why hobby hunting turns the most brutal dying process into a selfie opportunity.
What needs to change: Concrete political demands regarding animal dignity, hunting license guidelines, youth protection and independent oversight.
Argumentation: Answers to the most common objections of the hobby hunting lobby.
Quick links: All relevant articles, studies and sources at a glance.

Animal dignity: What the law promises and what it delivers

Switzerland has enshrined the protection of animal dignity in its legal system to a greater extent than any other country. Article 120, paragraph 2 of the Federal Constitution (BV) has enshrined the "dignity of the creature" as a constitutional principle since 1992. Article 1 of the Animal Welfare Act (TSchG) states its purpose as "to protect the dignity and welfare of the animal." Article 3, letter a, of the TSchG specifies what dignity means: The intrinsic value of the animal must be respected. Interventions that degrade it, excessively instrumentalize it, or violate its physical appearance are considered a violation of animal dignity.

Anyone who disregards animal dignity commits animal cruelty within the meaning of Art. 26 para. 1 lit. a of the Animal Welfare Act and risks imprisonment of up to three years or a fine. In 1989, the Federal Supreme Court ruled that only comprehensive protection of life can do justice to the ethical sensibilities of society. Furthermore, scholarly literature discusses whether animal dignity can have legal effect even after death, analogous to the post-mortem effect of human dignity under Art. 7 of the Federal Constitution. Bolliger and Rüttimann write in this regard: Because the concept of dignity cannot have a fundamentally different meaning for animals than for humans, a legal effect beyond death should not be categorically excluded in the case of animal dignity.

Despite this high density of regulations, the online display of dead wild animals remains largely unregulated. Animal welfare laws protect animals from pain and suffering, but do not explicitly regulate how their bodies may be presented in the media after death. A society that recognizes the dignity of animals in its legal texts must also consistently address the degrading display of dead animals.

More on the legal framework: Hunting and animal welfare: What the practice means for wild animals

Article 135 of the Criminal Code: When violent images become a criminal offense

Article 135 of the Swiss Criminal Code prohibits depictions that "vividly portray cruel acts of violence against humans or animals and thereby seriously violate fundamental human dignity." The provision explicitly includes violence against animals. Anyone who produces, distributes, stores, displays, or makes such recordings accessible is liable to prosecution (paragraph 1, up to three years' imprisonment). Since the revision, mere possession is also a criminal offense (paragraph 1bis, up to one year's imprisonment).

The Foundation for Animal Law (TIR) confirms that anyone who records and publishes online footage explicitly depicting violence against animals is committing a crime. The question of whether operators of social networks are also liable under Article 135 of the Swiss Criminal Code remains unresolved in practice.

The Federal Supreme Court applies Article 135 of the Swiss Criminal Code restrictively, limiting it to "truly blatant and unambiguous cases" of excessive violence. Typical photos taken after a hunt, in which a hobby hunter poses next to a shot animal, do not fall under this provision according to prevailing legal opinion, because the depiction of the "legal" killing is not considered excessive enough. The threshold is high: Where the state itself permits the killing, it is difficult to classify the photographic documentation as "cruel violence." Legally, this creates a loophole: The dignity of the animal ends where the camera begins.

That this loophole is not insignificant is demonstrated by a recent case from Graubünden. As documented by wildbeimwild.com , the Graubünden public prosecutor's office refused to open criminal proceedings against an amateur hunter who publicly posted photos of his kill and children on social media. At the same time, someone who used one of these images in a critical context was prosecuted. The case is now before the Federal Supreme Court. This case exemplifies how hunting images are effectively treated as a legal vacuum in Switzerland: those who display dead animals go unpunished, while those who criticize the same images risk prosecution.

More on cases bordering on criminality: hunting and animal cruelty

Police and army: What happens when nationals pose with dead bodies?

The police and military have strict rules governing how to deal with victims and images of violence. Those working at the edge of life and death must not use this moment as a stage for self-promotion. Violations are severely punished because they turn victims into objects of entertainment and undermine trust in the rule of law.

A case from London illustrates how seriously such violations are taken: In June 2020, police officers Deniz J. (47) and Jamie L. (33) were assigned to guard the crime scene of a double murder of two sisters in Fryent Country Park. Instead of fulfilling their duties, they took selfies with the bodies and shared the images in WhatsApp groups. The verdict: Both were dismissed from the police force and sentenced to two years and nine months in prison each. The victims' mother stated that the officers had "dehumanized" her children.

In Germany, a police officer trainee in North Rhine-Westphalia was dismissed in 2020 for "lack of character suitability" after repeatedly using official duties for social media selfies, including during a prisoner transport. The Higher Administrative Court of North Rhine-Westphalia upheld the dismissal. The message is clear: anyone who abuses their position at the intersection of power and law enforcement for narcissistic self-promotion will lose their job.

There are no comparable consequences for recreational hunters. No hunting license is revoked because someone proudly poses with a dead deer. No hunting association sanctions members who post gory scenes on their social media. The underlying behavior—posing with a dead body—is structurally the same. The judgment, however, follows a double standard: In the case of human victims, it is considered a violation of dignity. In the case of wild animals, it is seen as "hunter's honor.".

More examples of misguided hunting practices: Unscrupulous Swiss hunting authorities

What the studies say: 96 percent react negatively

The data is unequivocal. A representative study conducted in 2024 by the market research institute Bilendi and Respondi as part of a master's thesis at the University of Applied Sciences Burgenland systematically examined for the first time how Generation Z reacts to photos of hunters on social media. The results are devastating for recreational hunting: 96 to 99 percent of the emotional reactions to these photos were negative. 73 percent of respondents wanted such images to be labeled with a warning. 69 percent did not want to see any photos of hunters on social media. 67 percent felt sorry for the animals depicted. 57 percent believed that photos of hunters negatively impact the public perception of recreational hunting.

The level of rejection remained consistently high, regardless of whether the images depicted game, the recreational hunter, or other compositions. The study thus refutes the widespread assumption among recreational hunters that an "appealing presentation" can make photos of hunters socially acceptable. Hunting communication expert Christoph Fischer puts it bluntly on the platform Hirsch&Co: "A dead animal remains a dead animal and cannot evoke positive associations in the average animal-loving citizen." He describes hunter photos as "communicative landmines" and warns that every single thoughtless photo can destroy the painstakingly cultivated narrative of "responsible wildlife management" in seconds.

It is noteworthy that the criticism also comes from within the recreational hunting community itself: 70 percent of young recreational hunters already spoke out clearly against the dissemination of photos of hunters on social media in 2019 (Fischer 2019). In the USA, the organization Mountain Pursuit documented that in 2019, 29 percent of the hunting industry's Instagram posts still showed trophy photos or bloody scenes, a figure that fell by 25 percent by 2021 because even the industry recognized that such images jeopardize the public acceptance of recreational hunting.

Social media platforms are also reacting: Since introducing "Sensitive Content Control," Instagram classifies weapons and hunting content as potentially problematic and limits its reach for non-followers. Hashtags like #trophyhunting are banned. The algorithm recognizes images of weapons and automatically reduces their visibility. As a result, recreational hunting loses not only moral but also technical control over its visual language.

More analyses on today's hunting culture: The hobby hunter in the 21st century

Psychology: Dead bodies as a stage for self-presentation

Images of hunters offer insight into a psychology of distancing. Those who pose smiling next to a dead animal signal that the suffering and death of that individual recede into the background compared to pride, success, and group affiliation. Social psychology has demonstrated that repeated exposure to images of violence without an empathetic context shifts the internal threshold of what is acceptable: people become accustomed to sights that would previously have shocked them.

In a police context, this very tendency is considered a warning sign. Anyone who casually poses with a victim, according to professional assessment, demonstrates that they might be unsuitable for such a sensitive role. In recreational hunting, the same desire to stage scenes with a dead body is glorified as a "passion for nature" or "tradition." Hunting magazines are full of pictures of hobby hunters caught up in the thrill of the hunt, posing in a dominant position over their victims. As wildbeimwild.com aptly describes : Any soldier or police officer who presented themselves to their victim in the way that recreational hunters do would be dishonorably discharged and committed to a psychiatric hospital.

The image speaks volumes: kneeling at the animal's head, one hand on the antlers, the other on the weapon, a broad smile, thumbs up. The animal is not a living subject, but rather proof of marksmanship, masculinity, or hunting success. The pose reduces the animal to a mere prop in an ego trip. Amateur hunters need such photographs to feel important and to gain recognition within the hunting culture. Whoever can boast the largest trophy, the strongest stag, or the longest shot climbs the hierarchy. The parallel to trophy hunting abroad is unmistakable: whether a deer in a hunting area in Graubünden or an elephant in Namibia, the mechanics of self-presentation through the dead animal are the same.

From an ethical perspective, death is the most vulnerable moment for a living being. Using it as a backdrop for selfies reduces the individual to an object, reinforces the devaluation of wildlife, and fosters a culture in which empathy becomes secondary to ego and entertainment.

More on the psychological background: Psychology of Hunting

International comparisons: Who acts and who watches

The debate surrounding photos of hunters is not limited to Switzerland. In Namibia, Environment Minister Pohamba Shifeta issued a ban on posting photos of dead wild animals on social media. His reasoning: such images misrepresent recreational hunting and are morally unacceptable. Wildbeimwild.com reported on the threat of punishment, which is intended to apply to everyone, "especially those with hunting permits." Photos may only be taken for private use, not for social media.

In the US, Walmart, the world's largest private employer, has removed all depictions of hunting violence from its stores and screens. Import bans on hunting trophies are being discussed or implemented in a growing number of countries: Belgium, Finland, the Netherlands, and France have already enacted such bans. In the UK, a corresponding bill passed the House of Commons. The EU is discussing stricter import regulations .

Switzerland is lagging behind in this development. There is neither a legal regulation for photos of hunters nor binding guidelines from hunting associations. The Swiss Hunting Association, Jagd Schweiz, recommends "restraint" internally regarding such posts, but does not sanction violations. The result: While a minister is taking action in Namibia, the Swiss debate remains at the stage of polite requests.

More on the Swiss failing: Hobby hunting fact-checked: A quick license to kill instead of knowledge

Ethics of dying: Fear of death is not a photo subject

In human medicine, "dying with dignity" is a central guiding principle. Palliative medicine and ethics emphasize that the final phase of life should be characterized by peace, pain reduction, and respect. No one would dream of subjecting a dying person to the fear of death and then staging their body as a trophy for recreational purposes.

This is precisely what happens to wild animals during recreational hunting. They are shot at a distance, flee in panic, are often injured, and fight for their lives. As the dossier on wild animals, mortal fear, and the lack of tranquilizer darts shows, the success rate for tracking wounded animals varies from only 35 to 65 percent, depending on the canton. An estimated 3,000 to 4,000 wild animals are shot and never put down in Switzerland every year. A Danish study (Elmeros et al. 2012) demonstrated that 25 percent of foxes killed bore traces of previous shootings. The German Veterinary Association for Animal Welfare (TVT) documented that up to 70 percent of animals shot during driven hunts do not die immediately.

This very result—a bleeding, panicked, and ultimately killed animal—is then proudly photographed. While animals destined for slaughter in Switzerland must be stunned before being bled, no comparable stunning requirement applies to wild animals hunted recreationally. From an ethical standpoint, it is hardly justifiable that we choose to commemorate the most brutal and uncontrolled dying process with a selfie. The "hunter's picture" celebrates the outcome of a process that we would condemn as animal cruelty in a slaughterhouse.

More on the lack of mandatory stunning: Driven hunts under observation

What would need to change

Animal dignity beyond death: The concept of dignity under animal welfare law must extend beyond death. Article 3(a) of the Animal Welfare Act, in conjunction with Article 26, must be interpreted in such a way that the degrading display of dead animals online is classified as a violation of their dignity. Model motion: Regulation of images of hunters
Binding social media guidelines for hunting license holders: The issuance of a hunting license is linked to a binding guideline. The publication of photos of hunters displaying dead animals as trophies is defined as incompatible with ethical hunting practices. Violations will result in the revocation or temporary suspension of the license.
Independent hunting oversight with media control: The case in Graubünden shows that public prosecutors treat photos of hunters as trivial matters, while critical use of the same images is prosecuted. Independent hunting oversight, modeled on the Geneva system, would also professionalize the control over the media portrayal of recreational hunting. Model proposal: Independent hunting oversight: External control instead of self-regulation.
Consistently apply youth protection laws: Images of animals killed by hunters are freely accessible on online platforms, even to minors. The Youth Protection Act (JSFVG) must include images of animals killed by hunters within its scope, analogous to other depictions of violence against animals.

Argumentation

"Slaying photos are a tradition." Many earlier traditions, from public executions to animal fights, are considered unacceptable today because they turned suffering into a spectacle. Referencing tradition doesn't explain why a behavior should be morally justifiable. Slaying photos follow the same pattern, turning the death of an animal into a stage for pride and entertainment.

"One photo can't hurt." In the logic of social media, quantity and repetition are what count. According to Bilendi/Respondi 2024, 96 to 99 percent of Generation Z react negatively to photos of hunters. Every new bloody pose joins a stream of images that associates recreational hunting with brutality, gun fetishism, and a lack of empathy.

“Aren’t there also problematic images from the police and military?” Yes, and they are prosecuted. In London in 2021, two police officers were sentenced to almost three years in prison each for taking selfies with murder victims and sharing them via WhatsApp. In North Rhine-Westphalia, a police cadet was dismissed from the force for taking selfies while on duty. Comparable consequences are lacking for recreational hunting, even though the behavior is structurally the same.

“Animals have no personal rights; the comparison is flawed.” The comparison doesn't aim for identical legal status, but rather identical attitudes: the staging of a dead body as an ego-driven moment. Switzerland recognizes the intrinsic value of animals in Article 1 of its Animal Welfare Act. A consistent application of this principle must also address the issue of post-mortem degradation.

"Those who eat meat shouldn't talk about pictures of the animal being killed." This hypocrisy argument confuses different issues. Meat consumption can be ethically criticized, but that doesn't justify using the death of an animal as an excuse for narcissistic self-promotion online. Someone who eats a steak doesn't pose smiling next to the cow.

"Common sense is enough." The dissemination and defense of photos of hunters shows that "common sense" functions differently in parts of the recreational hunting community than in the rest of society. Where empathy and self-restraint are insufficient, clear ethical and legal guidelines are needed.

"Hunting is only criticized by opponents of hunting." Seventy percent of young recreational hunters themselves are against posting photos of their kills online (Fischer 2019). The platform Hirsch&Co, a pro-hunting media outlet, warns of the communicative risks. Even the hunting industry recognizes that photos of hunters do more damage to its own image than any external campaign.

Quick links

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Our claim

Images of hunted game are not a fringe issue, but rather a reflection of how we as a society think about dignity, compassion, and violence. This dossier documents why the display of dead wild animals clashes with legal rights, existing research, and minimum ethical standards, and why the same pose that would cost a police officer his job is considered "tradition" among recreational hunters. The dossier is continuously updated as new court rulings, studies, or political developments necessitate it.

More on the topic of hobby hunting: In our dossier on hunting, we compile fact checks, analyses and background reports.