Knowledge of wildlife behaviour, how animals care for their young, how they communicate with each other, and other cute and interesting facts are common in nature guidebooks, magazine articles, and safari guide rhetoric. The eco-tourism experience is about giving the animal a place in our hearts. Conversely, knowledge of ecosystem processes, energy flow, homeostasis, genetic bottlenecks, and carrying capacity is not well understood by the general public, as it is seldom explained outside of scientific writing and lecture halls. The last thing an avid tourist on safari wants to hear about is how a six-carbon sugar is converted into two molecules of pyruvate, allowing an elephant to locomote. A love of animals, combined with a limited understanding of ecology, is possibly one of the root causes of many vitriolic debates about wildlife conservation. My teenager would call it a clap-back battle - a mud-slinging contest by camouflaged keyboard ninjas on social media. Some of the topics that incite these debates include elephant culling, trophy hunting, and alien invasive species extermination (especially if the species is a 'cute' mammal). I will attempt to unpack two of these topics affecting biodiversity conservation in southern Africa: trophy hunting and elephant management.