12-year-old girl faces online backlash for big game hunting photos

A 12-year-old girl who likes to hunt big game with her father is facing a growing backlash after posting photos of herself online posing with animals she killed with the help of her dad.

On an African hunting trip last week with her father, Aryanna Gourdin of Utah posted pictures of her kills: an impala, a zebra, calling it one of her "dream hunts."

Aryanna posing with a dead giraffe racked up 73,000 comments, some positive but mostly outrage and even death threats. One said, "You and your redneck father should be hunted."

"It's something I cherish and enjoy," Aryanna Gourdin said. "They love animals and we love animals too, we just also love hunting."

The Gourdins did nothing illegal and some African countries rely on money from big game hunters for conservation efforts.

"They don't understand the conservation aspect of it," said Gourdin's father.

But many wildlife groups say trophy hunting should be a thing of the past.

"It's 2016, we do not have to kill an animal to save it," said Jeff Flocken of the International Fund for Animal Welfare.

But Aryana, a hunter since age seven, isn't apologizing. "I'm a hunter and no matter what the people say to me, I'm never going to stop," she said.

As for her online critics, Aryanna says she's simply going to ignore them.