Bob P - please get your facts straight

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Posted By: Tim

First let me get this out of the way. I have never said in any of the above threads that hunting is a sport.

Jeff –

Hunting isn’t for everyone. A lot of people can never see themselves killing an animal no matter the situation, certainly not on purpose. I understand where those feelings come from.
Like I said in my above post, a lot goes into the hunt. You don’t just walk into the woods and five minutes later kill a deer and walk back out. You have to learn about the animal, know what signs to look for, and then you still have to be in the right place at the right time. And even if all of that happens and the deer is right in front of you well within range, the true hunter will not take the shot until the deer is in the right stance that he is sure to take it down a humanly as possible.

I can not explain in just a few words on this post what makes hunting exciting and worthwhile for some of us. It isn’t simply the taking of an animals life. Hunters don’t have some pent up aggression or need to simply kill something.

I will admit I don’t understand how people that eat meat have an issue with people that hunt and do it with respect to the animal and its habitat. What is the difference between me killing a deer and eating it, and someone who doesn’t hunt going to the grocery store and buying chicken? I assure you the deer led a much better life before becoming my dinner than the chicken did before it became yours. But somehow if the person in question didn’t actually do the killing, eating the meat then becomes OK? Or if it were farm raised and not grown in the wild it’s OK to kill it and eat it. If it were grown for human consumption than it’s different than if it occurred naturally in the wild?

I understand there are generally ill feelings towards taking an animals life for what people see as unnecessary reasons. But to those of us that hunt it isn’t what many that don’t perceive it to be.

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Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

"I will admit I don’t understand how people that eat meat have an issue with people that hunt and do it with respect to the animal and its habitat. What is the difference between me killing a deer and eating it, and someone who doesn’t hunt going to the grocery store and buying chicken?"

The fact that true hunters do all that they can to end the animal's life as quickly as possible with no suffering is something that is not really universally known to non-hunters. And Tim, I appreciate your above point as it relates to hunters who eat the meat that they kill. However, I think that the trophy aspect to hunting is grotesque. I just simply can't comprehend that aspect of hunting.

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Posted By: barrysloate

It's all inhumane, no matter whether an animal is killed for sport or for the dinner table. But nobody said life is fair.

Part of the problem with hunting is some animals are only wounded, and die a very painful death. Hunters don't always admit that is part of the equation.

Everytime I sit down and eat a steak, or a boiled lobster, I realize an animal had to suffer for my benefit. It's all very sad, but I haven't reached the point where I've stopped eating them. Maybe one day I will.

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Posted By: Tim

"I think that the trophy aspect to hunting is grotesque."

As a hunter I completely agree with you. And unfortunately it is becoming more and more the norm. Farms in Ohio, Texas, and other states are breeding deer soley for the purpose of creating trophies. People spend a certain amount of money to come to their facility and kill a certain size trophy deer. I don't consider this hunting.

Barry-
You are correct, in some cases an animal is wounded and not killed quickly. We try through education, training, and patience to reduce the chance that it happens.

I fish also and I find it fascinating how hunting is seen as such and evil thing but the outcry against fishing isn't very loud. Go to any fishing pier and you will see people hook a fish, pull it from its habitat, and throw it in a bucket and allow if to suffocate over a long period of time. A very slow and painfull death. Are people not concerned about the fish? Is the fishing pole not as menacing a weapon as the shotgun?

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Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

Tim, I agree on fishing. The old saw about how the hook doesn't hurt the fish because fish can't feel the pain is about as ridiculous as horse people saying that the whip doesn't hurt a horse. Simply pure rationalization for a brutal act.

In a more enlightened world we'd all stop harming animals for any purpose; for reasons of sport should go first.

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Posted By: Cobby33

Not getting personal here, since this has been a civil exchange. However, the below link should abolish all credibility to the argument that hunting is in any conceivable way, humane. It also blasts the "theory" of wildlife management. Truly disturbing.

http://www.defenders.org/programs_and_policy/policy_and_legislation/aerial_hunting.php?ht</a


P.S. Tim- I respect your viewpoint- yet I think people should be aware of these (above) and similar issues.

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Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

Cobby, that is a truly sickening video. It really does take a certain type of person to shoot a defenseless animal. I'm still not certain I can conceive of any satisfaction that one could get from harming an animal for sport.

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Posted By: Cobby33

Jeff- My thoughts exactly.

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Posted By: Bob Pomilla

Hard to refute.


"Of all the creatures, man is the most detestable. Of the entire brood, he's the one that possesses malice. He is the only creature that inflicts pain for sport, knowing it to be pain. The fact that man knows right from wrong proves his intellectual superiority to the other creatures; but the fact that he can do wrong proves his moral inferiority to any creature that cannot."
- Mark Twain -

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Posted By: Jim Dale

That we have hands to gather and hunt, forward seeing eyes for the same reason, and teeth that match that of any other carnivor on the planet? Our human race is a hunter gatherer race - period.

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Posted By: Cobby33

And how many of us would survive a week in the jungle with no heat; refrigerator; air conditioning; clothing; fast food; Internet; etc.? Certainly, we've evolved (for the better?) from our natural "instincts" of many thousands of years ago.

P.S. Great Twain quote.

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Posted By: Bob Pomilla

"That we have.........teeth that match that of any other carnivor on the planet"

I just have to look at the fangs of my house cats, to put the lie to that.

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Posted By: Andrew

From a stand-up comic:

Vegetarian: "...you wouldn't eat those animals if they could talk."
Meat Eater: "Using that logic, I don't think you would eat those veggies if they could."



"Take your life in your own hands and what happens? A terrible thing: no one to blame." -- Erica Jong