koeeadi;
Well said. I can see no rational objection to your viewpoint, provided of course that it is your own personal viewpoint and you don’t seek to impose it on others.
On the other hand, one returns more than the other. In both cases, you have all the traveling through nature, getting back to the outdoors, the scenery, the friends, etc. In one, you bring back pictures. In the other, you bring back enough food to feed yourself (And probably family, too) for a good long while. I think that’s one of the main reasons people might like hunting more…
I generally rank hunting as being “better” than slaughterhouses, myself. The animals actually have a chance to get away (Witness the many hunters that come back from long weekends, without ever even seeing their prey), it requires some degree of skill, and actually confronts people with the facts of where their food comes from. People ordering a Big Mac rarely connect a slim brown patty with a living cow. Then there’s the argument about suffering, but that’s more of a grey area.
I was generally against canned hunts (Especially in comparison to regular hunting), but the more I think about it, the more and more similarities I see between canned hunts and they typical slaughterhouse. The animals are brought in specifically to be killed for food, and have no way of escaping death (With the exception of some of the very VERY large “canned hunts” where the hunter never finds the animal…). In both cases, the animal is entrapped in a small enclosure, and killed (One with a gun, one with an air-hammer). Now, I fully agree that just killing the animal to take a trophy (Or nothing at all) and leaving the body to rot isn’t good, wether it’s canned, free, or slaughterhouse, but assuming that the meat is taken in all cases… How different are canned hunts and slaughterhouses, really?
Well put, phoenix. I felt/ feel the same as you about canned hunts. I sorta had an unexamined notion that they were bad ([south park] Mmmm’kay?[/south park]), but I’ve been thinking about it, and thinking back to discussions I’ve had about organic/ humane agriculture standards where one of the big obstacles is health laws prohibiting on-farm slaughter, thus necessitating the generally highly stressful capture, handling, transport, social mixing, etc. of a trip to the slaughterhouse. So now I’m starting to think that canned hunts may be less stressful for the animal than agriculture, though less fair than un-canned hunts. I’m no longer convinced they are morally wrong, but I’m not sure I’d call them hunting, either.
Stoid, you are still not grasping the distinction between the entire process of hunting, which is pleasant and rewarding, and the actual action of the kill, which brings the hunter into the stark light of the implications of his existance as an omnivore (or heck, if he or she is hunting gophers, then even with his existance as a vegetarian). You are also not grasping that while this may well bring about feelings of guilt, etc., but facing and accepting those feelings can indeed be fulfilling and rewarding. I’m not sure how else I can explain this distinction, but hopefully some day you will see it. I think Scylla’s analogy to running a marathon may help: why would anyone spend all that time and effort to run a marathon (or play any other sports, for that matter), which makes every part of their body hurt? By your logic, they don’t, so either marathons don’t exist, or else there is no pain afterwards.
And viking, you are still not grasping that I can grasp your point perfectly well, and simply disagree that it is valid, although it’s a pretty fancy argument.
In any case, it doesn’t matter whether I buy it or not, because even if I did, it wouldn’t change my opinion of people who seek out whatever feelings hunting brings them. They make the decision that for them to get their ya-yas, however those ya-yas are defined, it must entail the killing of an animal, and they make the decision that those ya-yas must be gotten. People whose ya-yas require the up close and personal killing of an animal are people I don’t care to be friends with. Their yas and my yas are very, very different, and no, I do not respect them for this.
Anyone has a right to hunt, and I have no intention of interfering with that right. (excepting endangered species) But I do have the right to view the desire to do this as perfectly vile and to feel that this reflects extremely poorly on those who choose it, as measured by my own personal ethics and worldview. Different strokes and all that.
I get my ya- yas from watching the Steelers kick the hell out of the Browns.
I get my ya- yas from cracking open a beer and watching a Kevin Smith film.
I get my ya- yas from preparing a delicious meal and sharing it with my friends and family.
I hunt on occasion. NO YA-YAS!
Scylla stated my opinion much better than I could have. (Right down to the thing about the dog…GET OUTTA HEAD!)
Although I find the experience rewarding it is not the quasi-orgasmic release you make it out to be. It is more a spiritual thing. It is about being accountable for your place in “The Circle of Life” But it is also about personal growth.
Many religions practice pilgrimages or other rituals that involve personal sacrifice or resolution to complete a task. Often these things entail both pain and pleasure.
Reading about the U.S.M.C. crucible training program will not make me a Marine. The crucible challenge is grueling but what is gained cannot be achieved in any other way.
I have no desire to be a Marine. But I have a great deal of respect and admiration for those that have answered that calling.
It is obvious that you have no desire to hunt. It is an experience you feel you do not need or want. Great Fine! I applaud you commitment to the humane treatment of all life.
There seems to be a fundamental disagreement on whether or not hunting adds to the “universal suffering quotient”(Bullet v. Starvation, Ranch v. Forrest, Population Growth v. Habitat Shrinkage etc.) I say universal because suffering is a byproduct of life, ALL LIFE. It can never be eliminated. So what we are talking about is degree.
Valid arguments have been made both ways.
I am getting tired of people saying a person’s experience is invalid “Because I said so”
The argument is not “Fancy”. It is empirically undefinable.
This may not be the way you meant it but this is what it sounds like:
“Looking at that sunset, I felt one with everything.”
LIAR!
“Seeing the birth of my child really put my life into perspective”
HOGWASH!
“My faith in God gives me strength”
BULLSHIT!
The OP seemed ambivalent. He was looking for insight. The best insight anyone can give is there own personal experience.
If a hunter “must” kill an animal to get their ya-yas, then my dad is some kind of masochist.
Or maybe just a lousy shot.
He’s come home empty-handed from plenty of hunts. Didn’t seem to diminish the experience for him.
That is completely wrong! 
So are you saying that watching football is orgasmic and going out to kill things puts you in touch with God? Spending a day trying to kill things, then killing them, is comparable with a monk spending a day praying, something like that?
And are you further claiming that I can have no opinion about this? Since when do we just swallow everything anyone says around here?
And again… even if everything you say is true, so?
So, since it cannot be eliminated, we should ADD to it, would that be your position?
But I digress from my own position, which I think I’ve made clear, but I’ll try again, more bluntly, if that’s possible: If you hunt, I judge you for it. I think that’s a horrible, selfish, disgusting choice, no matter WHAT you get out of it, even if it enables you to have lunch with Jesus Christ! The fact that YOUR need to have YOUR experience causes YOU to CHOOSE TO KILL, and that the KILLING ITSELF is a NECESSARY part of your lunch with Jesus, is, to my mind, an enormous choice that speaks to me about who you are, and it’s just not good. Therefore, I don’t want to hang out with you, period.
That is all I’m saying. That’s all I’ve said since I showed up here.
And Cranky, if the kill itself doesn’t add or diminish the experience for your dad, why doesn’t he just leave the gun at home?
Stoid, you have a right to judge us as callous, vile, disgusting, selfish monsters. That is your right. You further have the right to not hang out with us. No problems on my part.
However, it seems to us (well, me at least, but I think I can take the liberty of speaking for a few other posters in this thread on this point) that you judge us from a position of ignorance with respect to what our motivations are. We have been trying to explain these motivations. Fighting ignorance and all that.
You can have an opinion about our experiences, if that opinion is that our experiences are vile. However, you have no basis to say that our descriptions of our experiences are wrong, which it appears to be what you are saying when you write things like
Here, you are arguing that you know what makes a hunter tick, and those of us who have hunted (or will, in my own case) do not. I don’t know if I can get away with saying you are not entitled to this opinion, but it certainly is a good way to get our heckles up…
** viking ** You continue to take issue with the words I use. (I have an opinion about why this is, but no matter…)
Okay, let’s simplify:
Can we say this: You who hunt find it a * positive * experience, however you define that. People do not seek out negative experiences as sport. (The pain of running a marathon is not negative. It’s pain, but it’s good pain. So it goes for all good things which have uncomfortable components.) Therefore you think hunting is a * good * thing. (Generally people don’t think that positive experiences that they seek out and defend are bad things). One way or another, you have come to the conclusion that it is perectly alright, even terrific, to bring about the suffering, pain, and death of another living thing so that YOU can have this experience. Repeatedly.
I understand that this is how you feel about it.
However, the fact that this is your view of it, and that I understand that this is your view of it, makes no difference to my opinion of it. I think hunting is a bad thing, and I am horrified that anyone would engage in it, no matter how positive others find the experience. I am mortified that anyone * would* experience seeking innocent creatures out and then killing them as positive.
Is that accurate?
Not quite. (My theory about why I continue to take exception to the words you use is that they do not quite capture the subtle reasons why I hunt.)
Yes, I think hunting (the whole package) is a positive experience. It does, however, have elements that are not, in themselves, particularly pleasurable. Just like the ``good pain’’ of running is not, in itself, that much fun. Yes, I think hunting is a good thing. But, and this is the key here, this is where I lose you.
I do not necessarily think it is perfectly alright and terrific to cause suffering and death. I think that causing suffering and death is inevitable in life, and given that, it is important to me that I do not shy away from that, but that I embrace it, experience it first-hand, and face the stark reality of the consequences of my existence.
Do you see the distinction?
Now, it may be that this distinction does not affect your choice to be horrified at my actions; that I accept. But as you describe it, you are not quite correctly understanding how I feel about it.
Do you feel the same about people who “hunt down” their food in the local Safeway? Or is (effectively) paying someone to kill the animal for you much more moral of a choice?
If you’re eating meat, an animal dies somewhere. The only difference here, that I see, is who does it.
Stoid:
Apparently not. As you’ve been told repeatedly in this and earlier threads that is not an accurate representation of hunters, any more than your meat eating is motivated by the desire to see third parties kill animals on your behalf.
You’ve been told this many times, and I can only assume that your ignorance on this is deliberate and willful.
This is prejudice, pure and simple. You might as well be going on about how you don’t like associating with them damn Nigras. Same lack of logic, same willful ignorance. Same prejudice.
That this is your opinion is fine. You’re entitled to it. This however is Great Debates. Opinions are worthwhile in the proper forum, and prejudice founded on ignorance also has its proper forum.
Here in Great Debates, your personal opinion founded on nothing but your deliberate and total ignorance of hunting and hunters is completely worthless.
You have said you don’t associate with hunters. You don’t hang out with them, or enquire honestly into their mindset. You do not hunt.
What exactly is this opinion of yours founded on?
It looks to me like you have admittedly founded your opinion on a purposefully closed mind, total lack of experience, and complete ignorance of your subject.
Do you think this is a winning hand?
Whao… no wonder you started that other thread… sheesh.
Personally, I think it would behoove all people to kill an animal once in their lifetimes and eat it. Everyone should go thru the “Survivor” thing and find out how puny humans really are in the natural order of things. Those who cant stomach it can go and eat veggies the reast of their lives. More steaks for the rest of us. I dont think its right that people grow up not knowing how a chicken becomes a McNugget. Or that goats have a more nutritious milk than cows milk. Or even not know what part of the cow a ribeye comes from. Its not for everyone but it must be taught.
Yeah, well, like I said, I can have an opinion about this, and I do. (re: the validity) You don’t like it, that’s fine and fair. Neither of us has to like, agree with, or accept anything the other says. We make our points, hope for the best, get on with our lives.
I understand you perfectly, that is not the problem.
Even if I totally accept and believe what you say, it is still disgusting to me that you would choose this. What it requires to acheive this oneness with the universe is much too high a price, and I think it reflects very badly on your overall humanity that you are so enamored of “facing the stark reality of the consequences of your existence” :rolleyes: that you will repeatedly indulge in bloodsport. Ugh. How primitive. How unnecessary. How grotesque. How selfish. How cruel.
I suggest you try meditation.
That is your issue, not mine. I have no problem at all with eating animals, and with the fact that they must be killed in order for this to happen. I have a problem with causing them to * suffer while they live * (pigs made to live in boxes, that sort of thing) or in the process of killing them. Everything dies, and if we weren’t going to eat it, the cows and pigs and chickens would never have lived to begine with. That doesn’t give us the right to torture them.
Death itself is inevitable for everything, and once it is dead, it has no knowledge of it. So obessesing about the death of an organism for that organism’s sake is wasted emotion.
The other thing I have a problem with is the idea that some folks * make sport of killing *. Killing animals is an ugly, sad business, that should be undertaken as quickly and humanely as possible, and the word “sport” should never be attached to it, in my view of a civilized society. That anyone would find hunting down animals and killing them a thrilling, rewarding, relaxing, uplifting, or in any respect a positive way to spend an afternoon, and undertake it repeatedly, is anathema to me.
I absolutely agree. And I think that everyone should be taught exactly how cruel the modern business of producing animal-based food really is, so they can make informed choices and hopefully someday make changes in how the business of factory farming is run. Nothing will change so long as we remain ignorant.
And you have chosen to be deliberately and willfully ignorant on the subject of hunting and hunters.
Nothing changes.
stoid, let’s get something straight here.
What scylla does preserves large tracts of forest.
What I do when I get a burger from the local Golden Arches promotes the destruction of large tracts of forest, including rain forests that are cleared for the local bovine and porcine population.
Unintented consequences, anyone?
As I said, pantom, modern factory farming methods are horrific. Worse than hunting, for the animals involved - the suffering for factory farmed beasts is lifelong, and the effects on the environment as a whole are devastating.
But one has nothing to do with the other.
Well, you do state later on that the current stockyard/slaughterhouse method of getting meat entails more suffering for the animals involved. Reducing the amount of suffering involved in your food seems like a “positive way to spend an afternoon.” And the more often you do it, the less and less suffering is involved in the food you eat. At the same time that you’re doing some “good” in the world, you’re also giving yourself a very clear and realistic view of life; things die, living entails other things dying, etc. As I said before, too many people nowadays don’t connect the meat they eat with a living animal. The more philosophical impact of such could be considered uplifting. You’re also going out into the wilderness, away from the usual daily worries and into the great outdoors, certainly sounds relaxing to me. Rewarding? You get enough meat to last you for a good, long time, certainly sounds like a reward. And I’m sure if you go out on a weekend trek, finally finding what your looking for after a full day or two of hiking, could certainly be thrilling.
I mean really, if hunting results in less suffering for the animal than if that animal were slaughtered in typical factory-farming methods, it seems like going hunting would be the more moral choice. Most people usually see that as a good thing…
Personally, I could do with or without the “sport” part, but even though I think it applies in theory, it conjures up the wrong image in most people’s mind. But then, I don’t look at it from the entertainment aspect so much as the predatory aspect, so it’s pretty much irelevant to me…