no, don’t get rid of the snakes, they are an important natural rodent control, and rodents like rats and mice cause far more damage and spread much more disease than the snakes causing harm to humans.
Yes, pigeons can (but do not always) carry diease
Yes, opossums can, too.
As a bonus, we’ve been having a big raccoon problem in my household. As in in the house. We’ve tried live trapping them, and got about half that way, but the rest we’ve had to kill. We do our best to make it quick, but it’s not something anyone here enjoys. We leave the carcasses out in the rear of the backyard, where they are promptly recycled by the local Carrion Crew (crows, coyotes, possibly other raccoon, feral cats and dogs, really, whatever wanders by). Except for that one that was claimed by a neighbor who, apparently, enjoys eating raccoon.
Anyhow, quite a few other animals than deer have discreet hunting seasons, and some pest species are never NOT in season for hunting. Deer hunting gets a lot of publicity, but plenty of other things get hunted. The folks who are using hunting for their meat typically eat lots more things than just deer.
These seem to be rather arbitrary values when judging the worth of a life. As though value is based on how many anthropomorphic traits we can imagine.
I’m only bringing in this extreme position to illustrate most people have some manner of balance. There’s a few people who will wait until something dies before they eat it, but most of us are okay with killing to eat.
There’s more to hunting than just killing things:
1] You’ll need a gun, and guns are fun.
2] You get to go camping with the spouse and kidlettes for a week
3] Hunters hunt, gatherers gather … paleo-style, it’s a hoot
4] It’s actually quite a bit of food, plus the buckskins
5] Culling the herd, better for the environment
6] You get to kill things, lawful like
Really? I can’t eat a lot of the high-protein vegan foods (I’m allergic to most legumes, and in, quick trip to the ER so I don’t die allergic). Is it moral to condemn me to chronic protein deficiency for someone else’s moral stance?
The Amish do not practice infant baptism. You have to be a full adult to be baptized. Joining the church as an adult is a conscious decision.
IF a child leaves BEFORE being baptized into the Amish faith then no, they are not shunned.
If they leave AFTER they formally join the church, yes, they are shunned (possibly a few exceptions, but it’s rare as hen’s teeth).
Did you mention that before? If I missed it I apologize. No, in your case of course there should be no prohibition against eating meat. But what about for other people?
Certainly not by an arbitrary standard such as “natural”! Rape is natural. It’s natural among male apes to kill the offspring of a new mate (from her previous mate). Lots of heinous things are natural, since nature is merely the result of evolution and is no guarantee of morality.
As self-aware beings, we have the burden of deciding what is right and wrong. To me, consciousness/awareness is paramount, since without it, value is meaningless. That is, I’m a humanist.
I bet we don’t…and I bet you and I both die before our bet can be won or lost.
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I’m sure you’re right about that!
I disagree. The ability to feel pain or joy is what creates value, so these things are not the least bit arbitrary.
It’s debatable whether plants have experiences. The case is a lot clearer for mammals, simply by analogy to humans.
I’m not sure what, exactly, is so *horrifically *wrong here.
An Amish person doesn’t join the church until around 19 or 20… they aren’t kids, they’re legal adults. By doing so they are willingly accepting a set of rules to live under, a set of rules they are very familiar with already. If they break the rules they know what will happen. If they refuse to make amends but rather just leave sure, they’re ostracized, if they wish to make amends and ask forgiveness they can be re-admitted to that society. It’s not like they’re taking them out back of the barn and shooting them in the head.
Not that I agree theirs is a particularly desirable lifestyle or whatever but no one is forced to join their church. As I mentioned, they can choose not to join the Amish church and still maintain contact with their families.
I disagree. Too restrictive and vindictive. But now we have wandered (my fault) really far off path. I will probably start this as a separate thread tomorrow…
I certainly value all life equally when it comes to killing for food, except for a certain fondness for me and my own. Something has to die or I’m going to die. So, no, I see no difference between plants and animals in this context.
Very true … and at time when everybody else isn’t shooting guns in the woods !!!
Amish are anabaptists … they believe only an adult can choose to follow God … and once committed it’s like marriage, “Until death do you part” … and they shun everybody not in their church, so obviously one is shunned if they leave the church, it’s not that big of a deal.
I think predation is a legitimate reason to kill. I don’t think it is immoral to enjoy the hunt but yeah you should eat what you kill and only kill what you’re going to eat.
I think I agree. There is (possibly) a small set of hunters for whom hunting is some dysfunctional fetish that allows them to kill legally. But I don’t think most hunters are like that. I guess my comments about hunting for thrill of the kill are a bit exaggerated. Not, that a thrill is not involved, but the idea that there is something immoral about it.
I have no problem with deer hunting, but I snicker when hunters brag that they donate deer meat to homeless shelters. Gee, how big of you to donate shitty meat no one else wants so the poor can have some scraps to feed on. Every Republican of you.
There is a certain satisfaction in providing food for one’s family. There’s nothing wrong with that, and it can be part of what makes hunting enjoyable.
That’s a lot different than taking pleasure in the suffering of animals.
I beg to differ. I have an excellent venison stew recipe that several people who have tried it prefer to beef stew. Maybe you don’t want the meat, but I’d be more than happy to take it.
The big problem is that most people don’t know how to properly cook venison or other game meat. You can’t treat it like domestic meat.
Huh? Venison can be a bit more expensive than beef. Even deer farms exist to provide venison.
Like Broomstick said, game meat is different from farm-raised meat. This does not mean it is shitty meat, and in fact can be quite tasty. Mmm… venison sausages… bison burguers… squirrel meat in white gravy.
Personally, I know of a couple where the woman was vegetarian and the man was vegan. At least, that’s how they presented the first time I met them. A couple of years later, they had moved from their inner city apartment to a slightly more spacious shack in a more rural area. And then I heard them talk about how they stored meat in the freezer. Meat??? Turns out, the man is a vegan unless he (or I guess his wife/partner) hunts (or raises?) the animal. Had no qualms about hunting squirrels, and I think mentioned trying to hunt bird game and perhaps deer. These were also graduate students with limited budget, so the hunted meat helped feed them.
I’m not a hunter although some family members are, and largely I agree with Martin Hyde’s lenghty post above - hunting for food is fine, usual caveats applying; hunting purely for trophies is wasteful and destructive.
What have you done for homeless shelters, Democrat? Drop off a can of corn that someone else grew, picked, packed, and shipped to your local supermarket? At least you didn’t get your hands dirty.
Have you compared the price of beef to the price of venison? Or buffalo, or ostrich?
