Hunting Vs. Meat Industry
DiscoZombie
Join Date: 2003-08-05 Member: 18951Members
Join Date: 2003-08-05 Member: 18951Members
in Discussions
<div class="IPBDescription">why condemn one and not the other?</div> I just wanted to make this a post in the off-topic thread w/ the mounted dear head, but it got locked while I was typing <!--emo&:(--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/sad-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='sad-fix.gif' /><!--endemo--> so I figured I'd just make it a discussion...
I'm a vegetarian, but not really against hunting, especially if it's for food and if the species is overpopulated...
wild, hunted animals live much better lives than the animals raised through the meat industry. live your entire life in a cage the size of your body with no room to move, eating food created from basically garbage, including garbage parts of your slaughtered species, to finally be killed by an iron bolt to the head or a snapped neck... that's ok, but animals living a full life in their natural habitat and dying swiftly to a couple gunshots is cruel?
people need to get their priorities straight.
that said, hunting like <a href='http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L03163921.htm' target='_blank'>this</a> is never acceptable.
no, I'm not a crazy PETA guy and don't believe the sorts of things I described happen in all meat processing plants, but I'm am positive that the vast majority of animals used in food are not treated well. Some of us have heard how certain Native American tribes would actually thank the animals they killed for giving themselves up for food. Some Christians thank God for their meals before eating (appropriately called 'grace'). Both practices show respect - a lot more respect than giving an animal a horrible life, chopping it up, and putting it in a package with a clown on the box, or a picture of itself smiling with a bib on, ready to eat. A hunter is far more likely to show the proper respect than a meat industrialist is.
Like I said already, I'm not a crazy PETA person, I'm phrasing some of these things in an extreme way because my real question is how a meat eater can condemn hunting when hunted animals lead far better lives than manufactured-for-slaughter animals.
so yeah, become a vegetarian or shut up about hunting. <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
I'm a vegetarian, but not really against hunting, especially if it's for food and if the species is overpopulated...
wild, hunted animals live much better lives than the animals raised through the meat industry. live your entire life in a cage the size of your body with no room to move, eating food created from basically garbage, including garbage parts of your slaughtered species, to finally be killed by an iron bolt to the head or a snapped neck... that's ok, but animals living a full life in their natural habitat and dying swiftly to a couple gunshots is cruel?
people need to get their priorities straight.
that said, hunting like <a href='http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L03163921.htm' target='_blank'>this</a> is never acceptable.
no, I'm not a crazy PETA guy and don't believe the sorts of things I described happen in all meat processing plants, but I'm am positive that the vast majority of animals used in food are not treated well. Some of us have heard how certain Native American tribes would actually thank the animals they killed for giving themselves up for food. Some Christians thank God for their meals before eating (appropriately called 'grace'). Both practices show respect - a lot more respect than giving an animal a horrible life, chopping it up, and putting it in a package with a clown on the box, or a picture of itself smiling with a bib on, ready to eat. A hunter is far more likely to show the proper respect than a meat industrialist is.
Like I said already, I'm not a crazy PETA person, I'm phrasing some of these things in an extreme way because my real question is how a meat eater can condemn hunting when hunted animals lead far better lives than manufactured-for-slaughter animals.
so yeah, become a vegetarian or shut up about hunting. <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
Comments
However, hunting is simply inefficient for me. It's time consuming to go into the woods and either track or wait for a deer or moose, not to mention the paperwork you need to get approved for a hunting permit. Then there's the gun and ammunition. It's easier to just work my job and buy the meat at a market. I don't complain about hunting, but I don't complain about factory farms either.
I actually like factory farm meat. You can really taste the fear and cruelty, which makes the burger extra succulent.
And if you happened to find out that taco bell served chopped up human meat, would you have guessed it until now? I doubt those cows know what the heck they are eating. You make it sound so incredibly cruel, but ignorance is bliss I suppose. If they knew what they were eating, and they were forced to eat it all the same, I can see how that would be a different matter.
The life of a livestock is comparable to almost every dog in america. They're put in a fense and a little dog house, and fed once a day. Except of course livestock are quickly and painlessly killed when it is their time.
Humans are omnivores, meaning we eat plants and meat. We have the teeth equipped for tearing into meat. It's naive to think you can substitute meat with other plant products because it is more natural. Soy-bean tofu byproducts aren't natural. Meat has essential vitamins and minerals that you'd be hardpressed to find in other plants, and no such vitamins and minerals exist in one single plant, so you'd have to eat a reasonable-sized quantity of each plant to achieve the equivical amount of meat needed to consume for the day.
Also, new vitamins are coming out everyday that have not been discovered before. If you did not eat meat, you risk potentially denying yourself those vitamins yet left undiscovered and have a potential defficiency.
Humans could live off of grass, I'm sure, but it simply isn't what we were meant to eat. So I wouldn't condemn the meat industry unless you wanted to condemn us as humans.
it's hypocrisy that I'd rather call attention to - I don't like seeing people who support one thing but not another, when one thing can be seen as being as cruel, if not moreso...
yes, I do think the meat industry is cruel, but it bothers me more to see people get on a high horse about hunting when the majority of them support similar forms of cruelty and don't question it...
edit: spellins'
1. It involves guns (usually)
a. Incidently, people are occasionally killed with guns.
b. You can't separate hunting from gun legislation - remove reason to hunt, remove another reason to have a gun.
2. Bambi syndrome - it is so cute and fluffy, why kill it?
a. Animals have rights too, ya know.
3. We don't need to hunt for food
a. Kill a chicken, not a deer. (chickens are less fluffy)
b. Eat tofu - it has "all the essential stuff, and it isn't fluffy at all!"
That's how I see it anyway.
As you might expect, given my beliefs, I have a lot of interesting views on hunting. In my opinion, hunting should never be done for fun. That would make it akin to murder.
That said, hunting for <b>food</b> <span style='color:white'>[edited! thanks for poitning out the mistake XD]</span> is fine, as it is natural; wolves do it, tigers do it.. etc.
Free range farming/cattle etc is fine. They live as they would in the wild, just its a bit more convienient for humans. Most chicken in the UK is free range , and especially so with eggs.
However, a lot of cattle farming I find absolutely repulsive. A lot of the talk about how "humane" organisations are can be highly exagerated and fabricated, in reality, it varies imensely.. and in general, conditions are pretty poor, with exceptions obviously.
IMO: humans should take a look at how many natural predators work, and then reconsider a lot of things.
That said, it was pretty easy to tell when I got home from work the other day and a 45 gallon tub was full of severed limbs and body parts was sitting on my back porch. I knew that I wouldn't get a chance to play any games as my father was saving an extra $45 by doing the butchering himself. You can get an extra 20% yield if you take the time and do the butchering carefully.
The waste parts we give to our dogs. Nothing makes a dog happier than sharing in the 'kill'. Nothing says theft deterrent like a dog running up and down the yard with a spine flopping in his jaws.
You can't compare a human to anything else living on this planet.
You can't compare a human to anything else living on this planet. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Well, explain it to me, why not?
Humans are as near to perfection as is naturaly possible.
That said, hunting for fun is fine... <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
<b><i>What?</i></b>
<!--QuoteBegin-wizard@psu+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (wizard@psu)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Nothing says theft deterrent like a dog running up and down the yard with a spine flopping in his jaws.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Wish there was room in my signature for that.
That said, hunting for fun is fine... <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<b><i>What?</i></b>
<!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Thanks for pointing out the typo. I <3 my sugar-fueled-boredom-suffering brain <!--emo&:D--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/biggrin-fix.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='biggrin-fix.gif' /><!--endemo-->
That post has been fixed <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
... as near to perfectly delicious...
I have one problem with hunting. My parent's neighbor gave us like 10 pounds of venison every year and god that was a horrid week of dinners. I am not a fan of "gamey" meats so please hunt bacon.
... as near to perfectly delicious...
I have one problem with hunting. My parent's neighbor gave us like 10 pounds of venison every year and god that was a horrid week of dinners. I am not a fan of "gamey" meats so please hunt bacon. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It's all in how you cook it as long as it was prepared correctly.
<!--QuoteBegin-wizard@psu+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (wizard@psu)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Nothing says theft deterrent like a dog running up and down the yard with a spine flopping in his jaws.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Wish there was room in my signature for that. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
I know I took some pictures a few years ago. I'm going to go see if I can find them. If not, then I am going to take some more tomorrow.
And I disagree entirely with the statement that gun control and hunting are related. In general when people talk about gun control they talk about handguns and assault rifles, not a 30.6. And I know alot of people like myself, who don't condone hunting but do support the right to bear arms.
That being said, I don't think that the need to assert dominance over nature is a legitimate reason to hunt. If you really need to dominate something, play on voogru.
Hunting for sport is a questionable practice. But eat the prey, and it gains a meaning at least. If you shoot a deer, butcher it, eat it (or give it to others for eating), that's no different from a group of lions killing and devouring a gazelle. Even though your motivation may not be "pure" (an entirely human concept, nature is a cruel and senseless mistress), you're not doing anything unnatural. And since the head isn't very useful, you might as well stuff it and hang it on your wall. No predator is beyond flaunting their prowess.
I'm not talking about hunting elephants only for their tusks, or clubbing baby seals for their fur and stuff like that. I'm talking the kind of hunting where you actually make use of as much of the prey as you can.
Hunting humans: No. It's not that we're "special" or anything. It's not that we're the Gods among animals. Biologically, we're animals. Unusually intelligent animals with opposable thumbs, but animals nonetheless. We're not perfect either. We're not even close. We can run on two legs, but our speed is miserable. Our claws are short and fragile, our teeth are not very suitable for killing either. Our eyesight offers good colour differentiation and depth perception (and is probably the most developed of our senses), but a falcon, for example, can see much further than we can. Our hearing is average, our sense of smell is far below average. The pelvis of our women is actually unsuitable for giving birth, hence the labour pains that other animals don't experience (or at least not nearly to the same extent). If anything, we're well-balanced, not perfect, in that there are few areas where we really suck. But the one thing that distinguishes us from other animals is that we are not them, and they are not us. A human is not a deer (or a wolf), and a wolf or deer is no human. Nor a lion either, for that matter. Killing ourselves would not be in tune with the egoistic nature of, well, nature. We come first because we are us, not them.
Please don't force your suicidal lemming genes on your race. Go jump off a cliff if you need to.
Hunting humans: No. It's not that we're "special" or anything. It's not that we're the Gods among animals. Biologically, we're animals. Unusually intelligent animals with opposable thumbs, but animals nonetheless. We're not perfect either. We're not even close. We can run on two legs, but our speed is miserable. Our claws are short and fragile, our teeth are not very suitable for killing either. Our eyesight offers good colour differentiation and depth perception (and is probably the most developed of our senses), but a falcon, for example, can see much further than we can. Our hearing is average, our sense of smell is far below average. The pelvis of our women is actually unsuitable for giving birth, hence the labour pains that other animals don't experience (or at least not nearly to the same extent). If anything, we're well-balanced, not perfect, in that there are few areas where we really suck. But the one thing that distinguishes us from other animals is that we are not them, and they are not us. A human is not a deer (or a wolf), and a wolf or deer is no human. Nor a lion either, for that matter. Killing ourselves would not be in tune with the egoistic nature of, well, nature. We come first because we are us, not them.
Please don't force your suicidal lemming genes on your race. Go jump off a cliff if you need to. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I wonder what the possibilities of encountering a sentient life form on another planet that evolved from herbavores.
If you look at what a lot of people consider drawbacks you will find that we are evolved that way for a reason.
We walk on two legs to free our hands for other tasks
Our claws are short and flat so that they do not get in the way when we have to manipulate fine objects
Our teeth were not designed for killing, but they are perfect for the food we eat and pereparing hides.
Our eyesight is perhaps one of our most interesting features. Not as fine for details but far above every other mammal. Our color vision developed due to our wide foraging needs but the depth perception and related talents are what really helped us. No other animal can track speeds, distances or moving objects as well as a human can. It is a combination of our forward set (predatory) eyes and our large brains as opposed to the side set (herbavore) eyes and smaller optical regions of the brain that provide excellent fields of view to detect incomming predators but are not good for tracking objects. One can imagine how our ability to make spears, and other hunting tools was complimented by our keen ability to track and predict targets movements.
A few years ago I remember reading a Calvin and Hobbes comic where C & H were arguing about how dead a human would be against a tiger on a flat plain with no weapons. Perhaps but that is taking the human out of their natural environment. There were , now extinct, ancestors of modern humans who knew how to make stone axes by instinct. Probably very similar as to how birds know instinctively how to make complex nests. Yet if we were to take away the nests of birds very few would survive. To take away the benifits afforded to the human by their evolved intelligence is to take them out of their natural environment.
Just some of the things that you have to think about when you consider how unmatched modern humans appear in their environments.
Nothing says theft deterrent like a dog running up and down the yard with a spine flopping in his jaws. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
I called!
You can't compare a human to anything else living on this planet. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Well, explain it to me, why not? <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Because humankind, as a whole, was stupid enough to make society
You can't compare a human to anything else living on this planet. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Well, explain it to me, why not? <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Because humankind, as a whole, was stupid enough to make society <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
I just had to quote that wacky side discussion.
... as near to perfectly delicious...
I have one problem with hunting. My parent's neighbor gave us like 10 pounds of venison every year and god that was a horrid week of dinners. I am not a fan of "gamey" meats so please hunt bacon. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It's all in how you cook it as long as it was prepared correctly. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
You can sorta make bacon from deer... Well.. 'Deer jerkey" anyway.. good stuff.
... as near to perfectly delicious...
I have one problem with hunting. My parent's neighbor gave us like 10 pounds of venison every year and god that was a horrid week of dinners. I am not a fan of "gamey" meats so please hunt bacon. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
It's all in how you cook it as long as it was prepared correctly. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You can sorta make bacon from deer... Well.. 'Deer jerkey" anyway.. good stuff. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
You can make anything you want from the deer. I would not suggest a bacon-like product. The reason is that deer, unlike cattle/pigs/turkey, have not been bred so that their muscle is marbled with fat tissue.
Venison is a lean meat which contributes to its strong/gamey/tough reputation. However a properly dressed deer, taken at the right time can produce meats that are vastly superior to store bought versions.
Why? I'd have thought that tearing an animal apart with your bare hands (or whatever) would be more painful for it than being shot.
Why? I'd have thought that tearing an animal apart with your bare hands (or whatever) would be more painful for it than being shot. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
True, but it gives the animal a chance to fight back or to run away. If you manage to catch a rabbit with your bare hands and break its neck, thats an accomplishment because rabbits are fast and manuverable.
And of course it goes without saying that no matter how you kill it you'd better eat it.
Why? I'd have thought that tearing an animal apart with your bare hands (or whatever) would be more painful for it than being shot. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yeah, it would be, but let's convieniently ignore that fact so I can live safely in my sheltered bubble.