Killing animals for sport

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I hope that I don't anger anyone with this post, but I've always felt disgusted with people that like to go out and shoot animals just for a hobby. Now I don't see anything wrong with deer hunting, because as you may already know they are known to over-populate if left alone, and will starve to death and get hit by cars...so hunting them almost seems better than watching them starve to death, etc. But people that inevitably come to me and my hubby and brag about how they shot a bear or moose, etc. etc. as if it makes them manly and/or cool, makes me sick. What did this animal ever do to you? Are you starving and needed the food? I highly doubt it. Now I will probably seem hypocritical that I'm not a vegetarian. Although I eat very little meat. I think what triggered alot of this in me was one of my husbands friends came over and was bragging about how he taught his 4 year old to shoot a porcupine. WHY would you want to teach a 4 year old to shoot a gun? And why teach them it's ok to be psychotic? I think it's well known that serial killers seem to always start off killing animals when they're younger and then turn to people. Maybe the kid won't turn into a serial killer, but I cannot possibly imagine taking my son out when he turns 4 and saying "ok son we're going to kill an animal today". It just completely disgusts me. I love animals, I think every animals has a place on this earth and to go and kill them just to try to prove you can is an abomination. Does anyone agree with me?

Hunting for "sport" is wrong. Hunting and fishing are not real sports. Soccer, football, baseball, etc. are sports. Hunting and fishing are just glorfied forms of animal abuse. It's another way for people to feel good about themselves by hurting or killing someone weaker than them.

Yeah. If you kill it, you should eat it. It's a waste of life, otherwise.

I agree with you. Well, I don't like the shooting deer part...but a lot of people will disagree with me. Some of my male relatives have hunted, but to me I think it's unpleasant to see deer heads mounted on the wall. I adore animals. Personally, I want a career with animals, but there is nothing for me, so it will be a play therapist instead....oh. Anyways, I am not a complete vegetarian either. But I don't eat much meat anyways either.

Oh yes, I agree that mounting deer heads on the wall is so gross! I can't understand why anyone would want to have a dead animal hanging on their wall.

This past summer I helped my dad shoot squirrels that were digging up our garden. My family and I go fishing, but we always eat what we catch. And my dad has a lot of friends that deer hunt and then share the meat. I've eaten and really like deer hash.

As for animals mounted on the walls, I have an interest in taxidermy, so I like to study those kinds of subjects.

But I don't agree on letting a four year old go anywhere near a loaded gun.

I've never hunted so i can't comment on it. You can't hunt here because any half decent sized animal is either extinct here, or around in tiny numbers and heavily protected. Killing annoying insects is the closest i ever got to hunting. This may piss alot of people off, but if given the chance i would like to try it out. It gives you a sence of how our ancestors lived. Thousends of year ago before all this vegetarian stuff excisted you had to do it in order to survive. I mean you can't just survive from a bunch of fruits that may or may not be there, or be there in tiny amounts.

I don't like animal hunting and that is why i was so against the higher class when they were protesting about the fox hunting ban(though the ban is useless anyway) in Britain. I don't mind killing animals for food. If you want to feel manly go and do clay pidgeon shooting, its basically the same thing only your shooting fake plastic birds and you have a big shotgun with you...clay pidgeon shooting is fun

I've been hunting with my dad. It's interesting, but I've never shot anything on the hunts.

I have nothing against hunting for food, but trophy hunting is a wrong, these idiots never
take any meat if they are hunting Bighorns, they are just after the heads. I can't believe
the Canadian government allows trophy hunters in to the north the hunt polar bears.

Last edited by spudnik on 25 Aug 2008, 3:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Aren't polar bears going extinct?

I like how you put that PunkyKat!

I haven't been hunting in a while, but still, I can certainly understand the appeal (and no, it's not just because I hate animals). The truth is, hunting is a sport. It requires precision and strategy just like any athletic sport. You are pitting yourself against an opponent with a brain; an opponent that is capable of outfoxing you, so to speak. There's part of the appeal - many people hunt because it presents a different challenge every time. Look at it this way. You and your buddy play one-on-one basketball. He's a much less capable player than you, and you win the game every time. Would you continue to play? Maybe a few times, sure, but it'd get boring after awhile due to the lack of challenge.

I'm not saying that every hunter follows this rationale, of course. There are external benefits (food, bragging rights, head on the wall) which may be more important to some.

To anyone saying "but the animals are so defenseless!" Hey. That's just the way it is. The strong kill the weak. It's been that way since the beginning of time. T-Rex's tore apart whatever stood in their way. Cavemen held primordial fights for land. Rome had the Colosseum (in which, by the way, the homosapien was not always the clear cut winner). Large, successful corporations buy small, unsuccessful corporations.

In other words, you're an animal, but only in the worse sense of the word.

I hunt prairie dogs. I do this because the natural predators of the prairie dog (coyote, hawk, eagle, etc) no longer hunt them and they overpopulate. Today, the predators (including the magestic bald eagle) hunt something else that's much easier to catch: road-kill.

I won't eat a prairie dog because those "cute little critters" can carry the (bubonic) plague. I find that if I leave the carcasses out in my field, wild animals (including other prairie dogs) will come in and eat them. Hence - no "waste".

I do. Not by himself obviously (or leaving them within easy access), but I believe that educating kids about guns at a young age makes them less likely to want to play with them or show them off to a friend. The guns are bad mentality can backfire. To me, harping over and over about the dangers of guns without actually teaching them anything about firearms/etc can do a lot more harm than good.

If a kid has never seen a gun except on television, of course most are going to become curious when they come across one.

I think that by teaching children guns safety at a young age and even them letting handle one and showing them what it can do greatly reduces the risk of them coming across one and “playing” with it.

Perhaps four is rather young.... at least depending on the kid, but at six or seven I think most can handle a pellet gun. Again you don’t just hand the child a gun. You teach them how to responsibility use it. That is what we plan on doing with our nephew anyhow.


As for the subject....

I love fishing and would like to get into hunting. Our family hunts and at some point or another they have mounted fish, ducks and other small game on the wall. Most of the time if they hunt, they eat what they kill.

At times when I fish I do catch and release, but if a fish swallows a hook and/or can’t be saved we tend to clean and eat them.

I see nothing wrong with fishing or hunting as long as you follow the rules and guidelines. As for hunting for sport, I see no issue with it. Sure if you are simply leaving carcass after animal carcass in the wild and do nothing with them or else hunting illegally then that is disgraceful. Most hunters or at least the ones I know, do don’t do that. They have more respect for wildlife then most non hunters.