From: "Matthew Wright", [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Steve wrote: >The argument I always use against banning fox hunting
>is that foxes will become extinct in various areas as there will
>be no reason to put up with them any longer.
This is a fair point Steve and behind that point are many complex
interrelated issues which are too often underestimated. There are many
reasons why banning hunting is unjustified some of which are covered in this
group from time to time. Often we hear from those opposed to hunting that
there is something wrong in people enjoying hunting. This issue is pivotal
to understanding the impact of the antis and is not properly countered by
hunters (a term I choose deliberately). The fact is that I, like many
others,
enjoy shooting and fishing as well as hunting. Having seen what happens in
all these pursuits I cannot find any significant differences in welfare
terms, those minor differences that do occur relate to the nature of the
method. A hound may be strictly speaking less efficient in a numbers game
but
thats offset by no potential for wounding. While in hill country hounds are
useful
to select a rogue fox by following the scent from a recently killed lamb.
The fox is not in my experience perturbed by the chase to any great degree,
a lot of the time it ambles
along, and at the end it dies quickly or escapes outright. Other
methods being different have different downsides, I know that despite being
a good shot I will wound some quarry (my dog may find most of them in due
course). I know that when I fish the method means theres
some stress to the fish while its being played, that sometimes the priest
might take more than one hit or that some fish returned to the water,
despite my being careful,
will become ill and die. The methods mean there are nuances in what happens
to the quarry but those nuances are not major and balance themselves out
when compared. Clearly the current fieldsports are a common family with
related ethics. I think hunters sense that there is a net benefit from being
part of nature although they are not good at explaining this. One of the
strongest illustrations of the nonsense of a ban on hunting is to ask your
MP to explain to you the difference between flying a hawk to a rabbit and
working a lurcher to a rabbit. When he can't do so, ask why they are
introducing illogical and unjust laws and why they are targetting hunting
with hounds. So where is their logic - is it the red jackets worn by
perceived toffs? I could of course choose to ride to the riverbank with my
rod and wearing red and blowing a horn. Some salmon anglers are the worst
toffs, should they be banned? We
should not hesitate in defending loudly the fact that we enjoy being a
hunter. There is nothing wrong in enjoying natural skills and knowing an
important job is well done. Indeed enjoyment, thus refinement of skills,
is necessary for order and preservation - binding together the components of
value in the countryside. Let me try to illustrate this in part - what we
sometimes hear is that hunting is hypocritical because it doesn't kill
enough foxes efficiently enough. This misses the point entirely as no
"hunter" is aiming to eradicate a species, when we fish, shoot and hunt we
have handicapped ourselves by the choice of our methods and this is in fact
the mark of civilisation and holds within it ethics and conservation. When I
fish for trout with a fly I am being a hunter, stalking the fish, enjoying
the take and enjoying the feel of it on the line. I choose a fly as a fair
contest, I don't choose a stick of dynamite which would of course be the
most efficient. This point still holds true in all fieldsports, instead of
shooting we could drive pheasants into huge nets , just as we could poison
the earths of foxes or indeed most
efficient of all introduce a deadly virus. We wouldn't enjoy this, take
pride from it or have scope to refine balanced natural skills. Indeed it is
the cold blooded bueraucratic civil servant thinking inherent in solutions
like myxatomosis that are the real threat to nature. This is the mentality
that should offend people. It is the sort of buearacratic mentality that
threw the full force
of the state onto law abiding pistol shooters for no good reason. As well as
being a passionate
believer in the hunter I am also concerned about a deeper trend in a ban on
hunting which would be a major triumph for the artificial view of the world
and the dangerous concept that man is divorced from nature. I firmly believe
that this "divorced" notion is more damaging to our environment than those
which engage it on its own terms.
Matthew
Cybershooters website: http://www.cybershooters.org
List admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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