Thread: Explaining Hunting to Vegetarians and Animal People

Originally Posted by MassiveAttack

I am not shy about discussing it and don't feel the need to apoligise. Also I think explaning it by saying that it's a source of food is a bit of a cop out as not every animal thats shot is eaten. Killing for pest control, thropies and sport is also valid.

If someone ask me why I would kill species X I like to look at them with a puzzled look and say "well they are not going to kill themselves are they?".

The basic truth of the matter is that as a species we are slowly killing all the other life on the planet. If you are a vagatarian then you may not be directly responsable for causing a animal to die but you are directly responsable for encroaching on their habitat which is worse in the long run.

So when you animal rights friends ask you why you feel the need to kill things ask them what used to live on the 1/4 acre section that they live on. Most people would say grass and sheep and before that bush and birds. By occuping that space (and the rest) they are reducing the amount of land that mother nature can occupy on this planet. Then ask them what they have done to directly benifit the birds and animals that live in this country and then talk about the duck ponds you have created and the preaditor control that you do.

Whats worse, shooting a duck in a healthy\increasing population or destroying the habitat that ducks use in order to carve out a lifestyle block to live on? With the former the species still propsers, with the later the species declines.

A particularly wierd thing about NZ is that most greenies\animal rights\vegetarians have no empithy for introduced species. If they did there would be a lot more protests against private cat ownership and 1080.

That would have to be one of the best posts I've read!