Rights to hunt or not be hunted

[Art Eatman]

Context, Keith, context. Dagny did miss your point, but his own was not incorrect if one considers the problems around urban areas in the eastern U.S.

Man is the apex predator, everywhere; in some areas he is the only predator.

We dip in and out of science one minute and morals and ethics the next. It's difficult to get everything expressed correctly, and it's also easy to misread posts. I try to keep reminding myself that, "You have no duty to understand; it's my responsibility to make myself understood."

As usual, Art

[Dagny]

Okay, I must go back and re-read Keith's points. I must also go back to my texts and studies on wild predator populations controlling wild prey populations. I must've missed something in those courses on wildlands, forest and game management. BTW, "control" in the wild does not mean a perfectly balanced population of both species or actually all the species in the system. There ARE some pretty substantial swings in numbers and health. But overall, wild predators do a pretty good job. We HUNTERS MUST REPLACE THAT NEEDED ROLE since we have essentially eliminated the predator population in many areas and for many prey species. Without predators, then disease and starvation step in - unfortunately in a wasteful and drastic manner.

[Keith Rogan]

Dagny,

Its not just an academic exercise to express the notion that man is a "natural predator". The granola crowd has convinced everyone (even us apparently) that man is some alien species that has invaded the natural world like a virus - that we're not part of that picture like every other creature.
If we adopt their premise and use their language we will eventually lose the battle no matter how well we justify the activity with pragmatic arguments about population control, etc.
We are the older species and the animals we hunt have developed the way they have BECAUSE of our presence. If man was not present, deer might only reproduce every other year, or every third year.
Wildlife have developed this fecundity over the millennia and to remove us will adversely affect them.
Wild predators will cull a portion of the grass eaters, but they'll never stop the from population from eating itself out of browse without mans intervention - just as it has always been.
You can just look here to Alaska for proof of that, we're overrun with wolves but its still the best hunting in North America - its a "natural" environment with a variety of predators (including man) feeding on a variety of browsers.
Pick up some of Mech's stuff on Isle Royale wolves and moose - and starvation cycles.



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Keith
The Bears and Bear Maulings Page: members.xoom.com/keithrogan

[Art Eatman]

Dagny, homo sap's evolution from hunter-gatherer to farmer to urban-hive-dweller has been a social phenomenon, not one stemming from biology.

Homo sap was intimately a part of nature for thousands of years more than he has been organized into large, urban groups. Remember that today's societal construct is highly artificial.

All artificial constructs are extremely vulnerable to dramatic collapses in population. With herbivores, it's over-crowding and stripping of the food supply. With carnivores, it's the absence of herbivores. (The jackrabbit/coyote cycle is well documented.)

Homo sap? I submit we're "do it to our-selfers". Gaia won't have to lift a finger.

, Art

[Keith Rogan]

Art,

I guess I'm just not articulating my point very well.
The Greens come out with a premise of "Man Is Not A Natural Part Of the Environment" as the basis for their anti-hunting philosophy and we don't even examine this - we swallow the statement whole and then counter with pragmatic arguments, but on grounds that the enemy has chosen!

And its a bull**** premise! We are not the newer species that has adopted to them - we are the older species that has caused them to develop their rapid reproduction rates. Removing man from the equation is not "restoring the balance", it is upsetting the balance, turning it upside down.
Even modern tools are nothing new, man has always "cheated" with fire and fear to drive animals into enclosures, off cliffs, into bogs, etc. Our predatory advantage is not claws and teeth, its a brain.

The ONLY difference between now and a half-million years ago is that we have grown dramatically in population. So we limit ourselves with seasons and bag limits.

By allowing them to set the grounds for the argument, we are in effect turning a biological and scientific debate into an emotion and morality based one.
You can't win such an argument - Bambi will always trump biology.
We need to force them to take a step back and defend their original premise - that man is not part of the environment. Keep the debate there, on solid scientific grounds that they can't defend.




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Keith
The Bears and Bear Maulings Page: members.xoom.com/keithrogan

[Dagny]

Keith,
Okay, I see your point about humans having been part of the predator/prey environment on some continents (the old world) for hundreds of millenia. Even in N & S America we have been here for 10,000 years and perhaps twice that long (but that is recent compared to the old world).

An interesting page that I've stumbled upon during my searches (I've not yet read it all or delved into its links)
http://www.innerx.net/personal/tsmith/iceciv.html

[This message has been edited by Dagny (edited August 20, 2000).]

[DAL]

Isn't it nice that this discussion can take place at all? Thanks to the modern conveniences (sterile canning, refrigeration, rapid transportation) we've all become accustomed to, we now have the option of gathering our own food or having others do it for us.

There is no right to hunt, any more than there is a right to an education, a job, medical care, a minimum wage, etc., etc., etc. The only right that humans have is to live their lives rationally to the best of their ability by their own labor, free from force or coercion, as long as they aren't infringing upon someone else's rights (an old idea that seems radical today). In my book, therefore, since hunting does not infringe upon any human's rights (unless it occurs on private property), it is a perfectly acceptable activity.

Hunting is a personal thing that each person must decide either to do or not to do. If someone chooses not to hunt, that's fine, and I support them as much as I do those who choose to hunt.

BTW, Dagny, could you, for the record, state unequivocally where you stand on the issue of hunting for me? Are you for, against, or on the fence on this topic? Maybe you've already stated your position and I missed it. If so, would you mind humoring me?
DAL

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Reading "Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal," by Ayn Rand, should be required of every politician and in every high school.

"Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are ruined."
--Patrick Henry, during Virginia's Convention to Ratify the Constitution (1788)

GOA, JPFO, PPFC, CSSA, LP, ARI, NRA

[This message has been edited by DAL (edited August 20, 2000).]

[Art Eatman]

Keith, I've been telling folks that "I-am-By-God a part of the environment!" for several decades. I gotta admit I pay little attention to the Greens, because outside their political power their babble is childish prattle.

When I speak to the various facts of wildlife dynamics and carrying capacity of the land, it's not for any justification. Most often, it's just to point out what happens in an "If A, then B" sequence. I can't help it; it's the teacher in me. (Like a buddy of mine who was caught "in flagrante delicto" with his sister-in-law. He looked up at his wife and said, "I can't help it, hon'; it's just a character defect.")

If somebody wants to believe that hunting is somehow immoral, my suggestion to them is that they not hunt. Further silence on their part does not offend me in the slightest.

, Art

[Dagny]

DAL
You asked.
We have the RIGHT to procure food for ourselves and that includes hunting. To the extent that we can coexist with other predators who take weak & ill game that we do not want, so be it. But if we put ourselves as first and only, then we have the responsibility to kill as cleanly as possible and, in the least, to ensure the game population is not dangerously weakened by our hunting or, if we can, to improve health of the population. The latter includes killing the weak and ill - even if we do not consume them ourselves but leave them for scavengers.

Given our huge and burgeoning population, the "RIGHT" to hunt has now, by necessity, become a privilege simply because if everyone exercised this right in order to feed themselves, we would all starve. This causes me concern as many of our rights are being subjugated to the masses because of our numbers.

As to the right to not be hunted. Since we could be prey ourselves, I am still struggling with that concept. Definitely though, I put fish and fowl in the same league as nuts and berries. We harvest both wild and domesticated with no thought but our right to procure food.

Other mammals though have me thinking about our responsibility to cull their numbers as needed. If I won my dream of having an entire mountain valley to myself, would I permit other predators (both human and otherwise) the "right" to hunt in my valley if that valley could support only me and mine. I think not.

Thus, do I have the right to eliminate my competition - even if they are other humans who would eliminate me if they could?

[Dagny]

Answer to my last question: YES!
(and this answer, extended worldwide, as major consequences)

Art and Gizzmo - this thread likely has run its course and is over 100K. Does anyone wish to restart a new thread on this or something similar?

[Al Thompson]

Actually it's at 90k. When it hits the magic number, I'll close it.

Such a touchy subject and such polite remarks. Good work on all parties parts.

Giz

[rr41mag]

Yall ever notice that alot of these kind of questions and posts come up when it's not hunting season?

[Al Thompson]

Actually deer season has been open here since the 15th.

[BadMedicine]

It's been open since the 1st (aug) here in some units, for buck, unfurtunately you can only take FIVE!!!! hehe, that's just on the islandswhere there are quite a few. You can take does later in the season, and the season is like 4 or 5 months long!!! Anyone wanna take a wag at how much a deer tag is??? THEY"RE FREE!!!! That's right, we already had to buy our licsences so why should we have to buy tags?? the only tags you need are brownbear, and musk ox. I'm lucky to live in alaska where thay don't rape you everytime you turn around.
Anybody Here live in Washington?? You have to buy a tag for EVERYTHING!! Wanna fish in the ocean?? buy a FOOD FISH LICSENCE. Oh, you want to fish in fresh water? buy a GAME FISH LICSENCE. Oh, you wanna fish for spiney ray(bass, perch,walleye)? buy a SPINE RAY LICSENCE!!! Oh did you want to collect clams and oysters on the beach? Get a SHELL FISH LICSENCE. Get a SEAWEED LICSENCE!!!(no joke) You wanna pick mushrooms? Get a MUSHROOM LICSENCE!!! (yes, they charge you to pick friggen fungis!!) They even have a permit you have to buy to hike in the state parks now. I swear that state got you coming and going, and while you were there!!! I'm finally glad to live in alaska, you buy one licsence, and can get anything that walks fly's or swims.

[Art Eatman]

BadMedicine, I understand your feelings. However, when you have a large number of people using a resource base, that use must be controlled or an over-harvest is quite possible--and even probable.

In Washington's example, the users pay for the cost of law enforcement, not the public at large.

For the vast majority of all people, the sum of all the costs of the licenses you mention is not all that much money. Texas has gone to a "Grand Slam" license which includes some 90% of peoples' outdoor hunting and fishing. It's cheaper than the cost of one-at-a-time, and sure simplifies getting a license...

Regards, Art

[Keith Rogan]

>>>>>>Okay, I see your point about humans having been part of the predator/prey environment on some continents (the old world) for hundreds of millenia. Even in N & S America we have been here for 10,000 years<<<<

Dagny,

No. That too is a myth. The common animals we know and hunt like deer, elk and moose are old world animals that came across the Bering land bridge WITH man, about 20,000 years ago. The animals that lived here prior to that time - animals not adapted to human predation are gone, replaced by the old world animals that came with us.
These animals have adapted further in north america, The red deer became our elk. The moose grew larger, etc, but they are the same animals found in Eurasia.



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Keith
The Bears and Bear Maulings Page: members.xoom.com/keithrogan

[BadMedicine]

Yes, in some states you can buy a "grandslam" licsence. In washington you can buy all the licences at once (all the fishing and hunting anyway, the fungis, seaweed, and shell fish are 3 completely different forms), but they aren't any cheaper that way, well actually theres a dollar handling fee on eaach tag, so if you get them all at once you save like $4. And then in Idaho, they have the "sportmans tag" which is a book of tags of everything, bear, deer elk, turkey cougar, etc, for like $80, and you do save from buying individually, on the tags, they still bend you over for the licsences, and there isn't that much hunting pressure there, compared to a few other places I've been, idaho, AK... Most that money probably goes to the $10K Poaching rewards they have. So basically, they take the hoinest peoples money and use it to fight poachers, we're being hosed. just my thoughts, glad to be here.

[dZ]

i wrote this awhile ago on TFL

let me paste it in
<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Weapon ownership, pride, and respect have been part of the human species for the last 50,000 years. When i
hunt deer, i am putting my psyche in touch with an important part of our human sphere of consciousness.

The hunter is a real part of all of us.

It has only been within the last 100-200 years that modern agricultural practices have replaced the woodscraft
with managed farmed animals. We now live very much out of step with nature. Now some of our kind feel the
hunter is an anachronism best left behind in our modern "safe" world.

Yet our children continue to play at hunting games. i had some "real" hippie friends in college. They were
practicing pacifists and vegetarians. Their child would find bent sticks and play. Bang! They did not own a TV...
We should not delude ourselves as much a we do. From the times before the Clovis point, our children have
played at the hunt. We owe them the knowledge of safe, respectful weapon skills.

Our species is driven by desires. Our physical world is a lot more complex and difficult to survive in than our
current worldview. Consider what it would take to gather and provision a root cellar for one winter. We now have
the incredible luxury of boredom. We can purchase a years hard labor with a swipe of a plastic card. We have a
tendancy to want more than we require. Most of our people now prey upon ourselves, to gain what we feel we
need to exist. Walk onto the car sales lot and feel what its is like to be hunted. Compare the common sizes of
the clothing closets in a modern home to one from only 50 years ago. One hundred years ago, if you wanted
to hear music, it required live musicians. Our luxuries have enslaved us to require more and more things to
support our vision of "the right way to live". Some of us work very hard to get a chin up on the ladder. Others
covet, then steal to acquire the symbols of the luxurious life.

Our world has dramatically changed, yet we are still mortal humans.
We know so much, but are in touch with so little. The founders of the American experiment knew that we would
continue onward to this point. This is why the Bill of Rights was written, to benchmark the rights that are the
incarnate in all people.

These rights shall not be infringed,
and we owe it to the future to vigilantly educate and protect ourselves.[/quote]

[Al Thompson]

Closing time!