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Old 07-30-2015, 06:02 AM   #1
Mercutio
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Arcanine Killing Animals - Y/N

I'm going to start with a provocative line: I don't care about Cecil the Lion.

I hadn't heard of said lion before some dentist shot him. I feel no particular shock or remorse at the death of this animal. I eat meat, the ethical argument doesn't phase me at all, and I'm continually angered by the fact that one lion's death makes the news but literally thousands of people dying literally every day in the DRC doesn't make it anywhere. We spend time, effort and resources keeping pandas alive despite Darwin's best efforts to kill them off but in countries like America we're not even providing free healthcare to people. Frankly, aside from potential ramifications to the local ecosystem, I can't think of a reason why I should care about this lion.

...

Fortunately for humanity I'm in the minority, but this does offer up a nice topical debate and I know there are some UPNers who get very passionate about animal welfare issues.

Is it ever ok to kill animals...

For the purposes of medicine/science (quack or real)?

For the purposes of food?

For the purposes of safety/security?

For the purposes of sport/leisure?

For some other reason I've not considered?

Last edited by Mercutio; 07-30-2015 at 06:10 AM.
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Old 07-30-2015, 06:34 AM   #2
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I didn't care either until I read into it.

My issue with it:
It was a tracked animal over at Oxford for studying. It was in a protected park. They lured it out of the park, blinded it with spotlights, shot it with an arrow. It didn't die. They let it suffer for 40 hours then returned, shot it, and then tried to break the GPS as they skinned and beheaded it. Like.. how the fuck is that ok? How is that even hunting?


If you really want to hunt in Africa, go kill some antelope or something. You cant bring the meat back but you can donate it to local villages. I have no issues with hunting if its part of your culture or needed to sustain populations or for food. What he did was fucked up and is a douchebag.
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Old 07-30-2015, 06:56 AM   #3
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Poaching is poaching. It's pretty reprehensible, especially when you're hunting a creature that's endangered and so important to the African identity.
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Old 07-30-2015, 07:07 AM   #4
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Oh absolutely the specific cruelty of this case is pretty bad. I personally still give no shits but I can appreciate why it is making the rounds on what passes for news media.
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Old 07-30-2015, 07:13 AM   #5
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Oh absolutely the specific cruelty of this case is pretty bad. I personally still give no shits but I can appreciate why it is making the rounds on what passes for news media.
The cruelty is why people are upset. The fact that is was protected and tracked and studies and pulled out is why people are upset. Even people who normally hunt think that was bullshit and cowardly. Lions are just big lazy cats.



As to why it's such a big news story is an entirely different debate.
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Old 07-30-2015, 07:42 AM   #6
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Poaching is hunting without legal permission, and for an act to be classified as poaching, you best know that you're doing something pretty fucked up. The laws regarding animal rights are pretty clear: don't be a sadistic arsehole and torture a creature for shits 'n' giggles. A big reason why the world is upset about Cecil is that, as Kuno said, the lion was part of a study who was illegally tortured, killed, and beheaded for a trophy. There was no reason for Cecil to die, except some dentist wanted to mount a skull on a trophy cabinet. I get that we eat meat, for which we kill animals, but poaching deprives several endangered species of basic dignity. On top of that, it spits at the face of cultural identity.

I never understood the rationale of people who enjoyed hunting endangered animals for purely sport. It's really icky, imo, when an affluent Caucasian flies into an African savannah, shoots a majestic giraffe, and then posts picture of the dying creature on Facebook, as if they are so fucking proud. It just makes me feel ill. Of course, from a medical and psychological perspective, people who torture animals are often 50% more at risk of becoming a serial killer. Gee, I wonder why.

(The American South has a particularly pernicious poaching culture. Hunting, as long as it's legal, is not great but okay, but trophy-hunting exotic animals is very icky. Especially if you torture the animal and/or draw out their death)
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Old 07-30-2015, 10:01 AM   #7
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mercutio View Post
Is it ever ok to kill animals...

For the purposes of medicine/science (quack or real)?

For the purposes of food?

For the purposes of safety/security?

For the purposes of sport/leisure?

For some other reason I've not considered?
Medicine/Science: I think this boils down to a question of how quickly you want medical science (and other sciences?) to advance. If you're unflinching in your desire to spare animals any harm, then you have to accept the consequences that we're perhaps a century away from creating "headless humans" on which to experiment -- putting aside the ethical debates inherent to that topic. If you're not willing to accept those consequences ... if you insist that we try to cure cancer and AIDS and everything nasty that afflicts us as soon as we can possibly can ... then you have to accept animal testing in science. You can't have it both ways. You can't say "I want the cure tomorrow and I want more no more animal testing." We use rodents routinely in autoimmune studies. Chimpanzees and other closely related animals that can catch human viruses are used in vaccine trials as opposed to using slaves, prisoners, or other members of the human race. These approaches are generally seen as good, as being better than doing human testing, and it's not hard to appreciate why that might be. It will be a great victory for all of Earth's creatures, us included, when we finally develop ways to test on human tissue, organ, or even (here we go again) headless organism cultures the way we currently test on lab rats and primates. But until that day comes, you've gotta choose: halting the advance of medical research for the sake of animals or else subjecting animals to cruel fates as we try to cure human diseases.

Food: absolutely. We live in nothing close to a world approximating "readiness for 100% of the planet to live a happy, healthy, meat-free life"; and so even if you make the personal choice to abstain from eating meat because you don't want animals to suffer, I think you have got to allow for your fellow man to keep on doing it for at least the next several centuries. If we get to a point where, similar to the "headless humans" mentioned above, we can create headless swine and cattle ... and if people don't freak the fuck out about this, as I'm sure many will, and if instead we collectively agree that this is an awesome application of science which lets us keep on enjoying meat without the animal suffering in any meaningful sense of the term ... then I think we could totally live in a world where people can keep on eating meat without worrying about the ethics of harming animals. Until that day comes, it'll have to be a case-by-case basis of people deciding whether their desire to eat meat trumps animals' lives or not.

Certainly I think we can agree that no one has any leg to stand on if he argues against animals being killed for meat yet routinely, even once yearly, willingly eats meat himself. Go vegetarian or go home.

Safety/Security: Absolutely. People today don't have to deal with pests to quite the same degree that our recent ancestors did, and so many of us have already forgotten or failed to realize just how dangerous pests can really be. But they are dangerous. And you have every right to defend yourself and your family against threats against your lives. Doesn't matter what form it comes in.

For example, catch and release is not going to work with most rodents. We don't have systems set up to take the rodents off your hands and drive them thousands of miles away, and consequently you either have to foot the bill of the trip yourself or else you lazily dump them ten miles away and they come back. If you have a rodent infestation, you have two real choices: 1) kill them or else 2) expose your building's occupants to very real hazards like Hantavirus, bubonic plague, and the like. Real nasty stuff.

For another example, it is frankly immoral to not put down an animal infected with rabies. Not only can we argue the ethics from the animal's side of things, talking about how we're "putting it out of its misery" and stuff like that. But even that aside, say the animal were in no way miserable and could live out a perfectly happy life while biting people and ruining theirs. We would then still be justified in killing the animal. It is absurdly immoral to not capture an animal you know to have rabies and to, in as ethical a means as possible, end its life. There's no cure at that point, it poses an active health risk to others until the day it dies, and quarantining it indefinitely is far crueler than euthanizing it. So euthanize it and save a community ... or don't and have a little boy's death on your conscience for the rest of your life and all because you wanted us to never kill any animals under any circumstances. I think the choice is clear.

Sport/Leisure: This is the one I have the hardest time defending. Some proponents bring up troubling arguments like "It's human nature to want to kill, and hunting is a better outlet than homicide." I don't like that sort of rhetoric, and thankfully it's not an argument all hunters use but I do hear it often enough to want to get it out of the way right now. Other proponents say that when they hunt they do it not only for sport but also for eating. But I think it's an impossibly tantalizing slippery slope towards killing big game animals when you allow hunting of any kind. Sure, 99% of hunters will never hunt big game in their lives, but there's always going to be that pull of "the ultimate prize," "the greatest challenge," "the most dangerous game." (Which by the way is a great short story and you should read it sans spoilers if you get the chance.) So like ... I dunno how to feel even about allowing the sport hunting of deer, knowing that it might set a man up for the lifelong temptation of hunting something greater.

That stated, and without giving the matter too much thought, my current position on hunting is that I am for it as far as other people's rights are concerned but I personally wouldn't want to partake in it. I think I could be persuaded to take a staunch anti-hunting position but I have personally known many hunters and they were all good people, something which complicates the issue for me. Even some of our heroes have been known to hunt. (Take the fictional Pevensies, for example. Every child loves them and yet how do they end the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe book? By going on a stag hunt for a mythical white stag, essentially the unicorn of deers. "Let's go kill it! ")

Population Control: This is a special hybrid of the safety and the sport & leisure categories, so I'll place it here separately. Many hunters I know, especially in the state of Indiana, are really big on the argument that they hunt to help keep animal populations under control. Deer are an occasional problem in Indiana; their populations get too big, they spill out into suburban settings, and they bring harm to both themselves and civilians as they idiotically jump in front of cars or crash through sliding glass doors. So every few years, the state will call all hunters for a government-overseen culling where the hunters are both permitted and encouraged to shoot deer that fall under certain parameters. (Usually the parameters include things like old age, sickness, etc. Usually young, healthy deer are supposed to be left alone.) The idea is that it helps out both populations: whether the deer like it or not, their leftover population ends up being Darwinianly "stronger" than it was before; and even though we've left the ablest deer behind to keep on crashing into our lives, at least for us humans the putative benefit is that in decreasing the deer's numbers we make it so that they will tend to stay to rural areas and not feel obligated to press into suburban areas.

You can appreciate how this ties into the safety category (what with the justification being that deer bring us harm when their population gets too big) and how it also ties into the sports & leisure category (what with the government soliciting help from private hunters). For now, in 2015, I would say I am strongly in favor of this outlet for hunters. It easily gives them the best means to scratch their hunter's itch without bringing additional harm to animals. And I would much, much rather the deer die (sorry) than both the deer and the motorist die when the stupid deer inevitably jumps out in front of a moving vehicle. Maybe in the future this argument won't hold as well anymore. Maybe we'll have non-lethal deterrents to deer entering suburbia. Maybe we'll have better protections for motorists against wildlife jumping out onto the roads. But until that time, I think that it's a win/win situation for non-hunters and hunters to allow the hunters to help cull deer populations. And this argument can be extended to other wildlife as well.

Last edited by Talon87; 07-30-2015 at 10:08 AM.
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Old 07-30-2015, 10:22 AM   #8
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See I think this news story is a pretty interesting insight into the evolution of human ethics and how its been slowly expanding for at least the last couple centuries, but in the grand scheme of things, this story isn't terribly important. Extremely cruel? Yes. A stain on bow and arrow hunters everywhere? Most definitely.

Quote:
For the purposes of medicine/science (quack or real)?
I think this is a pretty touchy subject and its something I don't really have the answers for. My initial reaction is "No, this isn't right" but there is a point in that these things do need to be tested. You do need to see if you have results, and that's why I don't really know. There needs to be some balance between the treatment of animals and the progress of human medicine.

Quote:
For the purposes of food?
This is really one of the things that I don't think you can argue against. Animals hunt other animals, its a natural thing to happen. Really in my opinion, farming animals is typically more inhumane than hunting them. Hunting for food is, in my opinion, really one of the only ways you can justify hunting an animal and it does have some uses otherwise (hunting feral pigs in Hawaii for example).

Note I don't include fishing in here, because most commercial fishing practices aren't very good and its a whole different ball game.

For the purposes of safety/security?

I think most safety risks are relatively overblown but if you are in a life-threatening situation, I honestly think the same rules apply as if you have a human assailant. But you shouldn't, say, kill a fox because it might eat your chickens. Have it relocated, there are other options.

For the purposes of sport/leisure?

No, no, no, no, no. It's disrespectful. Sport hunting is almost always done with a lack of respect for the ecosystem and the animal in question. I think this latest outrage is the best example of that. Bow and arrow hunters are supposed to get a kill shot because you don't typically get another shot, unlike with a gun, and the arrow can cause massive pain for the animal. I have family who hunts deer with a bow and arrow for food, and they are pretty appalled at this. For the pure reason of this animal suffers for nearly two days, in what seems to have been a deliberate act (this wasn't his first hunt, he's hunted a lot of other big game including rhinos, so its not like he sucks at it.) [/QUOTE]
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Old 07-30-2015, 11:03 AM   #9
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No, no, no, no, no. It's disrespectful. Sport hunting is almost always done with a lack of respect for the ecosystem and the animal in question.
So I am neither a hunter nor someone who would ever really advocate for it, but hunting with a license and during a designated season can be beneficial for the environment. Culling certain species' populations during specific seasons helps keep their populations in check by keeping populations from overfeeding and ruining their own habitats, especially when it's something like deer that are fairly large and lack megafauna predators that might otherwise regulate their population. As long as hunting is done legally and in-season, it can be a positive thing.
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Old 07-30-2015, 11:18 AM   #10
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It definitely can be a positive thing for the environment (I've already brought this up in my post but I'm used to people not fully reading them), but it is still disrespectful for the animal. I'm probably being a little old-fashioned but if you are going to kill an animal just to put a trophy on your wall, I think that's pretty sick. We are the only species (to my memory) which hunts purely to hunt. I really do think that if you aren't going to use the meat and whatever else on the animal yourself, it should be donated to someone who can use it and honestly it really should be the responsibility of any hunter to see if these options exist.

(I also find it funny on how the deer overpopulation problem which is partly our fault is now trying to be regulated through hunting.)
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Old 07-30-2015, 12:25 PM   #11
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From my experience, pretty much every hunter that hunts also eats the meat.
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Old 07-30-2015, 03:36 PM   #12
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I'm not sure I have much to say on the topic that hasn't been said, but by golly, I'm gonna try!

Scenarios Where Killing Animals is Fine:
Spoiler: show
Food- Here's a given that's been brought up several times already. But seriously, as much as I'm flexible enough to handle being vegetarian if I had to, not everybody is. And even that's an 'if I had to' statement. I'm an omnivore, so I should eat like an omnivore!

Population Control- As Talon pointed out, quite a few states have the occasional deer problem (Though we know who to blame here in Georgia). However, simply killing the deer isn't exactly smiled upon either. Even in that wondrous time where everybody takes up their guns and to the woods, the prey still has to be used, for more than just mounting a head on the wall. Venison is a pretty sought after meat in these parts, since it's both readily available at times and healthier than beef. There are plenty of people in the area who use the hide to make various useful objects. Heck, my dad occasionally makes knife handles out of antler! We get all of that, plus the decreased chance of hitting one on the road? Then go for it, as long as you stick to the guidelines!
Of course, population control involves far more than just an oddly thriving group of four-legged mammals. Thanks to one of my least favorite points in history, most inhabited regions are dealing with invasive species. Killing these guys doesn't seem like so bad an idea- especially since it's either that, or they kill off a lot of the critters that are supposed to be there. And it seems that the more I pay attention to what's out of place, the more I notice. Earlier this week, I found a nest of japanese hornets in the woods. Given how vicious hornets tend to be, of course these guys are gonna be an issue!

Medical Research- Let me clarify, here. I'm only bringing up accidental killing here. If you accidentally kill a cat trying to figure out a way to cure them from some horrid disease, than good. Now you know that combination doesn't work and won't distribute it across the land, killing off millions of innocent felines. It's not okay to kill the creature just to test on it's corpse. That's just wrong on so many levels, it's really freakin' ridiculous!

Putting a Pet Out of It's Misery- I'm not sure how many of you guys have been there, but it happens to most pet owners eventually: that horrible moment when you have to decide whether to put your loving companion down or let them live in constant pain. I's not pretty, it's not fun, and man, if it isn't traumatizing to children old enough to understand what's going on. It's a scenario that sucks no matter what you choose, so by no means am I going to stop you from making your choice. That would just be rude of me.

Self Defense- If a wolf is genuinely trying to tear your throat out without any instigation on your part, then by all means, shoot the sucker. I'd personally prefer it if you let it live, but am fully aware that isn't always possible. If you purposely did something to get that puppy mad at you, then I'm definitely not okay with it. Anyone stupid enough to do that deserves to die a horrible and messy death by canine- you're clearly not a good representative of humanity!


Scenarios Where Killing Animals is Definitely Not Okay:
Spoiler: show
For Profit- Look, I don't care how many thousands of peso that elephant tusk could net you, don't go for it. All that thing wants is to live it's long life in peace- who the heck are you to deny it that right? Of all the reasons animals have gone extinct in recent years, money seems like the lowest reason. Or it would be, if it weren't for...

The Sake of It- And now we've come back to Cecil. As much as I had no idea this guy even existed before today, I still feel as if his death is a terrible tragedy. Last I heard, the number of african lions had been counted exactly, which is already a horrendous situation for a specious to begin with. What this dentist did was adding insult to injury- and then insulting the first insult for being so weak! In my eyes, anyone who kills anything for their own selfish desires, rather than needs, is as low as they come. Torturing the creature before taking it's life is even worse- especially by the hands of a fully aware adult! Regardless of how moved by Cecil's tale you were or not, I'm sure that we all agree that this should never of happened and that he deserves whatever horrible things he has heading his way.


I've been building this one up all day... I've said all that I'd like so far, so I'll just off here.
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Old 07-30-2015, 04:12 PM   #13
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Killing animals is never acceptable, in any circumstance. That applies to humans as well as chickens for food. It is always murder in any context.

Humans are evolved to eat meat, but that doesn't mean we should embrace that part of our nature. We're endowed with intelligence and the ability to transform our diets in ways that animals can't, and possession of that ability with no desire to use it is immoral.

That said, legal hunting of African animals is a huge way to dissuade poaching, because you literally put up more money for the hunt than poachers would get from the animal products. Legally sanctioned hunts are one of two ways one can legally obtain ivory, the other being sale of ivory from extinct mammoths.

I don't think the hunt was wrong. I think it was bad that it was done illegally and the dentist was duped.
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Old 07-30-2015, 04:55 PM   #14
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I don't think the hunt was wrong.
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Killing animals is never acceptable, in any circumstance.
Your thoughts are inconsistent. :\ Either you think killing is okay in at least some contexts or else you think that it is never okay and that includes hunting.
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Old 07-30-2015, 05:05 PM   #15
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I'm an evil person who has firmly embraced the practical utility of taking life. That doesn't mean I don't acknowledge it's still morally abhorrent, but if you can't beat 'em, join 'em.

And I don't think the human race can totally conquer its animal nature. I think humanity's descendants, i.e. either the machine or biological successors to the human race, won't have such a barbaric duality anymore.
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Old 07-30-2015, 05:30 PM   #16
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True or not, that's not the point. The point is that you've said "A is never right" followed by "A-435b wasn't wrong." This is inconsistent whether you're evil or not, whether humanity is evil or not, etc. To give a Catholic example, you've gone and said:
"Contraception is never right."
followed by:
"I don't think he was wrong to use a condom."
I don't care whether you're a condom-using Catholic who wallows in guilt or not. What I care about is whether you really believe that there are never any circumstances in which use of contraceptives is moral.

Or, in this case, killing of animals.

But your reply still makes clear your position so you needn't bother clarifying further. A, you hold killing of animals to be a sin period; and B, you style yourself evil even though, imv, you are clearly not.
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Old 07-30-2015, 06:21 PM   #17
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I won't clarify my position, but the logic of net benefit is kind of Christ-like, the sacrifice of one for the good of the many.

I think sanctioned African safari hunts help reduce poaching. Not to the extent completely wiping TCM off the face of the earth would, but for the subset of people who want the thrill of hunting big game, or acquiring the very valuable exotic trophies (including ivory), sanctioned hunts from African governments, staged over a time so populations of wildlife are not adversely affected, are a net positive, even if killing animals is bad in general.

You let some animals die, so more won't die.

Similarly, if you wanted to spare the world from the sin of killing stuff, having a butcher take care of it is ideal. One person shoulders all the sins of killing, the other people don't have to deal. More blood-letting by the blood god!

Note that this viewpoint of mine is part of what gave me "jitters" during my view of Angel Beats back in 2007, where I found it odd and creepy that people in the afterlife would be enjoying dead meat. Or sex. But that's another matter!
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Old 07-31-2015, 12:51 AM   #18
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The problem with that in this scenario is that the killing didn't discourage others from doing the same.

If I killed one elephant to feed a village for a month- Sure. One kill stopped the deaths of many. And we didn't kill more than we needed.
If I killed a lion to stop it from mauling a guy- Sure. We killed the maneater and there won't be a crazed retaliation to the other lions which stayed away from humans.

If I kill a lion for it's head to put on my wall- No. That doesn't stop another guy from wanting one on his wall as well. If anything, some other poacher would see it, get jealous and go on his own hunt for his own decor.

Also, your viewpoint is that a movie villain straight out of Serenity and is rather silly IMHO. But whatever. I believe in a Hell where everyone waits in a long line awaiting judgement from a King of Hell as he has you atone for your sins before being reincarnated into a higher or lower form of life. I'm aiming for Orca.
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Old 07-31-2015, 05:10 PM   #19
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Orca are evil animals and I support Japan turning them (and dolphins) into canned food.

You're welcome for the fish...now you die!

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If I kill a lion for it's head to put on my wall- No. That doesn't stop another guy from wanting one on his wall as well. If anything, some other poacher would see it, get jealous and go on his own hunt for his own decor.
It doesn't no. The financial costs associated with such are the bottleneck. Alcoholics can't just steal liquor from a store, sure they could once, but that would be the end. They need the money to sustain their desire and cannibalize their capital streams toward that end.

In my scenario, legal 'poaching' would be profitable enough and enforced enough that illegal poaching wouldn't be feasible. If it's illegal to export any animal items from Africa except those you bought legally, there isn't going to be much overseas demand for said products, provided enforcement is maintained at shipping yards.

The sale of ivory in the US is very heavily regulated, hence why most ivory products would go to China or something. The same with rhino horn - it's more an issue with China not caring because of the cancerous belief in TCM rather than the demand being uncontrolled or unchecked from the US borders.

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Originally Posted by Loki View Post
Also, your viewpoint is that a movie villain straight out of Serenity and is rather silly IMHO. But whatever. I believe in a Hell where everyone waits in a long line awaiting judgement from a King of Hell as he has you atone for your sins before being reincarnated into a higher or lower form of life. I'm aiming for Orca.
You mean the convergence of sin thing? Catholic theology I believe would still count one guilty of the sin even if one didn't commit it. If you are a conspirator in any way, you're as guilty as the guy who pulled the trigger, no matter how small the role, because mentally you allowed it to happen. My logic was kind of a joke since I know that, like kashrut, if you violate the spirit of the law it's considered to be sharing in the punishment for breaking it literally.
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Old 08-03-2015, 01:49 AM   #20
Loki
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Legal sales of things like ivory have proven to do the exact opposite of what you believe. Instead of depressing the value in the market, the market gets bought out by people who then stockpile and fix the prices in such a way that it is impossible to keep the market happy, leading eventually to even more poaching.
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