the canadian seal cull

true Wilso

It's not that simple, and I'm pretty you could find out about it, if you were truly interested, wilso.

There is a long, complicated history involving Europeans over-fishing the Northern Banks, the seal hunt starting and stopping, and how all of that interacted.

I'm not particularly interested one way or the other in the seal cull, but I do think that if they need to be culled, it is best that they be killed in a way that the resulting corpse can be used in as many ways as possible. That means pelt, oil, flippers and all.

speaking of the deer-population in new york state and pennsylvania, one has to see it to believe it. i should state that i am not a hunter and i do feel sorry for the deer being killed; but i also eat meat, so i guess i am already guilty (i don't believe the killling in slaughterhouses is a pretty sight to see either). particularly in the fall, driving along the interstate highways you'll see dozens of deer carcasses that have been killed overnight by collisions with cars and transport trucks. anyone living around these areas is no doubt aware of the warnings broadcast by the radiostations during the fall-migration. when i have tried to explain the problem of "excess" deer to european friends, they usually shake their heads and find it impossible to believe. (i would not have believed it either before actually seeing it). the problem with the the overabundance of seals appears to be not that different. just this week there was a report on the CBC news from the fisheries research department in newfoundland. it appears that part of the problem is the overfishing of sharks; sharks are, of course, one of the predators of seals. apparently , the shark population has shrank considerably because of overfishing (just as an aside, until some years ago i never saw sharks being offered as a food fish in stores. another aside, does anybody feel sorry for the sharks being killed for food ? ). i have to state that i do not know if there is a "humane" way of killing seals (or any other animal for that matter). the sealers claim that the proposed "shooting" of the seals has been tried and is, apparently, even less humane than the clubbing. i am sure, i don't know what the answer is. perhaps we should all become vegetarians and let the animals roam freely. i'm sure you have all seen pictures from india. should we start living like the indians do ? but we would also have to stop eating chickens and other fowl, and let them roam too. perhaps we would all become better human beings, if we stopped ALL violence and killing and start living the way mahatma gandhi(?) did. are we ready for that ? hbg

Vivien - Again, your argument seems to amount to the notion that you know better than others what is and is not humane, what costs or risks are acceptable, etc. all in the name of some undefined quality of evolvedness which you and others believe you have and which allows you to look down your nose at others based on your assessment that they lack your self-anointed level of awareness, caring, and concern.

My mother, like most hunters, is not a cruel person. She is also--in this respect at least--not blind to common sense and reality. Hunting deer as a means to culling the herd and keeping numbers down allows us to do this necessary thing and GENERATE REVENUE at the same time. Your notion of using lethal injection would remove this important revenue stream--which helps so many other species (including humans)--and replace it with COSTS which you seem to consider to be of no consequence in the process of determining how to handle the problem.

That's the self-anointed visionary style thinking of which I wrote. Hunting is wrong because you think it is wrong, not because deer die--you acknowledge they must--not because some suffer--every method we could name involves some suffering--but simply because you don't like it. You dislike it so much, in fact, that you seem to care little for the fact that the hunting solution is one that creates revenue which helps improve habitat for all animals as well as creating jobs and YES, dare I say... allowing people to enjoy hunting.

But let's do away with all that money. Let's raise raxes and have the government spend millions on a program to dart the deer with some poison, cart the carcass away and incinerate it, etc.. Of course, they'll need to raise millions more to replace the money lost from user fees, etc., and people with jobs or businesses related to the industry will just have to go on unemployment, I guess, so that's still more cost we will all have to bear because Vivien and her more evolved European friends aren't comfortable with the notion that allowing people to hunt these animals for sport might just be the best way to handle the problem of having too many deer.

Scrat - I had thought better of you.

I don't like cruelty - i see taking pleasure in hunting and killing, causing suffering and pain without caring, distasteful. Anti slavery campaigners 'felt they knew better than others' - did that make them wrong?

You and cjhsa seem to feel anything is permissible as long as you have your fun,

Societies evolve and with that comes democracy and a more caring society, In this country well over half the population want hunting banned (fact - regular opinion polls) not because of any shortage but because they don't like the barbarity.

From your posts America puts money first. Sensitivity according to cj is crying at a cartoon deer's death but shooting a real one

This thread seems to have run its course - you attack my viewpoint without considering the core issue - suffering and death for man's pleasure and finances.

I am not a politician or a vet or a financial expert - don't expect me to solve it all! That needs government action.

Bye

I find this interesting, considering many nations over fished the grand banks. Many of these other nations used fishing techniques banned in canada. But I guess since it's off our coast we should be held responsible. By the same token, the seal population is not helping the cause to repopulate the fishing stock. So should we not try to improve the situation we are being blamed on creating?

The banning of the seal hunt hurt the indegenious peoples of the north, in Canada, greeenland, and the US. The ban devestated their livelyhood.
The seal hunt is barbaric but so are slaughterhouses, and way more livestock are stunned and bled alive than any annual seal hunt will ever produce.
Sharks are not destroyed so much for food, aside from the fins. Most are caught and die in nets or are scooped up and are discarded as waste.

Ceili: I do not agree with other cruel hunting on animals either. And look out with your argumentation: "it can always get worse" or "it's happening to other animals too" does not mean that we should accept the hunting and killing of these seals, especially not with the arguments the Canadian government uses.

After so many millennia of human domination in this world, it still seems that for the faults we humans make, nature always has to pay.

And I define "cruelty" very differently than do you. To me, leaving the deer to their own devices would be cruel, managing the problem effectively and without taking resources away from other things important to our society is not.

I was not being cruel when I had my cat euthenized when his cancer reached a point where his quality of life would have been a nasty downhill slide. I am not being cruel when I eat a hamburger. My mother is not being cruel when she shoots a doe. Like other self-anointed types, you define terms such that those who hold opposing positions are painted as being bad people. They are not. They just live in the world you want to remake out of whole cloth.

Let's just consider New York state. Suppose we give you your way, and hunting ends tomorrow. You tell me what government programs have to be slashed to pay for your program to solve the problem hunting was solving? School lunch program? Hell, kids don't really need lunch. Health care for the poor? Screw them! We're saving deer from cruelty, by paying government workers to kill them just so Vivien won't think hunters are cruel people.

Typical of your ilk, you don't want to discuss costs or compare the real, measurable pros and cons here; it's all about YOUR morality and how everyone else measures up to it. People either agree with you, or they are cruel, fetid, unevolved creatures to be looked down upon.

I don't hunt. I don't even fish, because long ago as a child the notion of causing a fish pain, of ending its life purely for my personal pleasure struck me as wrong. So I don't do it. But that's ME. That's my moral code for ME. I'm not here telling other people what ought to make them feel bad, or comparing people who hunt animals to people who own other human beings. (Shame on you for belittling the suffering of slaves with your petty, ill-considered analogy!) I don't like the idea of killing something so beautiful, but I do understand that it needs to happen, and recognize that the method we've hit upon for dealing with the problem solves it in such a way that we aren't diverting resources from other problems we also need to solve.

But I'm wasting my time; you don't care about that. This is about how YOU feel, and how OTHER PEOPLE are supposed to behave to make you feel better.

(You "thought better" of me? ROFLMAO!! With all due respect, the less you approve of me the more sure I am that I'm on the right track.)

Bye.

Vivien, I will never understand how sensitive musicians can be so vitriolic. Letty has a lot to learn, but I still hold on to my one thought which I have never betrayed. I will never wound another's soul.

Club sandwiches, not seals.

Scrat

I have had to do the same thing, a number of times, with cats that were very ill or in a great deal of pain. What you've described shouldn't happen at all. It sounds like incompetence to me. Change your vet, rather than allow another poor creature go through the same awful experience.

`

Yes! I couldn't agree more.

When it came time for the brother of the aforementioned cat, I took him to the same place, but was assisted by a different vet. She did things a bit differently, but in the end, I think it was mostly a matter of what each cat brought to the event. The first ("Barista") went in the doors frightened and fighting, and went out that way. Her brother ("Kramer") was calm and trusting and so had a different experience.

Letty - I haven't a vitriolic bone in my body. I do bridle a bit at being lumped into a category of inhumane and cruel types by those who simply disagree as to the nature of cruelty.

Vivien keeps arguing that she believes in "humane treatment" of animals. Do you see anyone arguing the opposite? No. So why do we keep reading this plaint from her? My guess is the she's not willing to actually discuss the real issues here which I and others have raised.

I wonder what seal tastes like?

Sorry, Scrat. I have always been a wuss when it comes to creatures. I remember, as a child, crying uncontrollably, when my dad put a worm on the hook.

When we camped, there was a domestic short-haired cat that we adopted. Although all the campers claimed Leo (his name) he always came around our RV. One morning, I heard a meow of a different kind. Leo had come to our RV spot to die. I don't think I have ever been so torn. We took him to the local vet, and had him put down.

I can never have another pet.

Of course you're not vitriolic.

You took a stray cat and paid a vet for euthanasia when a .22 round costs about a penny?

The worms are safe with you...

cjhsa, I'm adding you to my brat brigade. I have shot a gun twice in my life-- A 22 target pistol. I was pretty good for a novice, but a piece of paper with a bullseye on it, is far from a living, breathing creature.

Confession: I do put sandfleas on a hook for surf fishing. I rationalize that by saying they have no nervous systems, but they still struggle.

So, do I get a brat brigade merit badge?

yeah, if you learn to rub two sticks together without starting a forest fire.

Although my rational mind tells me otherwise, every time I think about putting those two cats to sleep, I feel as if I betrayed them somehow; as if it was my responsibility to spare them everything bad this world has to offer, even death. But had I allowed myself to be led by my emotions rather than my rational mind, both cats would have suffered needlessly in the name of my misplaced sense of "caring".

scrat, you just reminded me of a song that we used to sing as kids in order to make ourselves cry. The name of it was "Old Shep."

I know what you're saying about your cats.