Hunting is no more ethical than buying meat from the store and vice versa. It’s killing either way, plain and simple. Also, thousands of animals are shot but escape and bleed to death every year. Not all hunters kill every animal on the first try. Most of the animals suffer. Go vegan!

It’s not enough that we farm living creatures, we have to go into their homes (the forest) and killed them there too? No, it’s not okay to hunt, no matter the reason. Besides, this concept of “hunters as conservationist” although very popular with big organizations (WWF, Ducks Unlimited, National Wildlife Federation) just gives them an excuse to justify their Neanderthalian habits.

Why kill to eat???

Sure it’s better than factory farmed meat no doubt. BUT I think it’s ridiculous. Years ago man hunted to survive. This is not the case with Joe Perry.

I agree with Jamie Lynn- if Perry had to chase the animal down it would be different. Hunting with a gun is a cop out. You obviously have an unfair advantage (not that I promote chasing animals down with a knife)

I guess I’d still rather see meat eaters consume animals caught like this who had lived a free life than eating factory farm animals. It’s the lesser of two evils .. but it doesn’t make it right.

Honestly I think these hunters (even the women ones) just have too much testosterone!

E

I adore all things Aero, but this really hurts. Joe, try stalking those deer with a camera.

EVERYTHING WE EAT IS ALIVE!! PLANTS ARE ALIVE TOO! Just because you can’t hear them screaming doesn’t mean they’re not breathing. While living on this planet everyone needs to eat someone else to survive. It’s a hard thought to live with but that’s what we are. As long as we’re not eating everything with a pulse and eating only what we need, vegan or not, we’re just a part of nature.
I hate hunting when you don’t eat it. It’s not processed with some unknown chemicals in a factory either.I agree with Joe; only when you hunt and leave the carcass for no reason it’s disgusting behaviour.

Regarding:
“Besides, plants don’t feel the way animals do and we can’t even compare their level of consciousness”.

Are you sure? How do we know this? We assume this based on OUR perspective and understanding. Could we be wrong?

Just asking …

PS (I also love Aerosmith — I was hanging out around Lake Sunapee as a kid when they were teenagers jamming for the first time there. Joe served me more than one cone when he worked at the Anchorage down Sunapee Harbor.)

See what most people do not realize is that hunting is a vital to the survival of certain species. Let me start by saying I am NOT a hunter. I am however in my final year about to get a degree in Wildlife Biology and Management. Humans have eliminated most apex predators within many ecosystems in the US as well as the world at large. This lack of natural control is causing populations (especially of ungulates such as deer) to explode well beyond the carrying capacity of the system.

In the Northeastern United States the deer population is out of control to the point where collisions with vehicles are at record highs. Another negative effect is that due to the resources needed to support such a large population, deer in New England are now a major threat to endangered native vegetation in the area.

And then there is the well-being of the deer populations themselves. When the density of animals in an area is too high many problems begin to occur. The resource issue was already briefly talked about. There is not enough to feed the entire population, especially during the winter months. Starvation is common and winter kill is rising. Also higher unchecked populations become pools for disease that can wipe quickly through an entire population.

Many of you speak of hunting causing undue suffering for the animals being hunted. I am not completely disagreeing with you. Yes many animals are wounded and manage to get away, and yes these animals suffer. It is a hard truth. But if left unchecked how many countless other animals will suffer as they are not killed on impact from hitting a vehicle? How many countless other animals will die extremely slowly and painfully from disease, starvation, or unfit health through the winter months?

We have an obligation to be the stewards of the environment. And I believe that includes making hard calls so that animal populations we have affected irreversibly can maintain health successful numbers. The system is out of balance in a way that most of us are unable to fully comprehend. Educated management is our way of trying to reset that balance as close as we can and hunting is an invaluable part of this.

I have known many hunters and I agree that many of them are extremely respectful of the environment and conservation minded. Though there are always some who are disrespectful of life, I have found that most hunters see themselves as part of the bigger picture, more in tune and in touch with the natural world than most of us who live in cities and suburbs.

There needs to be a balance in this issue. We cannot be all one side or the other, and people need to realize this. People who allow wildlife to suffer because they do not look at all the information are just as guilty of ignorance than the people who do not care about the natural world at all.

Jeremy,

You make good points.
However, I would like to emphasize that this global depletion of species is largely due to the action of humans.

You mention that the deer population in the US is out of control, but you know better than I that that wouldn’t have happened if their natural predators hadn’t been hunted and their ecosystem destroyed.

“How many countless other animals will die extremely slowly and painfully from disease, starvation, or unfit health through the winter months?”

Well, maybe we should step back for once and let Nature do its work. Just because a certain species’ population is out of control, it doesn’t mean we should send a battalion of hunters to ‘control’ it!
I would rather let Nature follow its course and balance itself without human intervention – after all, our record when it comes to interfering with nature isn’t the best!

“We have an obligation to be the stewards of the environment”

I’m sorry, says who? And what a great work we’ve done so far…

“The system is out of balance in a way that most of us are unable to fully comprehend”

I’m sorry, again, but as a Wildlife Biology and Management student you should know better. Depletion of resources, destruction of ecosystems, over-hunting and pollution are the main reasons why ‘the system is out of balance’. You don’t need a degree to realize this.

“I have found that most hunters see themselves as part of the bigger picture, more in tune and in touch with the natural world than most of us who live in cities and suburbs.”

I’m not a hunter and I live in a city. Nonetheless, I am extremely in touch with the natural world…
I can even accept that some hunters are “respectful of the environment and conservation minded” (although it’s a paradox that they do it by killing animals) but the fact is that most hunters just enjoy killing animals and couldn’t care less about the environment (for instance do they pick up the empty shotgun shells and take them home? No!) or the animals.

Hil,

“So I guess my point is that hunters can be advocates for conservation, and in many ways can be strong allies to those of us that are fighting for the same cause, the preservation of the wildlands left in our country and the earth in general.”

Well, can you truly tell me that you believe that if hunters were told they couldn’t hunt for 5 years in order for nature to rebalance itself, they would agree with it? I sincerely doubt it!

I can tell you that in my country they would never accept such a thing…

The system is out of balance. No denying it. If humans packed up and left, no eating veg, no eating meat, no roads, no cars, no houses, dams, airports, sewage systems, farms, hospitals, schools – the system would eventually find it’s balance again. However with circa 6bn people on the planet this isn’t going to happen for the foreseeable future. Like it or not, as Jeremy says, hunting, in one form or another has to be part of a management plan for most ‘semi-natural’ areas. You either let people do it as ‘hunters’ or you pay people to come in and do the same job, only this time it’ll be termed a ‘cull’. Which is more acceptable? Neither? So do you re-introduce a large predator back to the UK to control deer populations or just accept things like the bark stripping of the pine forests on Brownsea Island and lose the last population of red squirrels in the South of England as their habitat disappears? Wheels within wheels

I’m an environmental adviser to the biggest conservation charity in the UK, I spend my days working on the resource and sustainabilty agenda. I spend my weekends, when I’m not with my family doing conservation work and yet I have hunted in the past and I still fish to this day. A kind of hunting no? Sure I’m not a beer hunter, I don’t sit in a hide and wait for something to go by, I take no pleasure in the kill at all. I do take pleasure in being able to sustainably take my own produce from the wild in a controlled manner that ensures that one day, my son will be able to do the same.

Like many cultures around the world I believe there is a spirituality behind being able to harvest foodstuffs (meat included) as ‘humanely’ as killing any animal can be, in a controlled and, in it’s widest sense, sustainable manner. In the same way that I take pride in my garden produce, foraged blackberries and mushrooms etc etc.

sorry for the barrage of text, I’m tired and have a biomass boiler to plan by 10:00!

Joe Perry’s comment is spot on.
When you hunt and consume what you kill, you are in balance with a need to feed your hungry body. One can hunt and kill for sport which does not feed the body and does not use nature in a sustaining way which is wrong. You also can cook up a pot of oatmeal and eat all you’ve cooked up and be in balance with the need to feed your body. One can also cook up a pot of oatmeal and eat a few bites and throw the rest in the trash. Not consuming that oatmeal is not sustaining just as the person who shoots animals for sport.

The only real difference here is that when you kill an animal it reminds you too much of yourself as a human. There’s blood and the flesh is similar to our own, and that is for some, is too much. Yet those who say it is “wrong to kill any animal” overlook the killing of the oat-stalk that produced the grain from which oatmeal is made. The only difference is we don’t see blood and plants and animals don’t have souls.

The true issue here is stewardship and the responsible use of the resources God has given us to sustain life. By eliminating an entire category of food-source we would then be out of balance with nature and not good stewards of the resources we have been given dominion over.

I am a hunter and conservationist. I have dedicated my personal and professional life to wildlife conservation, working as a wildlife scientist. There is NOTHING about regulated, ethical hunting that is counter to conservation. Many non-hunting conservation organizations accept and understand the role hunting plays in conservation. In fact in the U.S., hunting pays for most of conservation. In 1937, the Federal Aid in Wildife Restoration Act was passed. This law placed an excise tax (now at 11%) on all hunting related equipment that can ONLY be used for funding of wildife conservation efforts. This money (over $10 billion dollars to date) is distributed back to each state based on land area and number of hunting license sales. It is the ONLY stable source of funding for wildlife conservation. Non-consumptive wildlife users (bird-watchers, backpackers, photographers, etc.) are beneficiaries of wildlife conservation activites funding soley by hunters (a similar law is in effect for fisheries as well). Unregulated hunting and poaching can (and has) decimated wildlife populations. However, regulated hunting has NEVER caused extinction or extirpation of a species. In fact, hunting has provided reason for bringing back formerly rare species around the globe. And, protection of habitat for game species also results in habitat protection for nongame species. Some of the leading conservationists in the U.S. were hunters – Aldo Leopold, Theodore Roosevelt, and others. It was hunters that sounded the alarm bells about declining populations of animals in the U.S. and hunters that began the modern conservation movement. We owe those leaders, and hunters, our thanks for the abundance of wildlife we still enjoy today.

It is impossible to explain the spiritual connection to the land derived from hunting to someone who does not hunt. Ever try to explain the love a parent has for a child to someone that has no children? It is impossible. It is not about the kill although that is the objective. Hunters understand more about the need to keep wild places wild and to sustain wildlife populations than non-hunters.

In our desire to be more “earth-friendly”, we lose site of the need to conserve wild places. Who cares if the world is 4 degrees warmer in 100 years if there are only rooftops and parking lots to warm up? Yet, conservation organziations composed of hunters (Ducks Unlimited, National Wild Turkey Federation, Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, etc.) have spent hundreds of millions of dollars on purchasing land for wildlife conservation (yes, and hunting opportunity). How much did PETA spend last year to conserve habitat? What about HSUS? NOTHING. Who is doing more for wildlife conservation? You know the answer. Hunting is not a perfect system, but it is the basis of the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation, the most successful model for conservation in existence. I am proudly raising my 2 daughters to hunt, fish, and fully appreciate the outdoors. Without this connection to the land (which we are quickly losing due to urbanization), future generations will simply not care about wildife and wild places, and we all lose.

I think you all have some good points, points from both sides, and probably more good points from the pro-hunting side such as Eric’s, D. Miller’s and Jeremy’s. In my personal opinion I do not like hunting and I sometimes have a hard time respecting it — but I think that is because I have not seen many good examples. What I don’t like is seeing the enormous pride of killing a living creature, especially if the animal is killed only for sport, to hang on their wall or for fur. If it is used for food, and especially by local groups, I really do not have a problem with it. I have just seen too many pictures of hunters with a wide grin on their face, blood all over their clothes, and a line of animals in the back of their pick up truck. I guess what’s ironic is that the hunters who don’t “show off” their kill are the ones I don’t see… and that’s because they don’t show off!! So it is really good to hear the good side of hunting and that there are hunters out there that do it responsibly and actually do care about conservation, nature and the animals. I think Eric has a great point that all of us do something that is harmful in some way. For me, hunting is something I don’t really like, but I am not against it all together. I will not hunt but I will not protest hunters or tell someone they are wrong for hunting.