Jun 16, 2012 -- 11:45AM, arielg wrote:

What makes you think that hunters feel the need to justify their actions to people who oppose them? The vast majority of hunters couldn't give a rip that some who get their meat solely from cellophane wrapped boxes, or don't eat meat, think that they are evil. I certainly don't.

They have to justify it to their conscience, (if they have one)  not to the people who oppose them. The fact that most don't even notice a conflict doesn't mean anything: 90% of the activities of the mind are totally subconscious.  Most people live in the other 10% and have no idea where their likes and dislikes come from.

LOL. Your take is that even if they think it dosn't bother them to hunt, deep down it must? Is this your way of dealing with the fact that people reject your points, that even if they appear to disagree, deep down they really must? Coming from an area replete with hunters who  live for hunting and spend the offseasons trying to move up on lists for hunting spots, find leases,etc, I assure you that they are not worried at any level about it. People have eaten meat since the dawn of hominids. There is no reason to have a guilty conscience over it, and certainly no reason to feel guilt about killing your own meat while the squeamish have someone else do their killing for them and wrap it up in plastic for them.

I respect total vegetarians/vegans. I do not agree with them, but I respect their decision to abstain totally from meat. I also respect meat eaters willing to kill their own meat, even if they also buy their steaks from the store. But I have no respect for people who eat meat but decry hunters as immoral people without consciences. How do they think the meat they eat got in the store? By the meat fairy that conjures up steaks or chicken breasts wiithout an animal having to die? Vegans are honest.So are hunters. Meat eaters that oppose hunting are hypocrites. The fact that they do not have the courage to kill what they consume and must hire people to do the dirty work for them while being opposed to others killing some of their own food doesn't make them better morally,only cowardly.If they don't like animals dying for meat, then quit eating store bought meat. Those animals are just as dead as the ones the hunters kill.

Jun 16, 2012 -- 11:45AM, arielg wrote:

What makes you think that hunters feel the need to justify their actions to people who oppose them? The vast majority of hunters couldn't give a rip that some who get their meat solely from cellophane wrapped boxes, or don't eat meat, think that they are evil. I certainly don't.

They have to justify it to their conscience, (if they have one)  not to the people who oppose them. The fact that most don't even notice a conflict doesn't mean anything: 90% of the activities of the mind are totally subconscious.  Most people live in the other 10% and have no idea where their likes and dislikes come from.

I don't have to "justify" anything. And my consceince is doing just fine.

There is no lie in gettng your own meat from hunting. 

Jun 16, 2012 -- 10:25AM, arielg wrote:

I agree.  I also believe hunting to be superior because that animal is living an authentic existance and dies a fairly authentic death.

What the hell is "dying a fairly  authentic death"?. How is dying with a bullet in the head "authentic"?  It sounds like  gobbledegook   hunters and meat eaters engage in to justify killing. 

Well hello.

Authentic because the deer or the rabbit was out living as deer and rabbits do, eating what deer and rabbits normally eat and mating as they normally mate, etc.  Whereas farm raised animals are highly manipulated. 

One day a human hunter comes along with a rifle or a arrow typically and kills the deer or the rabbit.  It might have been a wolf or a panther or a bear or in the case of a rabbit a eagle or owl.  But in this case the predator happened to be human.  Deer and rabbits are authenticaly taken out by predators.  In the natural, and authentic world they don't live to ripe old ages and enter woodland creature nursing homes or anything.  They are always taken out by a predator.

I consider this superior because although it is probably a quicker less painfull death to be slaughtered than hunted the life the animal lived is authentic and to me that is more of what counts.  Death is typically a event, a one time event.  It is how the creature lives that matters to me, not so much the death. 

Personally, I consider it superior when the animal was raised and killed by careful professionals, making the lifetime of the animal rich in experiences, the meat nuanced in flavour by selective breeding, and the death painless by using modern stunning techniques.

It's hard to come by so much care in meat production. Most producers fail in one or the other dimension, many fail on all of them.

I have the same preferences for the plants I eat, by the way... no duplicity!

Chari -

Thank you for your post #40, which I appreciated because you 'got' what I was trying to say.

Mouse -

Good on ya, eating a couple of meatless meals a day.  Interestingly enough, that was how our family got started going veggie years ago ourselves.  One day, we found we weren't eating meat at all.  And it was no big deal.

As Teilhard has written, nowadays, his family eats less meat as well.

Everybody finds his/her own path in life and follows that path to the best of his/her ability.