Category Archives: hunting ethics

hunting ethics, taboo of the day

Taboo of the Day: Does Language Correlate to Behaviour?

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Readers that have been with Get Out & Go Hunting since the beginning may well remember an earlier reference made in the course of my pointless and esoteric blogging to “academic jerks”.  This reference at the time was made partially in a tongue in cheek fashion, since I do have some friends in the academic realm that are exceedingly polite and normal.  But this post is not about them.

Others in the academic sphere draw a fair amount of ire from me; self-styled “philosophers” in particular.  Generally it is their aloof, dogmatic, detachment from objective reality that I find especially maddening.  So it is with the inaugural edition of the Journal of Animal Ethics.  In the foreword to this scholarly journal, and by scholarly I mean based in academia…not that it is necessarily scholastically sound; that argument is best left to other self-important philosophers, one Oxford academic posited the notion that we, that is to say humanity at large (because why make small, incremental suggestions when you can righteously propose a paradigm shift for global society?) ought to rethink and adjust our terminology, or to use the oh-so fashionable academic term, our “discourse” when it comes to referring to our relationships with animals.
How you ask?  Here are some REAL EXAMPLES gleaned from the media reports and my actual perusal of the article.  My thoughts are an accompaniment in italics.
  • The word “pets” denotes a master/slave relationship and should be replaced with the term “companion animal”.  Imagine, a world where the structure of the relationship does not change (I don’t imagine pets will start buying owners anytime soon) nor will this squelch the market on roadside giveaways of free kittens…or should I say free companion felines?  Think of the costs and effort associated with renaming PetsMart to CompanionAnimalsMart.  No longer will you buy fish food…you’ll purchase chum for your icthyo-chum.  And so on…
  • The term “wild animal” will change to “free-living animal”.  They’ll need to change the constitution of a number of countries globally as well since this redefinition of the word “free” will take some getting used to…get the Webster’s people on adjusting their definitions of “free” as well.
  • All anthropocentric terms designed to cast animals in a lesser stature than humanity should be discarded including “dumb animal”, “beast”, “vermin”, and even “animal” at large to name a few.  These are considered “insulting” to non-humans by the animal ethicists as a group.  Yes…they actual refer to animals as “non-humans”…talk about reverse arrogance, why should animals be re-defined in nomenclature via a relation to their divergence from humanity?!  Are we the “standard”?!  Humanist clap-trap I say.
Some of my own independent thoughts on the matter?  Why yes,, here you go.  I suppose the term “Kingdom”, that is in its use as say ‘animal kingdom’ or ‘wild kingdom’ is phallocentric and most certainly denotes imperialism and class division within the animal community at large so I guess it ought to be discarded as well….Mutual of Omaha is going to have to re-brand a lot of old television shows.  I imagine they’ll be getting right on that.
What about our biblical sins?  Will we have to re-name the sloth?  I suggest freaky-assed looking tree mammal that does nothing all day long aside from existing.
Can I still call the unpleasant, offal consuming types of people in my life (lawyers, bankers, televangelists) vultures?  Mildly insulting to vultures I do admit but still apt.
On the plus side, my wife will have to stop calling me a pig.
This is the of course me taking this to the ad absurdum realm to show how silly this could become.  Yet, this is the proposal designed (I’m quoting the journal now) to “discipline ourselves to use more impartial nouns in our exploration of animals and our moral relations with them”.  Read: unless you think and speak the way we suggest you think and speak, you’ll be an outcast in our culture of defined language and philosophical boundaries.  I love how free-thinking academics can be when dealing with their realm of self-anointed expertise.
Basically, to my mind…and I’m not an animal ethicist so I’m sure my argument will be attacked for the locus from which it springs as opposed to any attack on its potential (and likely numerous) flaws…this journal sets out to do three things with this inaugural issue.
First it is looking to lay down a ground work of jargon, industry-speak if you will, that is intended to identify those who belong and ascribe to a set of beliefs from the infidels who do not, in this way asserting the group’s individualism and demonstrating just how dang superior they are morally and intellectually to you and I, the unwashed and unenlightened layman.  For some it will certainly make them seek this group’s approval and endorsement.
Second, instead of laying down a mission statement for the journal’s approach to the scholarly, legal, and social issues surrounding animal ethics, as a foreword ought to do, this is what we get.  This leads this (again completely outside-the-fold) reader to believe that this paradigm shift in the language of animal relations is their primary mission…in which case, our society is clearly doomed to inaction at the expense of quibbling over semantics.
Lastly, and this is the most likely, this foreword and the surrounding attention it has gathered (and admittedly not only am I late to this party, I’m just validating the sheer lunacy of it all) is really just a mechanism that serves the actual (i.e. cynically intended) purpose of generating attention for this movement and its adherents.  Which is not a pejorative statement in any way, after all we all need to make the rent somehow and speech is (for the most part) free, a principle which as a writer I endorse.
For the hunter?  Animal ethics are an important issue, in fact in my mind from a hunter’s perspective they are arguably the most important issue (although I’d also rank habitat conservation as at least equally important…perhaps a debate for a future Taboo of the Day?).
How we relate to animal life as active, visible consumers is a topic that for many reasons (guilt, ignorance, lack of interest, and so on) is given short shrift by the hunting community.  That death and a modicum of suffering is part and parcel to the hunting experience is not up for debate.  It is, period.  Justification is a good start, but it is not reconciliation.  I can justify my hunting activities in a way that satisfies myself and a good lot of others but for the most radical animal ethicists, vegans, and naturalists.  No, I won’t go into it here, but if anyone ever wants to have this debate in a civil, respectful way over a cold post-hunt beer, I’m not opposed at all to that.
Still, I fear that the introspection necessary to actually reconcile any and all harm caused at the hand of humans at large (and that includes hunters) to wild animals…I’m taking back the term…is sorely lacking.  Occasionally it is just flat-out ignored at the behest of defining our own cultural identity, but it is usually covered up in some sort of neo-Darwinian, survival of the fittest, law of the jungle argument that inevitably falls into the anthropocentric patterns that the likes of the Journal of Animal Ethics seems to be opposing.  Most of these arguments require heavy revision if the definition of “fittest” and “evolved” and would take up far, far more space than I could give them in this forum (even if I wrote a lifetime of these types of posts) so I’ll just close with this panacea of advice.
Everyone, from animal ethicists to hunters to the policy makers that inevitably are drawn into these debates ought to consider action and tangible improvements on the microcosmic scale before making far-reaching goals to shift the way people think, talk, and relate.  After all a law is much easier to change than a mind, and actions (in both the positive and negative camps) will always speak louder than any words…no matter who thinks the words are apt or not.
hunting ethics, taboo of the day

Taboo of the Day: Dealing With Death

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As a warning I’ll try to keep this post from getting too graphic or too heavy, but this has been on my mind much of the day.
Last night was a funny night…funny strange, not funny like a joke.  It might have been the half-moon or it might have been the turn of (long overdue) warm weather we’re experiencing here, but the raccoons were seemingly going berserk in Cambridge last night.
I had one of my last indoor soccer games last night, and when I pulled into the parking lot at the sports dome a big, fat, healthy-looking raccoon sat up on its haunches and watched me park me car.  Even though I could not shake the feeling that this particular raccoon was judging my park job, I’ve seen raccoons before so I moved quickly on to my game.  A couple of hours later, after my game and after some obligatory post-match conversation I left for home.  While I was waiting at a red light, a different, smaller raccoon crossed the road, anthropomorphically, at the crosswalk.  I did not observe if it looked both ways first.  I saw a third raccoon (more on this in a second) and then finally encountered a fourth as it sauntered up the gravel shoulder of the main road near my home.  I hadn’t seen four raccoons in the last six months, and here were four of them on one ten minute span of driving.  Skews the percentages a wee bit, I must say.
But back to the third raccoon.
I encountered this little fellow on a major three lane stretch of road, specifically Highway 401 just west of the Hespeler Road off ramp.  When I saw this animal it was about 40 yards ahead of me and already crossing from my lane (the right hand lane) into the centre lane.  This particular raccoon met his demise quite immediately under the right front tire of an eighteen wheeler that was travelling at over 100km/h.  I don’t think it is too inaccurate or graphic to say that this raccoon met his end by literally exploding.  No twitching, no writhing, and I presume no pain whatsoever.  Just a puff of fur and red moisture.  No time to swerve and no need to stop, as it was obvious that this specimen was beyond reprieve.
This instantly struck a nerve with me and I felt a weird mixture of remorse, sadness, and a briefly retching nausea at this scene.  It all happened so quickly that it was, in a word, shocking.  One second the animal was alive, microseconds later it was not.  Simple as that.  Moments later, while still in my mind, the feelings had basically subsided.  BUt maybe it was this event that made me keenly aware of the fourth raccoon closer to my home.
I related this tale last night to my wife and today to a co-worker.  While my wife just grimaced and made a sympathetic noise for the untimely end of this particular little ex-raccoon, my co-worker could not understand why this bothered me for even a second…when I pressed her on why she thought I was some sort of remorse-free monster, she said that I kill animals all the time so she just thought I had become numb to dealing with death.
Far from it.
I’m paraphrasing, but a hunter more qualified than I once wrote that they always felt a little bit sad and conflicted when they were successful in killing an animal.  They hinted that it was an act that forced the hunter to deal with the reality of killing for their food; a reality that was miles removed from what most experience when they buy the nice, clean stuff wrapped in plastic on a Styrofoam tray.  This particular writer embraced the introspection that those feelings forced him to deal with, and argued that those feelings were as much a part of the hunt as the pursuit, the kill, and the memories.  I could not (literally) have said it better myself.
Any animal, whether it is road-killed, hunted, or processed at an industrial facility for mass consumption has a life with some value; it is certainly valuable at the very least to that specific animal, which is why respect for the resource, and an effort to minimize suffering in the act of harvesting should always be the primary concerns of a hunter.  Dicey shot?  Maybe don’t try it.  Not sure if it’s a legal animal.  Again, why risk the shot?  Have a limit already sitting at home in the freezer?  How badly do you need more?  These are all ultimately questions that can only be answered by hunters in the moment, but it is certainly at least worth pondering them now.
And what of my original point, what of raccoon number three?  Well this really bothered me for a couple of reasons.  First, the utter pointlessness of this raccoon’s death.  Second, the split second nature of actually seeing anything’s life instantly (and messily) doused out before one’s eyes is troubling (and if it ever stops being disturbing for me, please make sure someone commits me).  Third, the response of my co-worker, who is a perfectly normal woman with no formal opposition to hunting, seemed to indicate that instead of non-hunters thinking first about the hunting community as conservationists, or of a group upholding their family and cultural traditions, the first thought was (while not malicious) of us as remorseless killers.
I suppose it is all too easy for those don’t participate in hunting, or have no positive exposure to the pastime, or even those with a moral opposition  to hunting at large (which is fine, I have my own moral oppositions to some things as well) to caricaturize us all as gun-toting lunatics with a “shoot first, ask questions later” mentality, as takers with no respect for the natural world, or as a bunch of rural reactionaries that are one national crisis away from starting a militia.  Sadly, some in the hunting community, by their actions and the way they describe their hunting experiences, do nothing to dispel this kind of slander.
So the next time someone says to you “I don’t know how you could shoot that animal” or “I think being in the woods would be fun, but I just don’t think I could pull the trigger” don’t get offended, and don’t go into a chest-slappingly macho diatribe about how the world has lost touch with the natural order of predator and prey (these are responses I have seen in the past…luckily from no one in my directly associated hunting group) and just smile, say something perfunctory like “I guess we’re all different” and then maybe explain to them in an honest, humble way how it really is for you.
They might come around, they might not.  But at least they dealt with a civil, polite member of the hunting community that treats the game with the respect that it deserves while simultaneously acknowledging the spectre of death that is ultimately inherent in successful hunting with reverence.  Let’s try to not treat the act of killing as an act of self-definition.

Hopefully that is the example that they’ll think of first the next time the meet a hunter.

hunting ethics, taboo of the day

Unpopularity Junction, a.k.a. Taboo of the Day

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I met a turkey hunter at my day job today.  In fact he is a hunter of many species, including species that I frankly have not been able to devote time and energy to pursuing, including bears, moose, pheasants.  But it was turkey hunting that we met over; I’d never seen him before in my neck of the office but he was passing by my desk and heard me remark to another co-worker about my intention to possible extend my Easter weekend this year to include a couple of days of turkey hunting.
His question was simple.
“You hunt?”
These are two words that I have heard so often that I am simultaneously buoyed and suspicious when someone asks me that question.  Sometimes the conversation leads to a lively re-telling of stories with a potential new friend, other times it is a prelude to a vitriolic harangue from someone who is opposed to the pastime.
I told the man that yes, in fact I did hunt.  He said that I didn’t strike him as someone who goes hunting (but that debate is for another post later) before we introduced ourselves and talked for a couple of minutes about where we go, what we chase, and what kind of rifles and shotguns we favour.  Turns out he goes hours north to the Ontario/Manitoba to hunt moose every year, has a son that goes with him, and also likes going to Eastern Canada every other year to hunt bears.  I told him about my lunatic addiction to turkey and waterfowl calls and then mentioned my affinity for the Bruce Peninsula.  Then he went merrily on his way (to where I don’t know…lunch, the bathroom, home for the day?) and I settled back down to work.  It was a perfectly non-event of a conversation.  Except for one thing.
When I told him I liked waterfowling, he kind of snorted in a condescending way, almost by reflex, before relating a quick few words that I will certainly fail at telling verbatim…so I’ll just sum it up.
He said he didn’t waterfowl anymore, although he used to, because he had seen too many ‘goons’ (that is the verbatim the term that he used) out sky-busting, shooting illegal birds, abusing limits, and generally acting like clods.  He didn’t judge me (at least I don’t think he did) but he just said that he could care less for waterfowlers.  Which is too bad, because I know a lot of really good, really honest duck and goose hunters that obey the laws and respect the game and the landowners.  He also remarked subtly that he thought the possession limits on ducks and geese were too high, that he knew guys who shot more than they could eat, threw out game, and so on….which I am sure is absolutely true.  I know some guys that do that too.  And again, it got me to thinking.
Like it or not and try as we might to believe otherwise, not everyone in society is a saint, or even decent, all of the time.  And so it goes with hunting.  It isn’t savoury, and it certainly is not an excuse.  But it happens, and anyone who says they are immune to it is either a lying delusional, or is qualified for immortalization on a postage stamp.
“Slob hunting” is not the realm of the urban weekend warrior, or the young, or related to a hunter’s specific ethnic or geographical clique.  It happens all too often, and no one wants to talk about it.  Since I’m not even remotely popular enough to be concerned about ostracizing anyone, let’s not bury our heads in the sand any longer.  This will be a recurring theme here at Get Out & Go Hunting, primarily because I think (and maybe I’m being erroneously optimistic) that talking about the negatives helps the hunting community at large recognize, question, and evaluate their actions with the hopes of cultivating acceptable behaviour that is legal, ethical, and that improves hunter representation.
Today’s Topic: Laws vs. Ethics
By definition, “ethic” is the “principles of conduct governing an individual or a group”.  My thanks to Webster’s Dictionary.
Since I do not have the temerity to feel that I speak for the whole hunting community, and since this is a broad topic which has been the subject of scads of editorials, articles, and hastily written letters to the editor (yes, I’m guilty of it too), I won’t belabour this too much.  Instead I’ll just throw out some real-life anecdotes, some thought experiments, and how I myself generally approach this issue.
I was once caught by the cover headline of a national hunting magazine that boasted an article that roughly went by the title “The Thorny Issue of Hunting Ethics”.  Presumably this publication equates something “personal” with something “thorny” and therefore gives such topics short-shrift.  But I did not know this then and I excitedly purchased this magazine, only to be disappointed by the token wishy-washiness of the article that in no way wanted to offend anyone, question anything, or even promote dialogue among fellow hunters.
But they got my money and put a serious chip on my shoulder about some points of hunting ethics; a chip that still resides there, and which I will now share with you.  The squeamish or the quick to anger may want to go back to my ‘lighter’ post about labelling turkey hunters before I alienate my entire readership.
Hunting ethics should not be thorny, or murky, or cloudy, or any other euphemism that obscures the importance of this issue.  They are not hard to understand and the sooner people in the hunting community come to grips with that the better we will all be.
But before I go sounding all alarmist I will state that I believe the vast, vast, infinitely vast majority of hunters are doing their thing legally and in good ethics.  In fact that is what makes this such a hot button issue for me.  This is because when someone deviates from the law and what is generally called ‘sporting’ behaviour the actions and outcomes  receive heavy coverage and stain the integrity of the collective.  Again, whether it is right or wrong, the reality is that when these things happen (poaching, waste, accidental shootings, and so on) the media and the public do not cast the hunting fraternity (and sorority) in a positive light.  This translates into reduced acceptance among non-hunters, reduced access with private landowners, reduced political acceptance (which we sadly rely on heavily) and ultimately reduced opportunity to get out and go hunting.
So here’s my approach.  I always first ask myself, is it legal?  This takes a nanosecond to answer.  If the answer is, there really is no excuse for doing it, and I can’t feel bad for any one who experiences negative outcomes for breaking fish and game laws.  Period.  This should be the primary litmus test for all actions by anyone in society, but there are hunters out there who feel some sort of bizarre exemption from the law.
There are rules I don’t like.  For example, I’d love to hunt turkeys right until sund-down every day of the season.  But the law says unload and lock it up at 7pm in Ontario, so that’s what I do.  It has cost me exactly one turkey, but really who cares?  That bird was still there the next day….even though that did not help me harvest him.  There are ways to influence legislation (again for a future blog post) but one of those ways is not non-compliance with the law.  The penalties are steep and justifiably so.
Unfortunately, tacit acceptance of law-breaking is still common, particularly in the “everything is fair game unless you get caught” vein.  I would support some sanctions from within the hunting community, but again that’s just me.  Delta Waterfowl does a good job of this in their monthly publication with the Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down section wherein they highlight their opposition to illegal activity (which is called POACHING) disguised as legitimate hunting, as well as applaud positive stories about hunting and conservation.  I’m not promoting a medieval public shaming replete with stockades, but I am talking about a nudge in the right direction from within our own community.
But let’s say that an act is not explicitly proscribed by legislation, what then?  For example, in some states it is explicitly illegal to shoot a turkey off the morning roost limb, while in Ontario there is no law (at least not one that I could find) making it illegal to shoot a turkey while it is still roosted, provided it is no more than thirty minutes from sunrise.  So which is right, and more importantly, if you were hunting in Ontario, would you shoot a tom on his roost limb?  I wouldn’t.  But I would (and have) shot ruffed grouse from tree limbs and off the ground, which some adamant wingshooters would never do.
I see it this way: the turkey is sleeping up there and his daily habit is to just stand there until he’s ready to fly down.  He is in a word, defenseless.  Ruffed grouse on the limb or walking on the ground on the other hand can, and usually do, get up and fly.  More than once I’ve been lining up a shot at a walking or standing ruffie, only to see them bust away in a flurry of thumping wings, leaving me either swinging hurriedly after them for a flying shot or just standing there looking defeated.  I have another friend who will never shoot at a flying grouse, primarily because he does not like fine shot pellets in a bird that he plans on eating.  So where do you stand on this?
I have a contentious spot for bait, as I’m not quite sure how to lean on this one.  I think food-plotting is paramount to baiting, but the law calls it “standing crops” even though all the marketing for the products seems to run counter to that definition.  I know other hunters that swear by food plot hunting because in their mind it not only improves odds for success, but can set up close range, more lethal shooting opportunities, which is ethically supportable.  I’ve hunted over apples and corn for deer with no success at all, primarily because I think the deer almost exclusively visited those locations to feed at night.  And then there is bear baiting, which is where I tend to slide into the “anti-bait” camp.  The most egregious example I ever saw?  On an internationally syndicated hunting show, I saw a nationally famous hunter who I will not name walk into a spot with a guide.  While the hunter got into position in the treestand, the guide filled two empty oil drums with garbage bags full of donuts, bagels, and white bread.  All were then thoroughly soaked in honey.
After laying the bait, the guide banged on the drums loudly with a stick and left the hunter to wait for a bear.  Inevitably, and not surprisingly, a few of them (four I think) showed up and one was arrowed by our intrepid hunter.  Again, my interpretation of this is as follows.  While this is obviously legal, this falls well shy of even food-plotting on my standard of what defines acceptable baiting.  Unlike the deer, the black bear is an opportunistic feeder, and these specific bears seemed to be well accustomed to come to what was basically a “bear feeder”.  The guide himself even said, on the record and in the show’s footage that the banging on the oil drums was the signal, the proverbial ‘dinner bell’, notifying the bears that food was there.  Again, the pro-bait camp is perfectly correct in that such a setup can provide more lethal and humane shot opportunities, as well as improve gender identification opportunities in areas with a “boars only” rule.  Still it just did not, and still doesn’t, sit right with me.
Likewise I once watched another hunting show (and in this case I use the term loosely) where first a hunter had his pick of over sixty elk that had literally flocked like birds to the only cistern on a property, and then after a commercial break a different hunter shot one of over two dozen deer that were loitering broadside around a feeder.  The deer in this case were so tame and accustomed to this set up that the hunter and the guide sat in the blind and spoke in normal, conversational tones while they were ‘choosing’ which deer to harvest, as opposed to the hushed tones or total silence of any deer blind I’ve ever sat in.  I’m probably about to earn myself hate  mail from those television producers (should they ever read this) but for my money, I’d be hard pressed to find a non-hunter anywhere that I would want to see any of those three displays.  That anyone could equate those three scenarios to ‘fair chase’ is obviously stretching to the broadest sense of that term imaginable.
Before anyone brings it up, I have a special post almost fully prepared for preserve hunting, and I’ll touch on that some other before I go on sounding like a rambling malcontent.
So now that I’ve ensured that I’ll never be invited on a bear, elk, or deer hunt by any of those unnamed outfitters (again, I don’t think they are subscribers) I’ll get off my pseudo-soapbox and close with this.
Do not let me have the last word on ethics.  I’m only qualified in the broadest sense of that term imaginable.  Again, while ethics are indeed personal, I don’t think they are thorny or complex and I believe that we as hunters can self-police ourselves and recognize something as dicey without getting self-righteous and combative.  As with all philosophies, there will be dissenters and subscribers to your specific beliefs. Have a debate about it, it is the only way we can learn.  The bottom line is this: if you don’t like it, don’t do it; just politely and articulately explain your objection and so long as no one is breaking the law learn to respect those who disagree.
After all, being courteous is an ethic we can all appreciate.