Every once in a while I run across a post from other bloggers like this one. I often time wonder what it is that made someone like SteveAudio come to exactly the opposite side of an issue as myself:
I hate guns. I recognize their sad neccessity, for law enforcement, and soldiers. But I have absolutely no comprehension how a human can enjoy killing a creature and call it sport. Some of my beliefs I am willing to call personal failings. I recognize that some may legitimately enjoy professional wrestling, whereas I think it’s idiotic. But I own my feelings about guns. No one is going to change my mind.
Read the whole thing. Though I do not hunt, I have killed animals before with a gun, but I didn’t find it to be either particularly fun or particularly unpleasant. I was always more interesting in honing marksmanship than I was in hunting, butchering and preparing game. I doubt anyone who hunts takes any particular joy in the killing of game, it’s just part of the process. I suspect for the vast majority of hunters, the joy is in the process; of participating in the food chain from start to finish, and the knowledge one must possess to successfully accomplish such tasks.
All the arguments by people who want to keep guns in their houses fail even casual scrutiny to me. Statistics, while open to interpretation, show far more danger from those guns than any perceived benefit. To me, it’s a bit like any addiction: one will torture logic to support the addiction, no matter how harmful. These people just want to have guns around.
I think that’s crazy.
Well, for every statistic that shows that, I can drag up two more than show the opposite. But I really have no issues with people who think it’s crazy to keep a firearm for self-defense, hunting or sport shooting. I totally get that some people just don’t understand it, much like I don’t understand why anyone enjoys riding horses enough go through the trouble and expense of raising and caring for them. It’s only when people go so far as to suggest because they don’t understand it, that the practice ought to be banned, or regulated to virtual non-existence, that I draw the line in the sand
I notice that in his post, he focuses exclusively on hunting, and he does not even mention target shooting or self-defense. His argument seems to boil down to: “I once shot a head off a squirrel and found it to be icky, ergo guns are bad.”
The argument is incomlpete if it leaves out target shooting and self-defense. I never perceived hunting to be particularly fun, but I have a soft spot for animals and could not see myself killing one simply for sport, so I never went. However, I am going target shooting for the first time next month and I would like for Steve to tell me why guns are so bad that I should be prohibited from doing this.
[…]What really makes this one amusing is that it almost exactly follows the satirical formula I laid out for writing an anti-gun editorial.[…]
Thanks for a respectful disagreement, unlike many of the comments I got when I put the same piece up at HuffPo (yes, I write there as well).
You didn’t mis-quote, make straw man or false logic arguments, just disagreed, and that’s cool. Sadly, your commenter Mark falls into that trap.
My main point was not really my feelings, and I purposely stayed away from the self-defense issue, as that is a volatile can of worms. The real point was the legislation being considered, which I feel is a good thing, and doesn’t threaten anyone’s 2nd amendment rights.
Thanks.
Thanks for the comment. As to the point of the legislation, I don’t really think too many folks are unhappy with it. Gun Owners of America is opposing it, but as I outlined in a previous post, they seem to be reaching for bogeymen that just aren’t there. It looks like a good deal.
“I doubt anyone who hunts takes any particular joy in the killing of game, it’s just part of the process. ”
This is true; hunting is fun, but the actual moment you have to kill something is not; it is something you do if you are going to eat the animal, or you are having to eliminate it for some other purpose. Just shooting them for the hell of it makes no sense to me; if I can’t eat it, and it isn’t bothering anyone, I’d as soon snap a photo. I do like eating elk, venison, rabbit, and bird, so will hunt them when they are in season. When you hunt, you are taking personal responsibility for the animal’s death, unlike buying meat at the supermarket, where the buyer is insulated from the responsibility of the killing and butchering involved.
Just my opinion.
Great comment. I think that’s a good bit of wisdom:
When you hunt, you are taking personal responsibility for the animal’s death, unlike buying meat at the supermarket, where the buyer is insulated from the responsibility of the killing and butchering involved.
And I think that’s what a lot of animal rights groups fail to understand. I can almost sympathize with people who preach against the wrongs of factory farming, even if I don’t agree with them ultimately. But failing to see the humanity in hunting is, I think, an actual failing. Strangely, I think if we lived in a society where we were more closely connected with our food, these types of ideas wouldn’t have a fertile soil in which to grow. In previous times, people simply couldn’t afford the luxury of many of these delusions.