> But I think some people are sadistic towards
> animals and towards people and they enjoy hurting others, and killing others,
> which can be sadism.

I think those people end up as arsonists and they torture small
animals and the like.  That doesn't make them hunters.  It has
nothing to *do* with hunting.  I can use a pocket knife to whittle a
stick or to murder someone.  Does whittling a stick make me
sadistic?  I'm not following your logic.

 That's what I'm talking about.  I don't think my cat is
> sadistic when it hunts animals and doesn't eat them.  Nor do I judge head
> hunters for killing members of rivalling tribes.  Instinct is instinct, and
> what people do is their business.

To me, hunting means food, and eating food means you survive.  I
don't see any *instincts* involved here.  Instinct is what you do
without thinking.  Taking a life in order to put food on the table
requires plenty of thought and planning.  (And maybe you shouldn't
feed your cat so well, so that when it hunts the mice, it *does* eat
them.  It would be healthier for it than cat food! <g>)

 What I am talking about is people losing
> their sensitivity to LIFE and nature and instinct and falling into sadism,
> just like people fall into greed, dishonesty, etc..  I'm talking about
> dysfunctional behavior, like some hunter shooting your dog, or, a deer, when
> it's not going to be eaten, and it's just an outlet for unresolved anger.

Okay, but what does that have to do with *hunting*?  Those things
you speak of are the exception, not the rule.  They are the
parenthetical statement, not the definition.  I think if a person
grows up to respect life AND death, of ALL species (as opposed to
the millions who seem to respect the life ONLY of the human species
ONLY) then that dysfunctional behavior is not present.  The danger is
in perceiving the human species as supreme over all others.  Once a
person understands the inherent value of ALL life, then the person
doesn't shoot the dog because it values the dog's life.

It isn't about unresolved anger, it's about proper family values
being taught, about parents passing that respect from one generation
to another.  It used to be that the men went out hunting while the
women gathered and raised the kids, or the men went to work while
the women gardened and took care of the kids.  Now that it takes two
full salaries to pay the bills, who's left to raise the kids?  A
babysitter can't pass on a parent's ideals to the wee ones.  And by
the time the parents come home from work and serve the evening meal,
it's nearly time to go to bed and get up and do it all again.
Again, no time to share in the important stuff with the kids.  So the
kids grow up thinking that their own juvenile way of looking at the
world has perhaps more value than in should as they mature.  I think
that Ted Nugent's ideas about teaching kids hunting would work.  If
they learn that all life is to be valued and all death is a solemn
affair, which can definitely be learned by hunting *for food* and
properly taking care of the dead animal, then they are learning a
valuable lesson about life.

Once a person understands and respects the right of all species to
share this earth, then hunting is just hunting.  A way of putting
food on the table.  It is a pretty natural thing to do.  And nature
isn't kind.  Something has to die that something else lives.

We are members of a paleolithic nutritional style.  Do you think
paleoman put off a hunting trip in case it was a cruel thing to do
to an animal?  Hunting is as much a part of our species development
as it was for a wolf. Nature is cruel, and we are a part of nature.
I think we should be true to that nature as paleo people.

Yes, now we have only to go to the store and buy meat already
butchered.  I think that lets us off the hook too easily.  It is
altogether to easy to ignore where meat comes from when we never see
it on the hoof, never have to hear the animal scream.  When you hunt
for your meat, you are involved in the cycle of the food chain, not
a mere bystander.  Yes, I think hunting for meat instills a sense of
respect for life, just as I think hunting for kicks shows poor
upbringing and a breakdown in human culture.

But aside from the moral aspects of hunting, I think that eating
wild game of all types would be a healthier food base for us than
ingesting artificially reared and raised animals, whether they are
pumped full of antibiotics or whether they are raised organically.
The hunted animal would have a more varied food supply than farmed
animals, allowing the meat to contain a better combination of trace
minerals, making the meat itself healthier than the same species
raised on a farm and fed other foods raised on another farm.

But alas, I am one of those modern-day gatherers with a regular job.
Hunting trips don't fit into a gatherer existence very well (the men
hunted, the women gathered), though I am convinced that in order to
hold true to my paleo philosophy and my northern heritage, I need to
learn to kill and butcher an animal for my food.  I wish I could hunt
all my meat, but I was raised a city kid, and haven't gotten my own
attitudes back to paleo levels.  It will come, though.  I am
changing.

Lisa Sporleder
Ester, Alaska  (what a better place to learn to hunt?)