How Much Is Enough? Part IV

Why does this seem like “mischaracterization” to you, Tovar? That’s really the scab I’m picking at here.

I mean, I totally get what you’re trying to say, but not so much why you’re trying to say it. It’s only words. Does it change the truth of the statement? We hunt for fun. We hunt to kill. We kill for fun.

When we try to explain it to someone else, maybe it’s not that simple. But what about when each of us tries to explain to ourselves, as individual hunters? Is there really a need to obfuscate? Is there actually a guilty conscience under there after all? If you set aside logic, how else do you justify what you do? What does it sound like if you silence the ego, and let id and super-ego fight it out?

Thanks, Beast. That’s an approach I take also, even when there’s no one around to “shame”. I always keep a box of garbage bags under the seat of my truck, and have been known to completely fill one just at a trailhead. If more hunters would take the time to slow down and pick up one water bottle, mylar balloon, or empty food container, it would make the outdoor experience better for everyone… including the wildlife.

Tovar, I do understand what you’re saying, but I don’t think you’re getting my point. Or you don’t want to.

Would any hunter come outright and say he kills for fun? Of course not. Phrased that way, it pretty much cuts right past the rest of the hunting experience. I understand that.

I also understand, completely, that the instant of choosing to end a life is not a thing that many people take lightly. That split second is not what most people define as “fun”.

But you can’t separate that from the whole. It must be worth the emotional distress of the kill to complete the hunting experience, right? And hunting is fun… it’s recreation… it’s sport in the purest sense of the word.

But don’t call it “fun” if you don’t want to. Call it Geophrey or Sabrina. It doesn’t matter what you call it. This isn’t mass consumption PR I’m talking about right now. I’m not suggesting that we all start running around, telling the world that we kill for fun.

I’m talking about introspection. I’m talking about taking a real, deep look at our motivations as hunters… as individuals… in the context of justifying the negative aspects of the hunt (wounded animals, damaged habitat, upset balances, etc.) against the fact that this is an activity carried out for recreation… for fun.

The outcome of this type of self-examination might be a more informed sense of ethics, and a better understanding of the individual variations of ethical behavior.

Or it might be an exercise in frustration.

If you believe that killing carrots is an accurate depiction of what she’s doing, Tovar, then yes. Does it sound ridiculous? Of course it does, because you’re talking about carrots, not a furry, warm-blooded animal.

But the “math” holds true. If the garden is planted for enjoyment, with the intent of harvesting the vegetables, then harvesting those veggies is part of that enjoyment… even if the harvest is the saddest or most emotionally challenging aspect of the whole. What core meaning is lost there?

Now… if those carrots screamed and writhed when she picked them, would she continue to garden? If they showed an intentional desire to avoid her efforts at harvest, and on occasion she breaks one off in the ground, or only pulls out the greens and not the carrot itself, leaving the root to moan and cry and suffer… would she still find gardening enjoyable?

You mention “personal experience” a couple of times, and that raises some points.

First of all, you’re absolutely right that I can’t speak for anyone else’s experience. I have to rely on what the individual shares with me. In your case, it’s a little fuzzy. In one paragraph you say you enjoy the hunt, and in another you tell me that hunting isn’t recreation to you. Which is it? Something more? What more?

I can no more define your experience than I can interpret its meaning to you. But you’re not as unique as it may seem. Your resistance to the idea that hunting is fun, or sport, is not at all uncommon. I think, based only on my own experience both as a lifelong hunter and a guide and mentor to other hunters (many of them very similar to you, who have come to hunting later in life), that much of that resistance stems from a need to claim the higher ground against a set of social mores that wants to tell you that killing is wrong. I think, again based on my own experience, that for most hunters, they claim this higher ground to pacify their own internal struggles with the idea of killing, particularly with the idea of killing for sport.

There’s an idealism that seems to be pretty common among many of the late-in-life hunters I’ve met. It’s part of an apparent “new ethic”, which isn’t really new but is an embrasure of the strictest interpretation of ethical hunting that (at least on its surface) seems to reject the cavalier attitudes of the “old school”. There’s a rennaisance, of sorts, in the idea that hunting should be some sort of noble pursuit. It’s sort of funny to note that the desire to impart nobility to recreational hunting gave birth to the concept and term of “sport” hunting in the first place.

Now maybe that sentiment is real and solid and indicates a change in the way hunting is perceived today, and in how it will be practiced in the future. That wouldn’t necessarily be a bad thing.

Or maybe it’s no different than the idealism of any young hunter, new to the sport, who still buys the idea that hunting ethically excuses the fact of the kill. “As long as I hunt only what I will eat. As long as I make every effort to kill cleanly. As long as I’m legal and safe. As long as I do this and don’t do that… then it’s OK to kill animals.”

The question is, how long does that sense of idealism prevail? After a lifetime of hunting, how much of that justification has become rhetorical and how much is replaced by pragmatism? How many of those deeply held beliefs erode over time? How often do we allow the situation to override conviction? I’d say the answer isn’t quite what many of the more idealistic hunters would like it to be.

I started to relate my own story of the evolution of my personal ethics and attitudes about hunting, but instead of turning this into another book-length post, I’ll cut to the point that I was once just as idealistic as anyone here… if not moreso. I chafed at the very idea of hunting as a simple sport, or recreation. It meant so much more to me… a sacred pursuit and a critical part of my identity. At that time, I’d have stood militantly with Tovar against the suggestion that the hunt could be labeled something so banal as “fun”.

Over time, pragmatism and situations changed the way I saw many things. I experienced more and more hunts, and kills, and in the process realized that a lot of what I had believed in was little more than rhetoric. Most hunters’ ethics, like my own, are largely situational, and founded more in sentiment than in reality. Not only that, but the individual variation in those ethics is stupefying.

So I peeled back the layers of sentiment and superficiality in an effort to get at the pure logic of the hunt. For a while, I thought I was pretty close. It’s our animal nature. There’s no such thing as “fairness” or “fair chase”. Etc.

I think I started out hoping to find one, unassailable defense of hunting. A universal ethic that no one could pick apart. A logical keystone that supports all of the other arguments. But instead, I find myself here, abandoning logic with the realization that sport hunting and hunters are inherently illogical. I did not find our strong point, but instead exposed the most sensitive nerve… our internal squeamishness about killing for sport (or about being accused of doing so). And it is from this point, I believe, that all of our ethics and justifications arise.

I won’t say that the way I see things is the way everyone should see them. I am probably not universally correct in my assumptions. I will, however, say that until you have examined your own motivations and justifications as deeply as this, then you can’t say I’m wrong either.

Kevin, I wouldn’t presume that there is a correct perspective here, except to each his own. Well… and then there’s Holly and Josh, but they occupy a special place.

We are each unique, which is something I’ve acknowledged and celebrated often. Our motivations and justifications suit each of us, even when they suit no one else. I’m good with that.

I don’t think anyone is “deluded” if they don’t see things the way I do, and that’s what I said when I started this. What I am looking for is real introspection, to challenge a few folks to maybe take that deeper look and see IF I’m right… not necessarily to see THAT I’m right.

And yeah, I’m pushing here. I’m pushing hard. I’ve heard all the platitudes. I expect I’ve used them all myself at one point or another. I want to stretch the conversation to a new level, and I believe that’s happened here to a point, but it could go further.

But it’s not going anywhere if the best we can do is dissect semantics. I’m fairly sure everyone here has the intelligence to understand what I mean by fun or recreation without falling back on Oxford or Webster. And likewise, I know what you and Tovar are getting at when you challenge my contention. Doesn’t mean I’m not going to shove it back and ask, “are you sure?”

The point of this series was never to force anyone to admit that they kill for fun, by the way. It was to examine our choice to continue to hunt, in the light of the knowledge that we don’t always live up to the ethical standards we sometimes set publicly (e.g. a quick, clean kill).

Tovar,

I’ve addressed this a bit in a follow-up post (Redux), and more is coming to light with today’s post, I imagine, but for the record and to complete this particular discussion thread, I want to apologize if you think I’m honestly discounting the conviction of your words or your actions as a hunter. I am not.

What I did to you is exactly what countless anti-hunters have done to me, which was the point of this entire series. It was intentional, but while the content of the discussion is purely serious, I can’t say the same for the context.

I know, and damned well, that the motivations, ethics, and experiences of every hunter are unique. There are, in fact, hunters who do find joy in the kill as a part of the hunt. There are many others who experience a range of differing emotions… none of which might be construed as “fun”. I won’t indict either extreme, because I don’t know their minds.

There is no doubt that the anti-hunters will continue to challenge our justifications and rationale, and it is certainly to our benefit to consider deeply before we respond. But in the end, it’s an emotion-based debate and there can be no “winner”.

I like to think that this thread of posts and comments has illustrated that point. If so, then the biggest part of my goal was achieved.