and i just love how you keep refuting yourself, obi.
"We only have so many resources, and can't even feed all the human beings on our planet right now (well, we could but for political institutions and other barriers, but that's another story, and even then, feeding seven billion people's a tall task.)" you said it right there! we could, but we don't!

I see obitard got his panties in a bunch. It isn't about killing but the brutality of hunting. There is such a thing a humanely killing. We should not hunt. We should not breed and farm raise in such a manner as to cause suffering. And we should not slaughter in a manner that causes suffering or pain.

"@obi: one last question to you, then i'm out of here: do you really think we would all starve to death if we wouldn't kill so many animals or maybe eat meat only once a week?"

1. Why once a week? Either eating meat is wrong or not...how does a little animal killing make it OK in this view where we're basically making out to the equivalent of murder? But that's besides the point,

2. Would we starve? No. Would we have an easier time feeding Team Human utilizing meat and plants as food sources? Yes. Do I care about Team Human over the others? Yes. So when World Hunger is eradicated, come to me then, and I'll support the "No More Meat" policy all the way.

"and do you really think all those people that are starving right now could be helped if it weren't for those darn animals rights?"

Again, I don't have a problem with animal rights, I have a problem saying animal rights = humane treatment. There is a difference. It seems illogical to me to treat something like a human being when it's not a human being...I wouldn't treat an ant the same way as I would a dog, would I? They're qualitatively different beings and therefore require different levels of attention and, yes, rights, but different rights...

And as neither are a "human being with the divine gift of articulate speech" (to quote one of the few characters more of an asshole than myself) I see no rational reason to treat them like a human being.

What's more--

We allow animals to kill one another in nature...but we would call that murder with human beings and prosecute...

If we're treating animals humanely, then shouldn't we hold them to the standard we've set for them and be appalled at their murdering their animal brethren?

We're so up in arms about the atrocities in Cambodia, Rwanda, and Nazi Germany...

But all this time the Lions have systematically been discriminating against the gazelle and antelope and killing them! Why, some predators have even driven other animals to extinction--

Prosecute them for Crimes Against Humanity, I say!

"you said it right there! we could, but we don't!"

Yes, and we *could* design a rocket to go to Mars, too.
Entirely in our capability.
But we have other mitigating, real-world factors like, say, cost that keep us from doing so (for now, at least, one day, hopefully...)

Likewise, sure...we could all become nice, happy, peaceful vegetarians...

It's entirely 100% technically possible Israel and Palestine will make peace today...
North and South Korea will reunify...
Vladimir Putin will stop picking on the gays...
We'll all Come Together Now in grand, John Lennon-esque, "Imagine" fashion--

BUT...we live in the real world.

Technically possible = could, sure...but that doesn't mean we practically can.

i don't think we should treat them equally, and i never ever said that, and you know that. but "intensive animal farming" (i didn't know that term since my mother tounge isn't english and i had to look it up - what a innocent way of putting this!) and hunting just for the fun of it should definitely be put to an end, yes.

Obi - you have insistently ignored this argument. Is it wrong to kill an animal by torture? That is what hunters do when they have to take multiple shots. They torture. And even am old Rhino *is* going to take multiple shots.

"Likewise, sure...we could all become nice, happy, peaceful vegetarians... BUT...we live in the real world."

that is the poorest excuse i've ever heard.

The main problem being discussed here, as I see it, is a question of absolute vs. relative ethics. Should there be no killing of animals for sport, as we should try to be the best as we could be, or is it better to allow one to be hunted to potentially save others?

IMHO, this is a very similar argument to allocation of limited resources in, for example, health care. In Canada, about a third of our health care budget goes towards keeping people alive in their last three years of life. Could that money keep more people alive with a higher quality of life by spending it in less developed nations? Or on medical science? Absolutely! But are you going to be the one pulling the plug on your grandmother?

My 2c worth (rounding down to 0 since the penny is no more) is that there are far more critical issues, like people killing people, to spend our time and money on than, for example, to spend our time lobbying governments on this one way or the other. I don't live in the country where this is being done, I don't know how poor they are, how much help the other Rhinos need, or how much they are being hunted regardless of how protected they are, or if the money will help keep other Rhinos from being hunted. Let the people that live there that know all of the complexities make the decision.

I don't like the fact that this is being done, but I would feel a lot worse if I didn't recently pay to have a chicken kabob, or if a lot of my friends and relatives didn't hunt. I would agree a lot more with Draugnar once we are a little further ethically forward with our treatment of our own species and better ethically manage resource management.

As for other species not looking out for other species, there are lots of examples of dolphins saving people. I talked to someone decades ago who was pushed back to safety by some dolphins. Black rhinos, not so much, but there are community-minded animals out there that recognize and help other species without gain to themselves.

^+1 to all of that...especially...

"My 2c worth (rounding down to 0 since the penny is no more) is that there are far more critical issues, like people killing people, to spend our time and money on than, for example, to spend our time lobbying governments on this one way or the other...
I don't like the fact that this is being done, but I would feel a lot worse if I didn't recently pay to have a chicken kabob, or if a lot of my friends and relatives didn't hunt. I would agree a lot more with Draugnar once we are a little further ethically forward with our treatment of our own species and better ethically manage resource management."

"My 2c worth (rounding down to 0 since the penny is no more) is that there are far more critical issues, like people killing people, to spend our time and money on than, for example, to spend our time lobbying governments on this one way or the other...
I don't like the fact that this is being done, but I would feel a lot worse if I didn't recently pay to have a chicken kabob, or if a lot of my friends and relatives didn't hunt. I would agree a lot more with Draugnar once we are a little further ethically forward with our treatment of our own species and better ethically manage resource management."

i don't agree with that. with this line of reasoning, we could cut all cultural funding ect.

'2. Would we starve? No. Would we have an easier time feeding Team Human utilizing meat and plants as food sources? Yes. Do I care about Team Human over the others? Yes. So when World Hunger is eradicated, come to me then, and I'll support the "No More Meat" policy all the way.'

- feeding animals 7 tonnes of grain to produce 1 tonnes of meat is hugely popular, but also an expensive way to feed humans. Without first growing the animal meat you'd be bale to support ~7 times the number of humans. Now if you include hunted animals (and not farmed ones) then you're getting their work for free, which accounts for almost all the fishing in the world... but there is still a huge saving to be made.

""Ingrid Newkirk, the president of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), has herself made the comparison unambiguously, saying: "Six million Jews died in concentration camps, but six billion broiler chickens will die this year in slaughterhouses."[14]"

I trust everyone sees and feels the problem with that statement?
No one here's going to make that equivalency?"

@Obi - i see you completely miss the point of this comparison - You don't NEED to claim equivalence to see 1) The holocaust is considered one of the most evil actions in human history. 2) the systematic suffering&destruction of chickens goes by with barely anyone batting an eyelid.

If you think both actions are evil then the responce to these actions should be similar, they don't need to be exactly equivalent. I don't need to claim 1 jew is worth the same as 1,000 chickens to actually have a point about doing evil things being somehow wrong...

One other thing to consider is the precedent. So rich fucktard gets to kill .02% of the Black Rhino population and suddenly all the rich fucktards who like to kill things will want to do the se and they will pay unscrupulous locals to tale them on hunting expeditions.

Yum. Rhino chops. Firing up my grill.

"suddenly all the rich fucktards who like to kill things will want to do the se and they will pay unscrupulous locals to tale them on hunting expeditions. " Uhhhhh....they already do this. It's called "going on a safari"

For Rhino, moron. That particular animal is protected. Shoot one on safari and go to jail.

Theodore Roosevelt is the biggest badass of all time. That is all.

Genghis Khan was one fucking badass, but I still don't approve of his actions.

@Obiwan - a beautiful display of both your arrogance and ignorance with your 'Team Human' bullshit.
There are many humans not on that team human ticket and seem hell bent on wiping out as many humans as possible.
Being a human being gives absolutely no credence or justification for killing animals unless it is in self-defense or for food.
Is this thread you have shown what an arrogant twat you are with a hyper-inflated opinion of yourself, but I feel many people already knew this about you, I used to think you were ok but now I know the truth......

+1 Nigee!

True to form, obiwanoniwan takes a point so obviously correct it's a truism and then cloaks it in so much obscurantist, pseudo-intellectual prose that it suffocates.

http://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/columnists/gordon-keith/20140109-gordon-keith-the-real-sin-in-dallas-safari-club-s-black-rhino-hunt-auction.ece

"True to form, obiwanoniwan takes a point so obviously correct it's a truism and then cloaks it in so much obscurantist, pseudo-intellectual prose that it suffocates."

I might agree with you, if it weren't that most of this community can't even see the obviously correct; in the event, though, I congratulate obi for being a little less benighted than the median poster.

@ Draugnar

Well, to be fair, there were a lot more black rhinos when Roosevelt went on his celebratory safari.

You morons are missing out on the best FREE entertainment that could ever be.

IGNORE obi-dork.

Just imagine it going crazy as it posts MORE AND MORE DRIVEL in utter desperation as this community finally WAKES UP and shuns his annoying "oh I just don't understand the masses, can anybody explain them to me?" TRIPE.

And they weren't outlawed then either, Gun.

But beyond that, I have a problem with hunting where you may just wound the animal and it wander for hours before you catch and finally kill it or, worse yet, you never do and it wanders until it either succumbs to its wounds, is killed by another predator, or maybe eventually recovers but is forever hurting from the wound. I've been shot. Can't tell you where as it is classified, but I took one in the shoulder and still have the scar and the pain in the extreme cold like last week to show for it.

@ Draugnar

Me too. Hunting needs to be an exercise in sportsmanship and mercy, not brutality and cruelty. First, I think hunting with anything other than a single-shot is unsportsmanlike, except for dangerous game. Second, hunters should finish off their kills as expeditiously as possible. Third, hunters should use the most powerful weapon they can realistically carry. Fourth, the animal should be harvested. Fifth, endangered species should not be hunted other than exceptional circumstances.

@draug, scar pics OR - as they say on the internets - it didn't happen :p