Michael Macher: What Animals Teach Us About What It Means To Be Human
What if you found yourself without a vocabulary with which to express the immediacy of your experience? Well, then you might know what it feels like to be an animal living in a world dominated by Homo sapiens.
» Dead Rabbit Toss Cancelled From New Zealand Town Event ...
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what ois wrong with these people? several months ago there was a news story about a woman whos papers had expired, she was deathly ill, the doctors said she couldnt tae a fliht, it would most liley killl her, so nz was going to deport her anyway, the response from the people of nz? it was a mob of get rid of her, shes not our problem! send her off she has no right here. now this. treating dead animals lie they are bricks. no revbernce for life in people or animals. i used to want to go there, but not anymore.
nz you lost my vaca. italy it is then.....
You think that's bad? Clearly you haven't heard of Michael Laws and Brian Tamaki...
Ok, Ive read as many comments about this as my mind can comfortably handle.
My conclusion -
a) Have we nothing better to do/teach our children than to swing dead animals around?
b) Yes the animal is already dead, and yes its not as if the animal is suffering but Its about respect for the dead, whether human or otherwise, pest or pet.
c) I repeat - HAVE WE NOTHING BETTER TO DO?!. Just because it is a tradition doesnt mean it isnt stupid.
Good day.
The animals are already dead. If we have to worry about the desecration of rabbit bodies then we're just being way too serious.
These children are being taught that necessary killing of these animals needn't be such a grim event. With life being what it is, some people should just shut up and leave people to their harmless pasttimes.
The woman who was interviewed says that the kids aren't going to be harming live animals... No, they get to watch their older brothers, fathers, uncles and neighbors kill pigs instead... What a thing to aspire to when they "grow up".
SICK! SICK! SICK!!!!!!!
I would like to point out something that is missed in the video.
In the South Island of New Zealand, rabbits are an introduced pest species which destroy crops and are hard to flush out.
Sure, it may seem cruel to treat the rabbits that way, but this is the same region that has an annual rabbit hunt over the Easter weekend. Hunters travel from around the country and end up with large hauls after just a couple of days.
Good point. To me, environmentalism trumps animal rights every time. There are invasive/introduced species that need to be removed. It doesn't matter how cute they are.
How can you be 'cruel' to something that's already dead?
May I point out that no one is disputing the enviromental consequences of the rabbits being alive and maybe being a pest in that region of the world? That may well be so but you all seem to be missing the point. The point is, children are throwing DEAD ANIMALS around and the commentators are making the point that this tradition brings families together. In my region of the world rats are pests, yet, when they are dead I don't see parents going out of their way to have their children throw them around for good family fun.
Perhaps if your family had thrown the dead rats around you'd be a happier adult. Have you ever thought about that???
Perhaps if your family had thrown around dead rats you'd be a little happier now.
But, did you bury the poor creatures after you killed them? Did YOU show respect for the dead?
Every place has it's weird practices that most civilized people find revolting. Ever see the Canadians take clubs and beat little Harp Seals to death? Ever see the japaneese or Norwegians shoot a long barbed Harpoon into a Whale? How about our own Ms Palin in Alaska flying above Wolves and wasting them with her Shotgun? Not one of these animals were directly attacking their killers but they still do it and laughingly claim it as their heritage right. At least when Dicky Cheney "hunted" birds that were turned loose in front of his Shotgun he managed to shoot a Lawyer so sometimes the anaimals score but not nearly enough.
LOL!!!
i never heard someone so detached from compassion. look at life thru your heart and not your eyes. its a better life.
Where's the cruelty if it's already dead?, maybe a bit unorthodox than an egg-hunt, but in rural areas you get a lot of weird stuff even greater than this.
The Throwing of the Grandmother was great, I wish mine was still alive so that I could wait, with glee, for the festivities
"Anyone got the sand of the Dead Rabbits?..."
sorry, random "Gangs of New York" reference.
These people are messed up. I'm glad it got shut down.
Check out the movie Black Sheep. Hilarious satire featuring the tension between New Zealand's animal right activists and corporate interests. You'll see that characterizing a whole country as a nation of backward, republican, animal and people haters is pretty simplistic and entirely useless.
I think people on both sides of this issue might enjoy it. Lot's of killer sheep action and payback for human abuse of animals while still approaching animal right's activism with humor. Not for the faint of heart. Adults only.
I prefer them in casserole.
Nowadays you can't swing a cat without hitting a animal rights nut !
I'm assuming sarcasm, but these people have their kids play catch with dead rabbits, and the SPCA are the nutty ones?
I suppose the vegan, cruelity-free alternative could be salad tossig.
*screams* LOLOLOL! Oh man, oh, that's hilarious.
Someone said it before.
Maybe after seeing the video it's cookie tossing.
I admit, not my joke.
Why rabbits?
Because the sheep are To Big To Flail.
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First Posted: 10-25-09 11:27 AM | Updated: 10-25-09 11:31 AM