I spent one of my boyhood summers on a farm where chickens were raised for their eggs.
But I will never forget how, one day, the farmer decided that one of his chickens would make a perfect dinner.
He chased a chicken down, grabbed it by the scruff of the neck and after about 30 seconds of loud death cries from the poor bird... There was no more life.
Michael Vick had not yet been born, but now, decades later, I thought of that crazy farmer when I read of the misdeeds Vick is going to cop to.
Apparently now-former NFL star Michael Vick is going to serve time on that dogfighting rap. You know, forceably killing pit bulls that he and his friends decided weren't mean enough to excel at that disgusting non-sport.
Vick's accomplices said the dogs were dispatched by means that could only be described as highly barbaric. Shooting, electrocution, even repeatedly hurling one dog to the ground until it breathed no more.
But as a society, we should not be so quick to condemn Vick and his friends without looking in the mirror.
Not being a vegetarian, I'd like to shine the mirror not on our eating habits, but the way so many of us hunt and select live beings for slaughter. To me, there is a profound difference.
This very weekend, numerous "game ranches" will host high net-worth, highly ammo'ed "hunters" who will track jungle cats and other exotic creatures down, and kill them for sport.
These assassins of creation's creatures are at least as bad as Michael Vick and his bunch.
Probably as I type this, greyhounds whose "entertainment" racing days are behind them and have not been adopted will be given a "mercy" killing. No, they won't be flailed to the ground until their skulls are crushed, but the "mercy" killings will leave them just as dead as the canines in Vick's "kennels."
Come to think of it, what about the animal shelter who cannot place the stray dogs in their custody? Is the gas chamber or fatal injection any more "humane" than what Michael Vick and his posse are accused of doing?
This weekend, much of our recreational countryside will be killing fields for deer and airborne game dispatched by hunters with telescopic sights. As these creatures experience a nanosecond of pain while their life ebbs away, they may just feel a type of fear and dread similar to the dogs that Vick and his companions are believed to have killed.
Or what about you and me? Maybe we're going to the seafood restaurant this weekend. So which lobster shall it be that is lifted out of the tank, suffocated from lack of water, and then placed on our plate?
For the "entertainment" of our palate?
Uhh, yeah dude. Fatal injection is more humane than electrocution, and more humane than death by being slammed on the ground-to finally die of internal injuries. Consider the effort required to repeatedly pick up an 80 to 100 pound dog and dash it to the ground enough times to finally kill it. Consider the effort required to rig up a dunk(water) and zap(electricity) for the dog. That's a lot of effort to accomplish a "culling" of an "unsuitable" animal. There are plenty of ways to do do this that don't involve the described level of cruelty.
Yes, seeing where your meat comes from is pretty gross. The only thing more gross is killing for sport, and then not to eat it. There is something honest and true about killing what you eat, in a humane and ethical manner, minimizing its pain and suffering. Talk with a hunter who takes pride in his or her skill in doing just that. That is why there is an ethic in hunting to down your quarry with just one shot of a gun or a bow. Talk with a farmer who raised the animal in a humane manner and then ends the animal's life in a quick and simple manner. Like the farmer who knew how to quickly end the chicken's life, minimizing its suffering.
Yes, fatal injection is more humane. A quick bullet to the brain is more humane. Pretty much anything is more humane than than the dog slam, pretty much anything. You know that chicken you mentioned, the dogs made a lot more noise, a lot more noise.
Implicit in your article is that hunters are some type of evil killer. Maybe I'm misinterpreting your use of a simple figure of speech, but generally, when someone says that "A is no better than B", they mean that both of them are no good; however, if A=B, then B must also equal A. Apparently, you believe that because we espouse deer hunting as acceptable, we must also think dogfighting is acceptable. You would be wrong, sir.
Does the thought of death make you sick? I'm surprised at your story about the chicken. As a psychologist, it seems that you need to come to terms with the fact that some life must if fact die in order for other lives to continue. Have you ever questioned where your meat comes from, sir? I have, and I prefer that a large portion of it come from wild animals, rather than from factory farms.
In closing, the words in your article do nothing to educate, inform, or sway anyone's opinion regarding hunting, if that was indeed your thinly disguised intent.
Still want to compare dog fighting to slaughtering chickens for food?
Are you saying it's wrong to kill pets because of the emotional trauma to the child? Any consideration for the animal's life?
Yup. Are you saying it's right?
"Any consideration for the animal's life?"
Yup, but other commenters are more qualified to elaborate on that than I am.
Mr. Shaw, you need be only slightly sharper than a door knob to realize that the folks at the animal shelters aren't killing their unwanted charges for sport, neither are they wagering big bucks on how long it will take them to die.
But that message is destroyed when the post descends into an inability to make distinctions. Is torturing to death a dog that was bred to fight, but is not good at it, different than the humane society killing stray dogs as humanely as possible? Of course it is. To not see the difference is to announce an inability to be taken seriously on an issue like this. Is there really no difference between maximizing the pain to an animal and minimizing it? Does it really not matter whether one is responsible for creating the situation that leads to an animal being put down?
Having had several dogs put down due to disease, I can tell you that the animal is not put to undue suffering. Michael Vick's methods of punishing his dogs for non-performance were unconscionable. The fact that his remaining dogs will be put down just because they are trained to kill is just sad.
So put him in a cage and throw away the key.
Likewise, there is a difference between painlessly putting an animal to sleep at the veterinarian’s office, and killing an animal with barbaric brutality.
Would it matter to you if a loved one dies quietly while sleeping, has a stroke, or is brutally murdered? Would you feel the same toward an emergency room medical team as you would toward a sadistic gang of criminals?
There is no excuse for killing animals in a so-called civilized society.
Professional sports are very effective for dumbing the population so they fail to consider what might be the result of so much killing.
there's a big difference.
I don't think the farmer's wife was giving odds and taking bets on her husband's successful neck-wringing. The farmer didn't have his animals rape one another. The farmer didn't resort to unnecessary brutality.
Oh yeah, they ATE the chicken.
Big difference between the farmer and the over-paid arrogance, anger, ignorance and brutality of Vick.
Let's be real. There is no excuse for killing animals in a civilized society that can produce so many kinds of foods without such violence.
And yes, there are people who do give a damn about dog fighting and try to eradicate it. I live in NC and just recently (within the last year) in Tennesse there was a major major bust in this one county that was about as corrupt as you can get: dog fighting, cock fighting, drugs, vice, gambling. Most of the people and families that lived in the county were in on it. I happen to know about this because a former coworker of my mother's was one of the people busted and indicted for it. This bust netted over 100 people from what I hear. But I doubt it was in the national news very long, if it ever got there at all. After all, 100 no-name rednecks getting busted in some TN backwater is not nearly as sexy and profitable as one famous person.