Thursday, February 10, 2005

Loving Monsters -- The Animal Rights Crowd

I really enjoyed this article by Glenn Reynolds regarding the tree lovers in Boulder who have ended up to be a hot lunch for the cougars they are protecting.
"but to me the most interesting behavior isn't the predatory nature of the cougars -- which are, after all, predators -- but the willful ignorance of human beings. So many were so invested in the notion that by thinking peaceful thoughts they could will into existence a state of peaceful affairs that they ignored the evidence right in front of them, which tended to suggest that cougars were quite happy to eat anything that was juicy, delicious, and unlikely to fight back."
Yes, lets sit with the cougars, praise Gaia, and sing Kumbaya... Isn't it wonderful, Moonstone? ... Moonstone?

I've been a conservationist all of my life, and I especially abhor cruelty to animals. Hunting isn't cruelty, by my definition. How can someone kill Bambi? If someone didn't, little Bambi would starve. I love to recall two events, one a story which I can't attribute, but which is so novel it simply has to be true.

It seems the animal rights crowd was concerned with the deer population, and took a small herd to an island. Of course, the deer didn't prosper as well as hoped, but they got along. Either the same or a different group had another target to save, timber wolves. The bozos decided to put wolves on the "other side" (no joke) of the island. In two years they found only starving wolves.

The second event was being solicited on a highway in St. Louis by several people who were protesting puppy mills. Now think people. Where would you raise puppies? My comment to the solicitor, who looked like a middle aged school teacher, was "then what are you for, free range puppies?". She didn't get it, and unfortunately if you waste your time speaking to these people, you will find they are vapid.

Back to Reynolds.
"Nonetheless, the same strand of wishful thinking appears: perhaps this time, the cougars won't want to eat us. Some people, apparently, would rather be dinner than face up to the fact that nature is red in tooth and claw, and that -- in this fallen world, at least -- the lion lies down with the lamb only after the lamb's neck is broken. (Worse yet is the noxious strand of liberalism that suggests we somehow deserve to be dinner.)"


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