Quote:
Originally posted by farfromhome
What gene do you possess that I do not?Or vice-versa?What is it in you that gives you joy about killing a wild free thing?I don't get it.
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I get that response a lot from people on forums like this. In the old days, I really, truly thought the animal rights people were insane. I still think that about some of them.
Human society at its most civilized is the farthest removed from nature. Civilization is good for humans who are all packed in together and need to get along. But it comes with a price. We are no longer an integral part of the planet we live on (i'm talking metaphysically here). Because we don't like being uncomfortable, we've built enormous concrete cities, connected by ribbons and ribbons of concrete roads, upon which we travel safely out of the elements in our vehicles. The closest many people get to "nature" as it were, is if they have to get out of their Hondas to take a leak. This is usually an unnerving experience for them, so they would rather do it in a filthy sewage-infested gas station restroom filled with disease than next to a pine tree where something might eat them.
We surround ourselves with other people and people-made things to the extent that most of us don't know of a world where we aren't separated from it by a sheet of glass or a tv screen. Since our only true interaction is with humans, we have no real basis for proper animal/human relationships. We dress our pets in human clothes, feed them human food. We watch talking animals with human emotions on TV. When one dies, we are saddened, and rightly so -- but we look at the dead critter and can't help wondering if its mother is saddened. I know my mom would be. The problem is, we have completely severed contact with the way it is "out there", outside of our concrete islands.
This stage of our evolution is, oh, about 140 years old. A blink in the history of our race. On a timeline, the generation that goes to oxygen bars
and spends $4 for a cup of water that has been run over coffee beans is about a micron removed from the generation that hunted, gardened, and gathered for its daily sustenance.
My love of hunting, the more primitive the better, doesn't stem from bloodlust. It stems from what I feel is already preprogrammed in all of us - the desire to be part of the world again. Yes, something might die, and for some, it's too high a price to pay. They'd rather have their protein in a sanitary looking, pre cut package. That's ok by me, but I like being there from the start.
The kill is bittersweet -- joy at success, some soulsearching over the death you've caused, thankfulness to the prey, to God...the emotions involved are deeply subconscious and we all share them. Some of us have 'educated' ourselves away from such unpleasantness, some, like me, decided we preferred the old version.
No, the whole experience is what drives me to hunt. If you're willing to put aside enough time and work at it, you can connect with your world on a very primal level. When hunting, you hear more clearly, you see farther, you can distinguish scents better. The cold is colder, the heat hotter. Food tastes better. At the end of the day, nothing sounds better than your shelter and a small fire. In fact, the plastic bags that you brought your food in seem utterly incongruous. You can hear a plastic bag for 100 yards. When you roll out of the sack in the morning, the intensity of the cold is negated by the fact that *you get to go HUNTING!!*
You wondered when I was getting to that, huh? Well, after a day or three in the woods, eliminating all the white noise that's been assaulting your brain for the last however many months and tuning in to your environment, the idea of hunting suddenly doesn't seem all that extreme. If you watch closely, you can witness maybe a dozen deaths in a day, from insect life on up. Death is part of the cycle. To me, watching something being born and witnessing its death create almost the same emotion - a kind of quiet awe.
The aggressive, "let's go bag us an elk" mentality is, in me, how I psyche myself up for success. I want the meat. In 20 years of hunting, I have kept one rack of antlers. It wasn't even that big, it was more of a keepsake from the experience. Nope, it's the protein. And I determine to myself that I will stretch my resources, my body, and my mind to the limit to get meat in my camp.
This isn't pretense. Think about it. I weigh 180 lbs. I have no claws, I can't run fast, I stink like a human, and my white skin practically glows in the dark from all the flourescent light it's been exposed to for so long. I'm a beacon. And now, I'm going to try to sneak up on a 600-lb animal that has better instincts, vision, smelling, hearing, and speed. On its own turf, with a sharp stick and a string. I must get within 30 yards or so of this animal undetected and put that sharp stick into a target area the size of a paper plate.
Usually I lose. Sometimes I win. The elk in question has run from wolves, mountain lions, starvation, plague, and harsh winters all its life. I'm small potatoes in its world.
And at the end of it all, it breaks my heart to have to get into a stinky truck and burn gasoline all the way down to the concretelands again, where my food will come wrapped in paper with a clown drawn on it, and I will have to listen to people tell me what I'm doing is wrong. Wrong was coming back, not going.
That's how much i like hunting. And we have the same basic genetics, you are just more skilled at filtering out old, old urges. That works for some people, just not for me.
I promise I'm not bloodthirsty. And for what it's worth, I like people, too. I play guitar in bars and would like my band to tour with Iron Maiden, if they're still alive when we hit it big. I vote, I support a peaceful society, and if someone finally manages to make it illegal to hunt, I will comply out of respect for the institution of law.
But it'll be bullshit.
edited to get rid of one or two "huh?" things that pop up when you try to soul search at 2 am