On the infamous Yahoo! Messageboard on religion, a woman brought up that she used to hunt deer for food, yet at the same time felt sorry for ending another creature's life (the thread was about regrets and whether it is just humanity that has this feeling, or whether all the Earth's creatures have regrets). She felt that hunting for herself and her family was more sustainable than the current 'production-line' way of raising animals for meat products because every part of the animals she killed were used and she wasted nothing (she also didn't have to pack it in plastic and cellophane, another eco-plus!)
However, another poster criticized her for feeling remorse about her actions and said that "feeling remorse for premeditated murder" is bizarre and if she felt that badly about it, she should resort back to supermarket meat which is "easier". This poster also said that hunting these days is done more for sport than for food and this woman should just resign herself to the fact that she does this because she enjoys it, because it's a hobby.
Setting aside their personal argument for now...is personally hunting for food/sport a good thing? I'm in the middle on this one.
Hunting for food feels like it's a good thing - we're so apart from nature these days that there would be very few people who could steel themselves into killing a creature for food, so over-hunting wouldn't be a problem (right now, anyway).
Hunting for sport, however, makes me a bit niggly. I don't relish the idea of a creature being hunted down and killed for fun, particularly if there is no use for the dead creature after the hunt is over. That, to me, is a waste of life.
Any and all thoughts welcome
