To Hunt or Not to Hunt…That is the Question

Chris Coniglio

 

Imagine a group of people trying to take away a passion of yours with the only reason being that their own opinions differ from yours. The idea that people are trying to take my hunting and fishing rights away is something that I refuse to allow and will always fight for. The group that I am referring to is the “anti hunters,” the ones who are against anything ever being harvested. It amazes me how someone cannot want to be a part of these great resources that we have. When I think of hunting and fishing I think of spending time with friends and family doing what we love to do. I think of that feeling when all the pieces of the puzzle come together on that cold crisp morning in October when the buck you’ve been after is standing only 20 yards away, giving you that one opportunity for the season. I think of comradery and the respect gained for one another as the years go by in the field. Now there are people on the other end of the spectrum, way on the other end that oppose this. When they think about hunting and fishing they can only picture hunters going out and shooting everything they can unethically and with no regard to anything else. They think how can these people go out and shoot these innocent creatures. In some cases the unethical “hunting” of animals occurs, but this should not place a burden on the rest of the hunters who participate for the right reasons. Hearing these anti hunters speak about hunting and fishing shows me how uneducated these people really are and if they could openly listen to hunters they might even change their mind one day.

 

There are many advantages to hunting and fishing that anti hunters do not see or refuse to see for that matter. For instance, if regulated hunting did not exist there would not be as many areas of publicly owned land to hike, bike, and bird-watch in. License fees help pay for this land, so outdoorsmen are the largest source of conservation funding. Annually $746 million dollars is spent by hunters in the United States on licenses and public land access fees alone, which account for more than half of all funding for state natural resource agencies (Jim Amrhein). Another aspect that non-hunters do not understand is that hunters are helping manage the herd in a healthy way. If populations were to get out of control, their food sources would quickly diminish and the animals would start to die off due to starvation. One needs to think of what they would rather have happen, a hopefully quick and clean kill due to a lot of practice during pre-season or let the animals starve on their own.

 

Hunting is also a big business in the United States. Hunting employs about 575,000 people and generates about $16.7 billion dollars to help pay these people for their efforts. There is no way that animal rights groups will be able to take away this business mainly because they have nothing better to offer in return. I am very passionate about this subject because I know I participate in the outdoors for the right reasons and I know there are many other people who feel the same way and for someone to try and take that away is like telling someone not to breath.

 

Works Cited:

 

Amrhein, Jim. "Right to Hunt vs. Animal Rights." Daily Reckoning. N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Sept. 2012. <http://dailyreckoning.com/right-to-hunt-vs-animal-rights/>.