a) The method of killing them is cruel.
b) they are driving some species to the brink of extinction
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Animal welfare, inhumane methods of slaughter, yes. Which can be managed by rules on humane methods of slaughter.
Are there less humane methods of slaughter for other animals tolerated?
Endangered species, yes. However there have been credible stats of significant recovery in whale populations to warrant Quota catches, as we do for other marine life.
I’m not a fan of whaling but do enjoy hunting/fishing etc.
Most wild animals don’t quietly die of old age. They die a horrible death normally eaten alive by other animal.
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I don’t think you can justify increased or continued inhumane killing just because it happens to other species. Surely we should be looking at more humane ways of killing animals that we eat or cull for environmental management. There’s no place for cruelty to animals.
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Can we tell them whales are majestic, beautiful animals and it’s really an ■■■■■■■■ thing to do hunting them down?
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I remember being given some to try in an izakaya almost 20 years ago. Can’t really recall the taste now. Every January it appears in some form in public school lunches around the country. No one thinks anything of it, it’s just a done thing.
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I’m not, rather pointing to double standards ( how cruel is our export trade in live animals)
When a species has not historically been a significant source of food in a country’s nutritional needs and there are other available animal species, it does not always wash when we take the moral high ground against other countries for harvesting species which are on our own taboo list for human consumption
Endangered species is a distinct issue.
Hunting for sport, including big game fishing and safaris, is about the most morally objectionable in my book.
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That’s what’s been thrown against me as an Australian accepting kangaroo slaughter.
And that’s by Europeans supporting deer culling - kangaroos are more appealing to them as magnificent wild beasts.
I agree with all you have said there- the disgusting treatment of animals in so many instances across the globe leaves me feeling genuinely ill. I appreciate the discussion but cannot follow this thread any more as the visual imagery it conjures is just too much for me.
Check out duck hunting in Victoria.
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If people have to go non-veg then eating kangaroo is justifiable on a number of grounds:
a) animal ethics. No stress to the animal, being herded, penned, trucked, sent to the slaughterhouse with its own stresses, or live export followed by killing in the slaughterhouse, or being thrown into someone’s car to have its throat cut at their house. Instead, killed by one clean shot in its habitat by a professional shooter.
b) global environment. Cows are a leading producer of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas. Sheep are not much better. Kangaroos produce far far less methane than either.
c) local environment. Kangaroos do not have cloven hooves so do not damage the fragile soils of Australia. They eat native grasses so do not require the huge water resources that some cattle farms require.
d) no need for feed lots
e) human health. Kangaroo meat is low fat so healthier
f) cooked properly, it is as good as if not better than bovine/ovine meats
If only George Bass and his cargo of alpacas from the camelid species had not drowned, we might have been spared the environmental damage of the hooved cattle as part of agribusiness.
I take the position that if a species is not harmful and there are affordable substitutes for its products (food and other) , it is unnecessary to kill them
The problem for kangaroos in our food and leather industry is that they don’t fit into our
farming methods. They can’t be domesticated as farmed animals. Like cats, hard to herd.
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Oof. That is … an extraordinarily generous assessment of how the roo shooting industry works. It’s an unbelievably foul and filthy business.
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Our farming methods could be easily adapted to fit the purpose required. Including fixing whatever problem HM is referring to that is not common knowledge
When we were trying to get acceptance of our wild pig meat exports for the purposes of a tariff concession for wild pig meat , we asked the industry to give us a vid as to how they were hunted, as opposed to farmed.
Had to junk it, blood and gore everywhere, including all over the helicopter , multiple shots to kill, agonised squealing of animals.
Should have got help from Ronnie Andrews.
I think we ended up using DNA to differentiate from domestic farmed pork, but it wasn’t my proudest moment in working life.
They’ve clearly never had one jump in front of their car while driving.
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I think this might qualify as a “woosh moment”
Also I very much doubt DNA analyses at the time could differentiate wild v domestic pork.
It was more about different species or sub species, that our wild boar were not derived from domestic pork gone wild.