http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2011/09/23/18691090.php?show_comments=1#18691154

Hunters have long used blatant lies to pacify public anger and to manipulate people into believing that their serial killing is not only NOT immoral and unethical, but actually beneficial. Here's the truth.

HUNTER LIE #1
We help animals by keeping their populations in check. If we didn't kill them they would starve from overpopulation.

FACT

If this were true, there would be piles of evidence [bones/bodies] all over the planet in places where hunters have historically found the habitats and animals too inaccessible to kill. The world would have heard these stories each time scientists discovered closed, ecological loops--islands--of which there are 10s of 1000s on Earth.

The biological reality is that if left alone, animal species regulate themselves. These 'controlling' elements are based primarily on food supplies and weather. Conditions which trigger hormonal responses in the females of non-human species. These responses determine whether the offspring will be male or female; how many babies a given animal will have; or if indeed they will have a successful pregnancy at all. Factor in disease and natural die-offs, and if hunting were never undertaken again, the environment would, for the first time in hundreds of years, function as the perfectly synchronized interdependent system Mother Nature intended.

"Dis"harmony--overpopulation--is CAUSED BY HUNTING. Species will adapt to FILL a void. These 'voids' are caused by Fish and Wildlife policies which encourage hunters to decimate natural predators, i.e., cougars, coyotes, wolves, etc.-- a standard practice of wildlife "managers" throughout the world. Obviously once predators are removed, if food supplies are plentiful and weather conditions favorable, an overpopulation problem is created. However, if conditions are NOT favorable, a massive environmental disaster, resulting in the starvation of animals targeted by such "management" methods becomes the reality.

Wildlife officials KNOW FULL WELL they are manipulating prey species to the point of overpopulation by killing off their natural predators. This is done out of A) GREED. Hunting licenses and other hunting-related revenues bring big bucks into local, state and federal coffers. B) Because state and federal wildlife "management" are completely CONTROLLED by hunters whose interests are 100% self-serving. The non-hunting public is totally disregarded, and their tax dollars hijacked for wildlife mass murder, with estimates as high as nearly 5 BILLION animals slaughtered annually by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services.

HUNTER LIE # 2
Without the money we contribute, many of the areas which exist for animal populations wouldn't be there.

FACT
Every single taxpaying citizen supports our National Parks system, and ALL OTHER PUBLIC LANDS. Hunters contribute with revenues generated by hunting licenses and other hunting related usage fees.

Whatever hunters provide in fees is minuscule in relation to what they COST the U.S. taxpayer. POACHING IS RAMPANT. Multiple billions are spent--annually--in manpower and on the increasing decimation of protected and endangered species from hunters' criminal activities, which far outweigh the comparatively tiny contributions of hunting licensing/usage fees.

The taxpaying public and wildlife are continually egregiously abused for the sole benefit of hunters. 50% of federally funded wildlife "refuges" regularly allow trapping/hunting within them. This disenfranchises the non-hunting public from enjoying these lands and bastardizes the purpose of wildlife "refuges" which were created to PROTECT the inhabitants. The average taxpayer is forced to support these refuges, which in turn SUBSIDIZES hunters--not the other way around. If most hunters had to purchase this same acreage and maintain its wildlife, few would have the where-with-all to do so. Without taxpayer funding, these wildlife refuges would not exist, and neither would the land hunters exploit at the public's expense. The war on our wildlife is an elitist's game, fully SUBSIDIZED by the abuse of taxpayer money to the tune of BILLIONS annually.

HUNTER LIE #3
We are avid environmentalists and conservationists.

FACT
Hunters claiming to be "caring" environmentalists because they help support green spaces [so does every taxpayer] is like saying you're pro-animal because you support slaughterhouses. Perpetuating the existence of animals for your own benefit [via artificial overpopulation] at the expense of their pain, suffering and death does not make you an environmentalist--only a malevolent opportunist. Hunting/poaching ranks second behind habitat destruction, as the leading cause of global, non-human species loss. Hunting is nothing short of ecological rape and the deluded and depraved partaking in such selfish acts of bloodlust can find no HONEST justification for their crimes.

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Copyright � 2011 Brennan Browne. Permission is granted for reprint in email, blog, print and web media if this credit is attached and the title and content remain unchanged. Brennan is a freelance writer whose commentaries have appeared on web media and in numerous blogs.