posted April 2, 2006
Tennessee’s turkey hunting season is upon us and sadly these majestic birds will once again be killed by those who enjoy making harmless animals suffer and die.
Before the Bald Eagle became known as the symbol of America, the great statesman and revolutionary Benjamin Franklin put his support behind honoring the turkey as the young country’s national bird. Franklin's choice would have been a good one, as the North American wild turkey was here to greet the Pilgrims as they landed on Plymouth Rock in 1620.
But the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency (TWRA) has declared war on these birds. Turkeys are not overpopulated in Tennessee; in fact, the TWRA has stocked them in certain counties for no other purpose than to provide hunters with living targets to kill. The birds cause no damage and are not implicated in significant amounts of car accidents. Hunting stocked birds serves absolutely no conservation purpose.
The TWRA is in the business to sell hunting permits, and they will manipulate hunted animal populations by breeding them, tweaking season lengths and bag limits, and killing off their natural predators. The TWRA collects the fees generated by the sale of hunting permits, as well as excise taxes on firearms and ammunition, because the agency needs to raise millions of dollars in revenue just to cover the salaries of its employees. The firearms industry also benefits by the spread of violence against wildlife and the duo of the firearms industry and the TWRA is a foe that the state’s wildlife cannot live with.
The Committee to Abolish Sport Hunting proposes wildlife watching programs to draw the public closer to wildlife and provide an economy that can far outpace the one which is currently based on firearms and violence. For information on how you can protect wildlife, please see our website at http://www.all-creatures.org/cash.
Joe Miele, Vice President
The Committee to Abolish Sport Hunting
Box 562
New Paltz, NY 12561
jmmiele@optonline.net
* * *
The letter written by "The Committee to Abolish Sport Hunting" representative Joe Miele was filled with half-truths and faulty assumptions.
It is true that Franklin wanted to make the turkey the national bird. Ironically, the reason was that it was a source of food for the Pilgrams. It is also true that the turkey is not overpopulated in most Tennessee counties. It is also true that some money is made on hunting by the state and firearms manufacturers. That is about all that is true with this e-mail.
First of all, wild turkeys are not "stocked birds" similar to "stocked quail" at a shooting preserve. They are put into the wild and encouraged by seasons and bag limits to reproduce and increase in number. When bird numbers support it, hunting permits are granted. The only reason there are any turkeys to argue about is that hunters through the TWRA paid to have turkeys and other wildlife managed in order for everyone, including Mr. Miele, to enjoy.
His not so hidden agenda is to attack our rights to own and use firearms. His term "violence against wildlife" sounds like we have been nuking turkeys. He knows that hunting revenue is an important part of the overall profit of gunmakers and, if that is removed, it will make it difficult for these guys to stay in business to produce firearms for any other personal use. This type of organization is touting the beginning of the end of basic rights in this country.
What really bothers me is the hypocrisy of these types of organizations. On the one hand, he wants to ban hunting. But aren't millions more domestic turkeys killed for human consuption? It seems that if he was so all-fired concerned about turkeys, he would want to stop the main reason for killing and eating the bird and that is Thanksgiving.
The problem here is Mr. Miele and the rest of these PETA types could really care less about saving all animals - just the fuzzy, pretty, cute, "majestic" kinds.
I wonder how many insects were killed for Mr. Miele to save the crop used to make his veggie burger. Insects are complicated animals that feel pain, yet I have never heard one of these fuzzy bunny animal activists getting upset that their houses are treated to kill termites. I'll bet they don't protest when fire ant mounds infest their yards. When roaches are running around their house, I bet when the exterminator kills them they don't call the police for "violence against wildlife." Also, when he is sitting on his porch, I bet he doesn't even swat a mosquito that lands on his arm.
Tim Price
The Committee to Save Roaches, Termites, Mosquitoes, Flies, and other Obnoxious Bugs
jat-55@msn.com
* * *
In response to the article on the wild turkey, I would disagree with Mr. Miele. His facts that turkeys are not overpopulated in Tennessee is inaccurate. I live in the city of Chattanooga where we have wild turkeys in our yards. (Yes, that's right).
Due to the restoration efforts of the TWRA and National Wild Turkey Federation, the wild turkey populations have increased tremendously.
Until recently, there were very few wild turkeys in the lower 48 states, but, due to restoration efforts, the wild turkey has rebounded from extinction.
I would like the Chattanoogan to run an article on the conservation efforts of the Cherokee Chapter of the National Wild Turkey Federation in Chattanooga. The Cherokee Chapter has donated thousnad of dollars for habitat improvement for a number of areas including the Ocoee unit of the Cherokee National Forest and Prentice Cooper State Forest.
Through conservation efforts, the sportsman and state governing bodies are able to provide habitat for the wild turkey as well as deer, quail and other game. This organization also supports activities for younger children and adults through the JAKES program ( uniors Acquiring Knowledge, Ethics and Sportsmanship). The Cherokee Chapter NWTF also supports persons with disabilities through the Wheelins sportsman program.
Does Mr Miele disapprove of catching stocked trout in our rivers and streams? If you really want to protect the rights as hunters and fisherman across our land, I would recommend joining the Nation Wild Turkey Federation. www.nwtf.org
Tim Bittenbender
Treasurer - Cherokee Chapter NWTF
Browntown Road
Chattanooga
pluto2k@bellsouth.net
* * *
There was a time when it was a necessity for food and clothing to hunt animals in the wild. Even now, some people do hunt for food, and that is certainly socially acceptable.
To call going out and shooting wildlife a "sport" is simply semantics, used as a front to explain away an obvious flaw in the character of those who get pleasure out of the destruction of life.
To compare the majesty of wildlife such as deer, turkey, bears, elk, tigers, and other animals to mosquitoes, roaches, flies, and the like, is absurd. The very fact that hunters don't hunt insects supports that point.
To use the money generated by hunters as an excuse for the destruction of wildlife reminds me of the scripture "the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil".
Yes, hunting wildlife simply for the sake of killing it is evil. Did you know that people shoot wildlife from helicopters, and then they call it a sport. Try to sell that one to somebody else, cause I’m not buying.
If all of the effort and money put in to the senseless killing of wildlife by hunters were directed towards building up our world rather than tearing it down, then the world would be a better place to live.
Michael Helton
mchtlh@aol.com
* * *
When I read the opinion piece by Miele, I rolled my eyes, having heard ill-formed arguments like his many, many times before. Same old thing, class prejudice parading as a concern for animal rights, and hatred and moral relativism dressing up as moral absolutism and a "concern for all life."
But the response by Michael Helton, is this serious? Seems like a bad caricature.
First, Helton states that at one time it was "necessary" to hunt for food and clothing. What, the alternative of penned up animals in cages, denied movement, interaction, even sunlight in some cases, is morally better than actually getting out there and assuming responsibility for the animal's life you are taking for food and clothing? Later, he says anyone who gets "pleasure out of the destruction of life" is "flawed." Well, if the destruction comes from the field or from the grocery or leather store, how is it different? There it is condemned, but before it is a viable option merely reorganized through farmers and salesmen.
Helton states that hunting is not a "sport," perhaps because the animals aren't in uniforms, or there are no referees, I guess. But, Webster's gives "sport" as "a diversion of the field." No hunter demands that it be called a "sport" anyways, so that's hardly an argument against hunting in the first place. If we stopped using the term "sport," Helton and others would still hate hunters. He is also incorrect to say that people hunt for the sake of killing. If that were true, hunters would just throw puppies into dumpsters to die like PETA does.
Helton says that people shoot animals from helicopters and call it a sport. That's an outright lie. The only shooting ever done from a helicopter has been actions of population control by state agencies in places like Alaska. No hunter ever did nor ever will nor ever can shoot from a helicopter. Why did they resort to shooting from helicopters? Because of "morally superior" people like Helton who refused to let the tradition of hunting continue. The populations still got out of control, affected the environment negatively, and the problems was taken over by government agencies. Animals still died, but they fed no one, and clothed no one.
But the final rebuff, that rather than hunt we should "build up our world." Well, then, why is he tearing down people who merely differ from him? He lies about them, attacks their character, their morality, and given the fact that he actualy sees animals from grocery stores as an option for people, he attacks simple lifestyle choices. Choices which, ironically, actualy do "build up the world" because they integrate man back into nature's systems, connect families through traditional activities, reinforce man as a responsible member of the environment, and best of all, educate people, employ people, and engage people in the basic activities of existing within nature, not as a detached, pious "tourist" like Miele wants us to be.
Matthew Guy, Ph.D.
redneckprofessor@yahoo.com
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