I
Posted on 08/18/2006 7:57:53 PM PDT by 1066AD
Anglers attacked by animal extremists By Nigel Bunyan (Filed: 19/08/2006)
A gang of masked animal rights activists has attacked a group of anglers, prompting fears that extremists are determined to widen the scope of their campaign of intimidation.
The 35 masked extremists had earlier disrupted a grouse shoot before being moved on by police.
A handful of people, some of them families, was enjoying a day out at the Bank House fly fishery, at Caton, near Lancaster, when the saboteurs arrived.
Lucy Belson, of Kirkby Lonsdale, Cumbria, was fishing with a friend when they suddenly found themselves at the mercy of the gang.
"They began throwing stones at my rod and one of them said, 'It's the easy way or the hard way. You've been sabbed.' They told me to pack up and go or I was 'going to get wet'."
Fighting broke out as two anglers on a nearby stretch of bank struggled with the protesters. Miss Belson, a resuscitation nurse at Westmorland General Hospital, in Kendal, said: "I decided to get out of there and go home but suddenly they all ran towards me waving bats and blocks of wood, shouting, 'Get her'. "I was jostled and they smashed my fishing rod."
As she broke away from the melee, Miss Belson saw another woman being punched in the face and several cars being vandalised.
"I was shaken at the time but now I am angry," she said. "They are cowards and I certainly won't be frightened to go back to the lake. I love fishing and I have been doing it since I was a little girl."
Lancashire police believe that the anglers were the victims of an opportunistic attack. Earlier in the day the saboteurs had tried to disrupt a grouse shoot at Lowgill, near High Bentham.
At the height of the confrontation, police called in the force helicopter, an armed response vehicle and nine other vehicles. However, there were no arrests and the saboteurs headed away.
Pc Duncan Thomas, the force's wildlife officer, said that saboteurs were increasingly attacking anglers.
"Both anglers and grouse shooting parties should be aware of the threat to them and they should have contingencies in place to protect themselves."
A Countryside Alliance spokesman said: "It does seem to be the way animal rights extremists are heading. Their issue is not animal welfare - it is about hating people. They simply want to cause trouble."
Last year animal extremists attacked anglers on the Grand Union canal, in Milton Keynes. Some of the fishermen were thrown into the water.
Tom Fell, the regional director of the Countryside Alliance for Cumbria, said: "These people will stop at nothing to achieve their ends. They are a real worry and a real danger."
Like what ? Protect yourself too enthusiastically and face prosecution yourself.
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In Montana we often fish with large caliber revolvers strapped to our belt because of bears...
They obviously are similar to people who bomb abortion clinics in that they figure that they will get progress by intimidation.
Abortion is murder; fishing is getting food.
I keep trying to imagine a group like this disrupting a dove shoot in Georgia...
nope, can't imagine it.
In Idaho when I was younger we always carried around a few large triple snag hooks -- just to get rid of suckers, carp and other trash fish, you understand. (Before suckers became a protected species, of course). Now and then someone got hooked in a clumsy cast...
No, go ahead and imagine it:
Masked animal rights thugs charge into the midst of dove hunters, thinking bird shot won't hurt them.
A number of hooded human shapes suddenly lying very still and quiet.
Imagine it......
;^)
You mean a grouse gun, or lead weights AREN'T protection contingencies?
Oh, yeah. Merry Old England, where the patients run the asykum, and victims only have the choice of either lying down, or bending over.
Maybe they should carry a wad of bank notes, and when confronted, throw them into the air, then run like Hell.
We have bears where we fish here in CT too. And on my belt...
I have some friends here in Florida that when they go up-river on a fishing trip for a few days, they pack a little artillery just in case.
They also carry a case of scotch, just in case of snakebite.
They also carry along a case of snakes so that the scotch won't go to waste.
My German Shepherds are poor bird dogs,but I don't think I have to worry about masked strangers bothering me while I hunt either.The dogs work on a simple principle;you bother me-they will bother you.
Sorry, but I'd be dunking some AR pansies in the water, maybe to the point of their being scared, then worrying about the consequences later.
Okay, I've been trying to tell folks we have idiots like this (including a LOT of freepers) in the U.S., who think when they send money to the HSUS, PETA, etc., they are helping "little puppies and kitties," you know, saving animals.
As she broke away from the melee, Miss Belson saw another woman being punched in the face and several cars being vandalised.
These brave souls, fighting for their cause by beating defenseless woman with rocks, bats and blocks of wood. /sarcasm
I can't envision 35 hooded extremists disturbing our fishing.
I honestly believe our small hospital could not handle 35 casualties all at the same time.
>>>>Like what ? Protect yourself too enthusiastically and face prosecution yourself.
Shoot, shovel, shut up
:)
How about the morgue? ;-/
Depending on where I am, I fished armed, too. Go ahead, make my day. Of course these idiots know they can get away with this in the UK.
The Cure . . .
An arm society is a polite society.
An unarmed Brit is a victim.
That's basically the way my buddies and I did several years ago...the fishing was incidental pretty much. Sad to grow up, come to think of it; those were good times.
State of NJ State Commission of Investigation of the SPCA
That is a PDF download of the 178 page report. I would love to copy and paste portions here but the Adobe free pdf to html converter can support the size of the doc.
Excerpt:
http://www.state.nj.us/sci/pdf/spca.pdf
Excerpt:
The movement [SPCA] had its roots in the efforts of Henry Bergh, a European aristocrat who, following his appointment in 1863 to a diplomatic post at the Russian Court of Czar Alexander II, championed the cause of animals against inhumane treatment. Bergh soon immigrated to America, but only after stopping in London to confer with the president of England's Royal Society. In February 1866, Bergh delivered an impassioned speech at New York City's Clinton Hall before an audience that included influencial government and business leaders.
In recounting the horrific practices in America of the inhumane treatment of animals, he emphasized that the protection of animals had neither class lines nor political boundaries. Bergh's speech was covered extensively by the press. Recognizing that anti-cruelty statutes were meaningless in the absence of enforcement, Bergh's approach was two pronged. His efforts culminated in the New York Legislature's passage of a charter incorporating the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals on april 10, 1866, and nine days later, of an anti-cruelty law that vested the society with the authority to enforce it. Bergh, whose successes were due largely to his political and social connections, was elected as the society's first president.
Thread for review - more excerpts:
Animal task force shows claws http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1280305/posts
Let them come to Texas and try to smash the faces of "women who fish"...
I do believe there are some people who just need killin'.
Most likely there's a six-pack in the cooler, especially on the weekend.
Fish On!
I think Roccus needs to do some BOW fishing!
Fortunately the 'shovel' part of shoot, shovel, shut up need not apply on the water :)
I wonder what a taser would do to one of these nut cases it he was pushed into the water and then tasered?
Gee, I'm sorry my 4'0 treble hook landed in your scalp....
About 9 years ago, here in south Florida, I was with a buddy, on his boat, crusing down the intercoastal on the way to the ocean.
Dusk.
We passed by a public park, idling (as required). There was a picnic going on at the park.
A bunch of kids at the edge of the water started throwing rocks at the boat. We were a good 100 feet from the bank. More kids joined, and some adults, and the rocks started getting close.
I had a .357, but did not want to use it.
A couple of rocks hit the boat, then more and more, to the point we were ducking, and scared. A couple of them were big, thrown by adults I guess, barely missing us. My buddy, the pilot, who owned it (ex cop), pulled out a flare gun, and skipped a flare off the surface of the water directly at the crowd. Then gunned the engines.
You should have heard the screams as the crowd scattered.
Yes, they were black, yes we are white.
I've used the flare gun defense myself. Returning from watching the fireworks display in NY harbor we were passing through Hell Gate, a narrow, treacherous stretch of water between Astoria Park in Queens and Randall's Island. Some folks in the park lined the railing on the sea wall and started shooting rockets and roman candles at passing boats. I, however, did not try to skip the flare. Yes, there were screams. }:^)
(No more Olmert! No more Kadima! No more Oslo!)
A shot gun would do the job. Aren't they still legal?
(No more Olmert! No more Kadima! No more Oslo!)
(No more Olmert! No more Kadima! No more Oslo!)
If you'd like to be on or off this Upper Midwest (WI, IA, MN, MI, and anyone else) list, largely rural issues, please FR mail me. And ping me is you see articles of interest.
I was making a wiza gurl implication about 'shoot shovel and shut up' referencing the fishing bow and ALF activists.
Oh, I understood. I was just making it clear that a bow and arrow is not what the ELF woud be facing if push came to shove. (push came to shoot?) }:^)
ELF-s/b-ALF
Let me just take this opportunity to brag about the huge large mouth I caught in MI a couple weeks ago. At 4lbs, 18", probably no big deal for most regular fishermen, but a big deal for this once or twice a year guy!
What Zook actually caught:
/teasing
I mean in the UK aren't shotguns still legal?
Calpernia, thanks SO MUCH for these links. I had not read your threads on this either.
Everybody on this thread needs to read these. This is what I keep screaming about the HSUS, it is a corrupt organization. Not just corrupt, but dangerous. Look at what has happened with the SPCA in New Jersey and be very afraid.
I was involved with fighting similar attempts to give broad police powers to local shelter authorities on a small scale here in my state once. The local shelter's board of directors consisted of a bunch of PETA card-carrying animal rights activists who were opposed to hunting, and wanted the authority to come in and confiscate a dog (and personal property)based on their own ideology, in a state and area with a high concentration of hunters. They also spend lots of time in schools trying to brainwash kids.
Remember back in the early 1990s when a New Jersey man was working in his garden with his small grandchild nearby? He killed a rat in his garden and the SPCA wrote him up a huge fine?
We can never let AR wackos run the shelters or help write laws (local, state or federal). And believe me, I track legislation on all levels and these AR (mostly HSUS) wackos are constantly trying to get more power.
Like every thread, there will be some freeper come on here and say what a great organization the hSUS is -- how they help animals, especially during Katrina, nada, nada.
In almost all cases they are confusing the local shelter volunteers with the national HSUS. And they have NO idea the HSUS is not about helping animals, but about hurting agriculture, ending animal ownership,research on animals for cures and treatments for heart disease, birth defects, cancer, etc.
I can't get no respect!
HaHa.
I was in Texas fishing a few years ago in a huge lake, when this guy on a jet ski decided he couldn't play anywhere on this big lake except right where I was casting.
I acidentally hooked him with a HUGE crankbait right on his neck.
Good cast ;)
"I mean in the UK aren't shotguns still legal?"
After reports re the dangers of kitchen knives from the UK, I'm not entirely sure you wouldn't be subject to prosecution there for negative vibes while being mugged.
:))
;)
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