Posted on 05/05/2003 11:52:01 PM PDT by farmfriend
Hunters, ranchers can offer facts, science in their defense
published May 5, 2003
By Billy Buchanan
On Mondays, I enjoy reading the weekly Op/Ed section. It's filled with interesting views on hot topics from guest columnists, myself included sometimes. This time however, I was not cheerful about the way my name was mentioned.
Nancy Shinn made her second deliberate attack: "Hunters, ranchers: Do humans have the right to kill and eat other species?"
Her second strike was written with the same emotional and belittling assertions as her first. I am an animal lover, hunter, cattleman and apparently Shinn's nemesis, whom I have yet to meet personally.
I live the so-called "despicable" way of life, which Shinn can only study with bias, negativity and the propaganda given to her by deceitful and ludicrous animal rights organizations.
Spokesman for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals Bruce Fredrich, condoning terrorism said, "It would be great if all the fast food outlets' slaughterhouses, laboratories, and the banks that fund them, exploded tomorrow."
PETA is not as warm and compassionate as you may have thought it was.
Need I remind readers of the Herald and News about the march in Reno put together by this organization saying that "slaughterhouse animals were treated no different than holocaust victims?" How disrespectful to the Jewish prisoners who caught a glimpse of this hell on earth. From a logical perspective, PETA's stance on animal treatment is not well thought out. I do not condone animal cruelty, but this mentality clearly baffles me and my friends.
Shinn gets her information from Fund for Animals, another organization that I have studied reluctantly, and in my eyes it is no better, if not worse, than PETA.
She says that her information proves that cattle are fed tallow that comes from euthanized dogs and cats at animal shelters.
Tallow not fed to livestock
I know that tallow is a byproduct that comes only from livestock. It is the suet or fat of animals of the sheep and ox kinds, separated from membranous and fibrous matter by melting.
This tallow is then used for soaps, oils and fragrances, which are not recycled into ruminant feed in any way. This practice of feeding byproducts to cattle mentioned by Shinn is rendered bone meal (not tallow) and no longer exists legally. It was extremely rare, and banned by the Food and Drug Administration six years ago.
She lectured me on Mad Cow Disease. I seem to know a great deal more about this devastating and fatal illness as well. It came from sheep infected with scrapie in the United Kingdom, not Shinn's so-called "dog and cat tallow." It has yet to enter our nation, thanks to its rapidly increasing technology.
Shinn says this is so because we do not test for it, and don't know it's here.
U.S. Department of Agriculture records show that it rapidly continues to strengthen protection against Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (most commonly known as Mad Cow Disease, or BSE). The U.S. Department of Agriculture and Food and Drug Administration, as well as other state and federal agencies, are working together to prevent this epidemic from sucking the life and economy out of this country.
In 2001, 5,200 animals were tested, in 2002 this number increased to 12,500. Systematic sampling by these organizations will only increase over time with technology.
Shinn once again speaks against my heritage and tradition, saying that ranchers are not animal lovers because they exploit animals so they can fatten bank accounts.
I would like to know what continent or pre-millennium era she lives in. I have yet to meet one of these cattle barons who gets rich from being in the cattle business.
We ranchers put a lot into this business so we can make a return, if we're lucky. There are many more vocations in which my family and I would have a more stable income and certain future. But because of the green pastures, open air and animals, we would not have it any other way.
Now that I have given the perspective of a rancher, I will defend the honest, responsible and traditional hunters out there.
Shinn says for the second time that hunters do not support wildlife conservation. This could not stray further from the research that I found.
She says that the "real truth" is that only 15 per cent of the $30 million in refuge spending comes from duck stamps while the other 85 per cent comes from Joe Blow public's tax revenue. It looks to me like most of this "truth" is excluded from Shinn's information.
What about those taxes?
She has neglected to mention that $204.2 million is collected from federal excise taxes on ammunition, required licenses and hunting equipment. All of this finance is later distributed to state and federal agencies for wildlife management programs. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service records prove this.
Refuges are not the only places that provide habitat for wildlife. Conservation project organizations that work with sportsmen raise multi-million dollars every year for wildlife enhancement. These funds provide habitat for game and non-game animals alike, including endangered species.
One of these great organizations is the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, which held a banquet right here in Klamath Falls in March and drew a crowd of more than 650 hunters and reached a million dollar mark that night. All of this money was used for the sole purpose of preserving land and wildlife. Putting Shinn's personal feelings aside, I highly doubt that hunters will kill off all of the wildlife.
This issue comes down to one simple question.
Do humans have the right to kill and eat other species?
It is clear that Shinn puts herself on the same level as animals, if not below it, because "God made them as well as humans."
Demoting myself to this level is something that I strongly oppose, not only because of my logical, scientific and moral reasons, but also because of my religious beliefs. It is written in the Holy Bible, the first book of Moses, chapter 1, Genesis 26, "And God said, let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let him have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth."
• • •
The author
Billy Buchanan is 16, and lives on a ranch in the Algoma area north of Klamath Falls.
If you want on or off this list, just let me know.
Hope so... otherwise, we'll die. You see, plants are species too. If you scratch plants and animals off the list of things we can eat, I get real hungry, real fast!
Are you advocating the murder of innocent potatoes? LOL
Nice job Billy...!!
FRegards,
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