Sample Sidebar Module

This is a sample module published to the sidebar_top position, using the -sidebar module class suffix. There is also a sidebar_bottom position below the menu.

Sample Sidebar Module

This is a sample module published to the sidebar_bottom position, using the -sidebar module class suffix. There is also a sidebar_top position below the search.
Home
images/iacf1.jpg
+

Books by Michael Sabbeth

Learn more about Michael's recent books.
+

Food & Wine

Because we all love them!
+

Art & Design

Michael Sabbath selection of artists and designers who approach wildlife and hunting themes

Buy The Good, The Bad & The Difference: How To Talk With Children About Values or Michael's newest book The Honorable Hunter Instructor Training Manual on Amazon.

Wholesaler discounts available for organizations or bulk orders. Email orders to michael@thehonorablehunter.com

CLICK HERE TO DONATE TO THE HONORABLE HUNTER HERE - Advancing ethics & education w/ youth in hunting, author on Amazon, lecturer, and educator. Help advance hunter education, and youth hunting!





Subscribe to Michael's THE HONORABLE HUNTER EXPERIENCE YouTube Channel below.


Fire Ants Change the Minds of Anti-Hunters

Details
Category: Frontpage

Fire Ants Change the Minds of Anti-Hunters

By Michael Sabbeth

This past April I participated in the Texas Hunter Education Annual Conference in Abilene. Rarely have I been in the presence of so many dedicated creative advocates for hunting, hunting ethics and hunting instruction. My presentation included examples of persuading hunting opponents and those neutral about hunting that hunting has benefits, including conservation and the respectful treatment of animals. The text of my talk is available on my website: https://thehonorablehunter.com/index.php/articles/226-focusing-on-the-big-picture-sabbeth-presentation-texas-hunter-education-annual-conference .

After my talk, Texas Parks and Wildlife game warden Darla Barr approached me and shared an anecdote. Two anti-hunters disdainfully challenged Darla for advocating killing beautiful innocent animals. Darla’s response is a textbook example of effective persuasion. Her words transformed these anti-hunters into persons willing to give thoughtful informed consideration of hunting’s beneficial consequences.

Darla implemented her persuasion strategy with skillful precision. First, she elicited the values of her challengers. The opponents valued animal conservation, the preservation of habitat, acknowledged that animals die from causes other than hunting, such as from disease, injury and starvation and they valued reducing animal suffering.

Second, Darla described a typical hunt. One bullet, one arrow, is, in most instances, sufficient for the hunt. Not always, of course, but when it’s not, the ethical hunter will track the animal and end the suffering effectively. Darla also described reality in vivid detail. Starvation, disease and injury lead to brutal lingering deaths. The predators move in and rip the living animal apart. And the fire ants attack, savage merciless invaders that penetrate the eyes and nose and throat of the animal in excruciating fashion. Sugarcoating reality demeans the animals. Darla did not sugarcoat.  

Third, and most significant, Darla presented the ladies with a binary choice: hunt or do not hunt. Do you prefer a rapid ethical death or an extended painful one? Thirty seconds of pain or several weeks of pain? Darla demanded clarity of values from her audience. It’s either A or its B. You can’t have both. Which do you prefer? People tend to carve out exceptions or alternatives to reality to avoid making uncomfortable choices. This human tendency does not necessarily advance ethical thinking.

There is a tendency to romanticize the lives of animals, as if the mountain lion and the young fawn are lying together on a lush green forest floor as in an Henri Rousseau painting waiting for the arrival of gluten-free, locally-sourced, non-GMO organic broccoli and steamed rice. But that’s not life in Nature. Nature is death, disease, starvation and sometimes fire ants.

The young ladies changed their minds about hunting. They became educated. More importantly, Darla skillfully showed that hunting was consistent with their values. They opposed animal suffering and favored conservation. Even if the ladies will not hunt, their opposition disappeared. The fire ants may have persuaded them.

This article will be soon published in the "Our News" section of the website of Fiocchi USA  www.fiocchiusa.com 

Michael Sabbeth is a lawyer and writer in Denver, Colorado. See his book The Good, The Bad & The Difference: How to Talk with Children About Values. Available at Amazon.com  http://tinyurl.com/c5flmmu

 

 

Michael's Latest Article

Follow Honor, Not Your Feelings 

By Michael G. Sabbeth 

A Colorado hunter education instructor shared this anecdote. He and his hunting buddies went on their annual elk hunt. One of the buddies had a fetish for taking long range shots, often at distances beyond his skill level. On a particular hunt, against the advice of his buddies, the hunter took a long range shot and wounded his elk. The hunting group spent two days tracking the wounded animal, which was never found. The hunting trip was ruined.  

The buddies told the hunter he was no longer invited to join their hunting group. The instructor told me it was painful and difficult to disinvite his friend. “I felt terrible, but it was the right thing to do. The hunter wounded animals and jeopardized our hunts.” I mentioned he could lose a friend. The instructor replied, “Maybe, but then he would not have been much of a friend.” 

The honorable hunter loves the hunt; loves the outdoors; loves the challenges preparing for the actual hunt often as much as the actual hunt. But love is not enough. Good intentions are not enough. Love must be intertwined with virtue and duty. When love is divorced from virtue and duty, you have neither love nor virtue nor duty. You have chaos.  

In many of my lectures and articles, I talk about the black rhinoceros hunts auctioned by the Dallas Safari Club. In the briefest summary, the rhino to be hunted had killed several young rhinos. The money to be raised would finance anti-poaching programs, enhance local water systems, and enrich schools.  

The attacks on the hunting auction were intense. The hunt was described as ‘barbaric.’ Let us go beyond the words of the attackers and examine their values. They valued the life of a post-reproductive rhino that had killed young animals more than the lives of young rhinos, cleaner water for the indigenous population and anti-poaching programs that would have saved more rhinos.  

Hunters are often accused of lacking compassion. Those who favored the DSC rhino hunt had more compassion than the opponents—compassion for increasing rhino populations, for the lives of the local human populations and for combating poaching. To have value and meaning, compassion must be built on a foundation of moral virtue. Just feeling good about yourself is morally worthless.  

Following feelings can be destructive. You should follow your values, but even that suggestion needs qualification. To be worth following, your values must be based on virtue and wisdom. Wisdom requires judgment and self-discipline.  

Risking wounding an animal by making a shot beyond your skill level is not a virtuous value. Risking people’s lives by riding in a truck with a loaded firearm is not a virtuous value. Exceeding game limits by playing the odds you won’t get caught is not a virtuous value.  

The honorable hunter seeks truth, but truth is not an end. Truth is the jumping off point for moral action. As M said to Max Denbeigh in the James Bond movie Spectre: “A license to kill is also a license not to kill. You must be sure when you pull the trigger.” The honorable hunter always asks this question: “Is the world better because I am in it?”    

Michael Sabbeth is the author of the new book, The Honorable Hunter: How To Honorably & Persuasively Defend & Promote Hunting.  


Thanks for checking out my site! Please come back soon for more interesting news!



Michael G. Sabbeth is a lawyer in Denver, Colorado. He lectures on ethics and rhetoric. He has written the book "The Good, The Bad and The Difference: How to Talk with Children About Values." & is now working on a book titled "No More Apologizing! Arguments to Defend and Advance Hunting and the Shooting Sports."

Login

Register

You need to enable user registration from User Manager/Options in the backend of Joomla before this module will activate.