AIBU to let my kids take time off school to go hunt saboteuring?

[LoopyLoopsPussInBoots]

I (genuinely) used to take time off as a child to do this, and have very fond memories of laying wrong scents, protesting and generally causing a nuisance to the local hunt.

AIBU to let my kids do the same? The sport only happens a few days a year, so it is hard to fit in around school.

That's disgusting behaviour Earth

It's crap behaviour definately.
It's also crap behaviour when animal rights people let non indigenous mink into the countryside to destroy the indigenous wildlife.
It is equally as crap to pursue the inedible for 'sport'.

Foxes are inedible, but they are a pest, hence the need to control them. Hounds are generally a better, more humane way than guns, traps etc. A good shot with an appropriate rifle would also be humane, but rifles are only suitable for certain terrain and environments. The 'sport' side of hunting is the exciting ride over beautiful countryside, hedges, fences etc. It is not directly related to the culling but is important to fund the hunt through subscriptions. Hunts also provide a valuable knacker service to farmers which is often forgotten. Hunts save a lot of animal suffering by culling the sick and weaker animals.

Earth - I've seen horrible things too. Razor wire in jumps and between treed at head height. TBH, I don't think hunting has any other purpose than being a fun day out as foxes are better shot to control them but if foxes are ever caught, mistakenly or whatever, they are usually the ill or infirm ones. It's natural selection of a sort since a foxes natural predators have been removed (wild dogs etc).

Disgraceful behaviour, Earthdog and no less disgusting and shameful than the cruelty and abuse upon animals, assaults upon sabs and other unlawful behaviour that I've witnessed and been victim of at the hands of the hunt.

I'm against hunting for the pleasure of killing something weaker than you (hunting to eat is another matter) but you would be teaching the kids that breaking the law to get your own way is acceptable. Not a good lesson.

"Hunts save a lot of animal suffering by culling the sick and weaker animals."

FUCK OFF WITH THE LIES!

Is <a class="break-all" href="http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?q=fox+hunting+fox+being+killed&hl=en&safe=off&client=firefox-a&hs=Cb9&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&tbm=isch&tbnid=3xGVtpuOpBh0MM:&imgrefurl=www.derbyfoxes.org.uk/viewtopic.php%3Ff%3D6%26t%3D10&docid=TFwLmUnF2HfXdM&imgurl=www.derbyfoxes.org.uk/images/dead.jpg&w=367&h=302&ei=HY2pTs6MMYWY8QPZ2tzuCw&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=392&sig=101830892641785858604&page=1&tbnh=159&tbnw=205&start=0&ndsp=10&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0&tx=78&ty=83&biw=1252&bih=523" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">THIS what you call saving animal suffering?

Sick. Just sick.

It's one thing to try and justify your cruel sport but don't try and bullshit us that it saves animal suffering.

Granted Earthdog that rifles are only suitable for certain terrain and environments - but the same can also be said of the Hunt....

Quite some time ago I watched a woman from ,I believe,the Quantock Hunt who actually stated that 'The stags quite enjoy the chase'.

If a person can twist the plain and obvious truths to this degree it demonstrates just how far a person can go to defend this truly inexcusable activity.

I hunt and shoot so have no axe to grind there, you choose your method for the environment. DBF the picture is of a dead fox, it tells us nothing of how the fox was killed ie VERY quickly and humanely.

A hound was killed by sabs this week, after they sounded a horn and called them across the A34. One dog was hit by a lorry, the driver of which, was extremely distressed :(

A sab was arrested :).

Take your child out of school if you think they'll learn something :). After all, education isn't confined to the classroom :).

It's the illegal killing of a fox - watch how the dogs rip him apart as they "save animal suffering" and listen to the huntsman shouting, aggressively threatening the filming hunt monitor with a "fucking smack in the mouth".

Stag hunting is even easier to defend than foxhunting, the stag hounds do a heck of a lot of work tracking and despatching injured deer. And I am not a stag hunter so have nothing to gain from defending the sport. I am also a meat eater, but find there are far more moral problems with meat eating then with field sports.

And to put this into perspective Earthdog I have lost many a chicken/duck to fox and would have no qualms in shooting the particular offender.(despite them being inedible).

I have no issues either with someone choosing to enjoy the shoot if they come home with a brace that they actually put in the pot,although I would not enjoy the activity.

But pursuing a terrified animal in the name of 'control' is simply not effective,let alone right.I cannot understand the 'sport' in this.

YANBU to hate hunting - but seeing as I always say it is BU to take kids out of school, I have to say YABU in the interests of consistency

jesus, dogs, that fox picture was upsetting. I'm not clicking on the video, I'm sure it would make me cry.

I would say though - that anyone who claims to be a hunt saboteur but who 'sabotages' the hunt by hurting the horses and dogs who are being used by the humans in the hunt - because the horses and dogs aren't choosing to do this! They are being used by the humans who are doing this - anyone who takes it out on the animals is not an animal lover. Is NOT concerned with ensuring animals don't suffer - because if their concern was animal suffering, they wouldn't CAUSE it! You don't protest against animal abuse by abusing animals. That's just crazy. So I can only assume that those particular saboteurs are not motivated by animal welfare but have a different anger against the hunty horsey classes. I can't believe anyone who is a true animal rights activist would want to hurt animals.

The unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable, countess.

(Thanks Oscar! :o)

oh, when I say "I would say though..." I'm not saying that to you dogs! I'm making a general comment in reply to the bloody disgusting things it is said are done to the horses and the dogs.

Sadly IME I have also watched a shocking lack of control over the pack by the Huntsmen and women....

DBF what is the point of that of that footage? The fox is again already dead!?

Hecate, I've been known to do the odd spot of sabbing and I mix in AR circles. I am not saying that this doesn't happen. I can say that in 46 years and over the course of hundreds and hundreds of days sabbing I have never known it to nor do I know anyone in AR who has - and by feck we'd be talking about it if one amongst our own number acted like that!

I can also say, with my hand on my heart, that I have far more faith in AR supporters and sabs not to hurt animals in order to discredit "the opposition" than I have in the hunt fraternity not to hurt animals for the same reason. After all, the hunt fraternity have no regard for the animals they kill or the dogs and horses they kill off if they are injured or don't make the grade so why should I trust them?

That makes me feel better, dogs.

I just can't bear to think of any animal being hurt - hell, tortured by anyone, and the idea of it being done by people who are doing it in protest at others doing it to other animals just makes my head explode, you know?

I think you'll find that the fox wasn't dead until the hounds got hold of it, Earthdog.

Now, that kind of animal abuse bothers me. Oddly I don't condone the senseless murder of a living animal, not for any reason, and certainly not for the fun of it.

I don't just find the hunting fraternity barbaric. I find them mentally sub-normal and extremely primitive.

It looks dead to me!! Foxes are shot first then given to the hounds to break up afterwards and as a sab you will know that, stop trying to deceive! Hey, I have been called worse things by AR guys I can live with it :-) BTW the sab that drove into my friend's horse Felix is a well known leader of a sab group still involved in AR.

Hmm. To take the word of someone who spends hours of their time looking after animals or someone who considers chasing them and watching them being torn apart a leisure activity.