DW won't allow me to take DS fishing as she says it's animal cruelty.

[MichaelJamesP]

DS knows about fishing, etc. and asked if we could go. I fished when I was his age.

DW has said absolutely not. Saying she doesn’t want to encourage him to injure animals.

Surely fish don’t feel pain?

It’s ridiculous, surely? Would you just take him when she is at work?

Biologist here. People used to think fish didn’t feel pain because they are “simpler animals” and don’t have a nervous system quite like ours . There is increasing evidence they do feel distress and pain though.

Also, ripping a hole in any animals mouth is going to cause it damage. A reasonably high number of fish die even if thrown back due to oxygen deprivation or through the injury!

Furthermore, fishing hooks / lines etc quite often end up in birds if accidentally lost or littered. It’s not as harmless as people think.

If you are fishing for sport and not food I don’t really see why your wife’s diet could make her a hypocrite. That’s like saying anyone who objects to me kicking a sheep for fun is a hypocrite if they eat lamb.

How old is your son? That’s the crux of it really. If he’s 16 you could argue he’s old enough to decide for himself , if he’s 4...

Fishing lakes, where you buy a permit, have Fish in them to catch and throw back. They don't have breeding programmes or anything. If everyone took their catch the lake would be empty before long they're not usually connected to a river.
I know no one needs to fish, just explaining why they get thrown back afterwards. In some lakes they'll be one or two huge fish and people will go regularly to try and catch it. It'll get caught by hundreds of people.

I don't know if this is an option but I am vegan and used to take young people fishing as part of a job. It's actually very relaxing fishing without any bait... Just watching the ripples, reeling back in and casting again...

Your wife is right though fishing is pretty cruel and barbaric and set to catch and release I had a memorable experience as a child when the fish actually swallowed the hook

Yeah that wasn't my point though. My point was what is the point of fishing just to throw it back. Just to be a twat basically.

Well no, that's the question I was answering. They throw it back so someone else can catch it

Father and son fishing sounds great and your wife sounds bat shit. In this instance it's fluffy tree hugger gone mad

No I don't, as I don't fish. But I work for Cadw's environmental department and see how the fishermen keep an eye out for the local wildlife. For example, one year they had noticed (well known - prime age fish) were loosing weight and so used extra spods of bait to keep their weight up (so they reproduced). Also, they spot signs of disease and treat them as appropriate. You would need to know more about it TBH to be able to make a proper judgment.

Another mumsnet parallel universe thread. It's fishing. Just surprised nobody has come along and cried about the poor ickle worm on the end of the line

Yes fish feel pain ffs.

And I'm with your DW.

Fishing is fucking cruel.
How would you like to have someone stick a hook through your mouth, suffocate you till you're half dead, then throw you back, often left in a state that means you die anyway.
Either that or the stress has flooded your body with so much adrenaline that you never recover and become infertile.

I hate fishing, and any hunting, especially when done for sport.

Just leave the poor sods alone and take up a hobby that doesn't involve killing and maiming things.

Don't take him behind your wife's back.
It says a lot about how much you respect her opinions that you'd ride roughshod over them.

This may well be one of those things there is no compromise on, absolutely no way would I be encouraging DS to take up bloodsports.

Oh and I get that some (not all- the ones round here leave fucking rubbish and crap everywhere) fisherman act as conservationists.

But if they really gave that much of a fucking shit they could just do the conservation work without all the inflicting pain on animals part, no?

Plenty of wildlife/eco conservationists manage to look after the local area without once deliberately hurting an animal.

That defence is nearly as much bullshit as the ones for fucking grouse shooting.

No it's not conservation to breed wild birds in tiny cages/ kill the local predator birds/ destroy bits of land

Also OP in my experience, children who are taught to kill animals are generally a bit; shall we say, disturbed? Not a great thing to be teaching them, not cute and not a good look.

Bloody hell, I’m with Mama I hope everyone whinging about fishing being cruel and barbaric is vegetarian.

I think the op should take his Ds fishing if he wants to. He’s his child too. Why should the DW’s opinion matter more than his?

Just out of interest, do you have this little respect for all your wife's opinions or just this one?

If either my husband or I had such strong feelings on any subject the other would respect it, I'm stunned that you think just taking him anyway in secret could ever be acceptable. I hope there's nothing you feel as strongly about.

If something causes another living being pain and suffering, why the actual fuck would you do it for sport??

Must feel really good to inflict pain on something, otherwise why do it??

I don't much like fishing, but I do appreciate the outcome of it, which makes me rather hypocritical.

I do my bit to ensure that any fish DH and DSs catch is disposed of quickly and effectively, something DH never used to bother with, which appalled me.

We eat the fish they catch, so it's not "sport" fishing. However, if the fish are too small to eat, then yes, they get unhooked and put back into the water. There is a legal minimum for size of fish that can be kept and we do always adhere to it.

Sometimes the boys will net-fish with a small net on a pole - we have a glass tank that we fill with water for them to put their "catch" in and we've had toadfish, leatherjackets, crabs galore and even a couple of seahorses in there! They're only kept for a few hours, and then put back in the lake. They're not hurt by it though, no hooks involved.

I hope everyone whinging about fishing being cruel and barbaric is vegetarian.

Yup.

I am.

And even if I wasn't I can see a massive, huge great difference between killing a fish to eat and causing suffering to one for fun.

Love all the outrage on here. "Fishing is cruel" said by no doubt 90% of people who eat meat and.....Fish. Because that's not cruel is it?

Surely fish don’t feel pain?

You really, honestly believe this? I despair.................

Is she vegan? I would better understand her stance on fishing if she was. Surely there's other things you can do with your son?

Any abuse of an animal or wrong. No animal should be caged,murdered of harvested,it's a modern day crime imo.

It's really disrespectful to consider doing it in secret. What are you going to do - tell your son to keep it between you two? That's not really fair is it? How old is he?

Fish definitely feel pain in some way: they will react to pain and (as any tropical fishkeeper knows) will remember it afterwards and avoid a situation associated with pain.

I have kept fish for over a decade and always do anything I can to ensure they are not put through any stress or pain for my entertainment.

Otoh I come from a community where many people make a living from fishing. From an environmental pov there is a lot to be said for sustainable fishing combined with the limited number of crops that will grow in this particular place rather than importing food stuffs from a long distance, which is the alternative.

So my conclusion would be, I'm totally fine with fishing if it goes to sustain life and does not involve over-fishing, but cannot get behind the idea of fishing for sport. For the fish, being caught repeatedly, kept out of water and then thrown back would seem more cruel to me than being caught once followed by a swift death.

As for the hypocrisy, I'm with Raraolala:

"If you are fishing for sport and not food I don’t really see why your wife’s diet could make her a hypocrite. That’s like saying anyone who objects to me kicking a sheep for fun is a hypocrite if they eat lamb."

"Also OP in my experience, children who are taught to kill animals are generally a bit; shall we say, disturbed? Not a great thing to be teaching them, not cute and not a good look."

This is hilarious. You're obviously not rural or seafaring. My family are farmers and trawlermen and amazingly, the whole town isn't disturbed and as far as I know neither are the hundreds of communities like them. They start young too.

Wow. You don't come across well in that post!

Firstly, 'surely fish don't feel pain' - why surely? What makes you think that? Coming out with a statement that you have no idea about because it suits your agenda doesn't make you sound very bright. Of course it is almost certain that they feel pain, if you even thought about it for a moment. That's not to say that you shouldn't go fishing, but yes what you're saying is that you'd like to show your son that it's fine to cause suffering for fun, even if it's fairly low-level stuff and you're not exactly taking him cock fighting. It is fine and really quite understandable for your wife to disagree with sending that message, and she certainly doesn't have to be a vegetarian to do so. Killing animals for food is one thing. Harming and killing because it is sport is something that a lot of people very fundamentally disagree with. Personally I find fishing to catch fish to eat a far more defensible message to send a child. Perhaps this is where your discussion could go next?

Secondly, taking him fishing behind her back? Why yes, knock yourself out. If you really are the kind of parent to take that approach, if I were your wife I'd rather know that as soon as possible (as she will because your son will tell her). If you think that a good solution to this is to lie to your wife then you need to wake up sharpish. Parenting together is about trust, compromise, communication. If you want to smash that to bits, go ahead. Don't then be surprised when you lose the respect and communication from her in return. And don't act surprised when your son becomes a teenager and employs the same tactics with you. Dad won't like it? No problem, I'll just lie to him! That's how he taught me to get what you want all those years ago when we used to go fishing... And lie to Mum and keep secrets from her? No, that's not bad, it's good. It's what Dad does, right?

Your answer to this will be, well, she won't compromise, why should she have the casting vote - and I think the answer to that is that the parent who thinks NO to something like this does have the casting vote. Fishing isn't life or death (except to the fish...) and there will be things in the future that your wife would like to do which you will feel vehemently against - likewise there, she should respect your feelings that X is not ok with you. That is generally how it works.

I was brought up sea fishing as a young girl and so was my db
My father still goes sea fishing
Family time out on the boat in the sea and bringing home tea, was a wonderful childhood experience.
At least I grew up knowing where food comes from
I don't consider myself disturbed