Hare Coursing

Chuck Stone · 27-02-2013 06:30PM

ScumLord wrote: »

There's only suffering if the Hare gets caught and even then it's minimal. You can't say that the 90% of the time the Hare doesn't get caught that he doesn't get a big rush out of the chase and thoroughly enjoys it.

A spokesman for the Hares said...

ScumLord · 27-02-2013 06:30PM

nervous_twitch wrote: »

That's really a patchwork argument to make in favour of blood sports. It's OK to terrorise an animal because, naturally, they experience stress and fear in the wild - and hypothetically - their stress and fear mightn't be as acute as that of a human?

It might be in that moment but after the fact they can't obsess about it like we do. They don't have the mental capacity.

We aren't forcing anything, we are just setting up a scenario and allowing nature to take it's course. If we weren't there the dogs would still chase the rabbit, the only difference is they would most likely succeed in killing it.

reprazant · 27-02-2013 06:33PM

Why do hares and other wild animals not have the mental capacity but dogs do?

nervous_twitch · 27-02-2013 06:37PM

ScumLord wrote: »

It might be in that moment but after the fact they can't obsess about it like we do. They don't have the mental capacity.

We aren't forcing anything, we are just setting up a scenario and allowing nature to take it's course. If we weren't there the dogs would still chase the rabbit, the only difference is they would most likely succeed in killing it.

'Setting up a scenario' and 'allowing nature to take its course' are mutually exclusive, I'm afraid, and that's what the fundamental problem is. Let the wild happen in the wild - we should be more intelligent than that.

Also, are you a zoologist or is this just guesswork? It could be argued that humans possess the intellect to rationalise fear and it's actually worse for the animal. But neither you or I know, do we?

starlings · 27-02-2013 06:39PM

Mike 1972 wrote: »

AH definitely not what it used to be.

I mean noone has suggested a compromise involving coursing "scumbags" yet .

coursing the spectators has been suggested, with lions and tigers and bears, oh my!

ScumLord · 27-02-2013 06:39PM

reprazant wrote: »

Why do hares and other wild animals not have the mental capacity but dogs do?

Because dogs have developed all kinds of adaptations to survive with humans including being able to read human emotions. When a dog is bet by it's owner it goes beyond physical abuse into psychological abuse because it's like your father or other peer ostracising you from the group.

ScumLord · 27-02-2013 06:46PM

nervous_twitch wrote: »

'Setting up a scenario' and 'allowing nature to take its course' are mutually exclusive, I'm afraid, and that's what the fundamental problem is. Let the wild happen in the wild - we should be more intelligent than that.

Everything is really the wild. To assume a human town exists in some realm outside of nature is just wrong. humans are just as much a part of the wild as every other living thing. Humans set up scenarios all the time, we destroy woodland and all the creatures in it to put a chair under you. You are contributing to far worse animal cruelty than anything that's ever happened at a a coursing meet.

Also, are you a zoologist or is this just guesswork? It could be argued that humans possess the intellect to rationalise fear and it's actually worse for the animal. But neither you or I know, do we?

It's pretty difficult to rationalise fear in the moment for human or Hare. After the fact humans are left with the dread it'll happen again, the Hare forgets about it. Humans are one of only a few animals that can imagine and plan ahead. Hares just didn't evolve the same mental abilities we did so they cannot experience things the same way we do.

As long as the Hare gets away and is released it's just another day surviving for that Hare. It may well have been in much more dangerous situations. Life in the wild is extremely difficult.

reprazant · 27-02-2013 06:48PM

So it is just guesswork then?

Seachmall · 27-02-2013 06:49PM

ScumLord wrote: »

As long as the Hare gets away and is released it's just another day surviving for that Hare.

Unless it gets mauled.

Dyr · 27-02-2013 06:55PM

hyperborean wrote: »

Who is we, and what makes you a better person?

Non stone age boggers. Not being a stone age bogger

nervous_twitch · 27-02-2013 07:01PM

ScumLord wrote: »

Everything is really the wild. To assume a human town exists in some realm outside of nature is just wrong. humans are just as much a part of the wild as every other living thing. Humans set up scenarios all the time, we destroy woodland and all the creatures in it to put a chair under you. You are contributing to far worse animal cruelty than anything that's ever happened at a a coursing meet.

This is going beyond the point here but yes, I believe the human ecosystem occupies a place very much outside the 'wilds' of the animal kingdom - distinctions must be made; otherwise, we would eat our young and kill the weak. We are animals, yes, but we have developed systems according to our mental capacity that separate us from most of our base, primal instincts. This is needed for the functional society we have designed. And ethics are very much a part of this (ethics and empathy, two drives that deviate us a species). For me, patronising though it might sound, I think you are socially underdeveloped if you think it's OK to pay - for entertainment reasons alone - to watch the persecution of another animal.

ScumLord wrote: »

It's pretty difficult to rationalise fear in the moment for human or Hare. After the fact humans are left with the dread it'll happen again, the Hare forgets about it. Humans are one of only a few animals that can imagine and plan ahead. Hares just didn't evolve the same mental abilities we did so they cannot experience things the same way we do.

As long as the Hare gets away and is released it's just another day surviving for that Hare. It may well have been in much more dangerous situations. Life in the wild is extremely difficult.

Again, this last part is irrelevant. Maybe the hare might have lived a blissful life and died of old age? Maybe it would have been ripped to shreds just after it was born? Who knows? It still doesn't endow us with any kind of right to exploit animals for 'fun'.

Rabidlamb · 27-02-2013 07:18PM

Follow this to the nth degree & you end up banning all forms of hunting.
Remember in the UK when they banned fox hunting, that's right, once the furore died down & the media left they never harmed another fox again.
Bless your ignorance.

Hunter21 · 27-02-2013 07:38PM

God help a lot of ye if ye ever watch the Grand National!

Ye will probably be more worried about the trees that were cut for the fences then the horse itself.

Grow a pair will ye! It's a legal sport. It's been a way of life for centuries.

Da Shins Kelly · 27-02-2013 07:41PM

Hunter21 wrote: »

It's a legal sport. It's been a way of life for centuries.

Doesn't make it right.

Chuck Stone · 27-02-2013 07:46PM

Hunter21 wrote: »

It's been a way of life for centuries.

So was slavery and kicking the fuck out of your wife.

Death and Taxes · 27-02-2013 07:47PM

Chuck Stone wrote: »

So was slavery and kicking the fuck out of your wife.

Hardly the same thing!

Chuck Stone · 27-02-2013 07:49PM

WileyCoyote wrote: »

Hardly the same thing!

No but the justification might have been the same not so long ago 'ah shure that's just the way things have always been'.

Appeal to common practice fallacy.

Haven't you got a Roadrunner to catch?

Da Shins Kelly · 27-02-2013 07:54PM

WileyCoyote wrote: »

Hardly the same thing!

I think the point is that certain traditions are outdated. Gladiatorial fighting was once a "legal sport" and "a way of life", and we managed to get over that.

Pumpkinseeds · 27-02-2013 08:06PM

It should be banned, full stop. Its an outdated thing that most right thinking human beings would find abhorrent. I find it obscene to put the words blood and sport in the same sentence. I just can't fathom what is enjoyable about an animal being subjected to cruelty, particularly for human entertainment. Then there are the sickos who use the dogs unmuzzled, out of sight of course.

Zombienosh · 27-02-2013 10:41PM

Chuck Stone wrote: »

So was slavery and kicking the fuck out of your wife.

Exactly "tradition" is not a valid excuse for anything.

7 7 12 · 27-02-2013 10:44PM

My opinion: anyone who even remotely enjoys or justifies terrifying and hurting animals is a serious ****ing mong.

7 7 12 · 27-02-2013 10:48PM

ScumLord wrote: »

Your still comparing human fear to animal fear and we don't experience fear in the same way as other animals do.

Source for this? You haven't the slightest idea what you're talking about. And anyway it doesn't even matter whether their fear is on the same level as ours, I'm sure given the choice to participate or not in brutality like this - they would choose not to.

The argument for fear is more complex because fear is a psychological response. Accepting that animals feel fear would be accepting that they're capable of having some kind of understanding about danger. A 1997 study led by the Sub-Department of Animal Behaviour at the University of Cambridge showed that when deer were hunted by a pack of hounds, they had high levels of stress hormones in their bodies at the time of death and their muscles presented signs of stress damage. These signs weren't present in animals that were killed with single clean shots [source: University of Cambridge]. This type of fear stress response can be found across the animal world.

Have a read of this : http://curiosity.discovery.com/question/animals-feel-fear-and-pain

Dyr · 27-02-2013 10:53PM

Hunter21 wrote: »

God help a lot of ye if ye ever watch the Grand National!

Ye will probably be more worried about the trees that were cut for the fences then the horse itself.

Grow a pair will ye! It's a legal sport. It's been a way of life for centuries.

When you're getting into an arena with a bear then you can demand that other people grow pair, out chasing ****ing hares with dogs? Would suggest a distinct lack of a pair and some concerns in the length dept too.

Dyr · 27-02-2013 11:01PM

Chuck Stone wrote: »

So was slavery and kicking the fuck out of your wife.

Still is for certain ethnictities, who incidentally love the hunting with dags too.

archer22 · 27-02-2013 11:01PM

ScumLord wrote: »

It would be more like me getting chased by two guys with ball gags in their mouths and their hands tied behind their back.

Although I'm sure the Hare can't ell the difference between a muzzled dog and a non muzzled dog.

Your still comparing human fear to animal fear and we don't experience fear in the same way as other animals do. We're cursed with the imagination to realise what's going to happen to us. The thought process in a Hare brain could go "I'm in a box -- I'm in a field -- oh no dogs -- Run -- no dogs -- eat grass". These animals put up with being constantly on the dinner menu in the wild so it's no different to them as long as they know where to escape too.

Then why do they start crying when they are caught then?..I will tell you why because there is only one logical explanation..Its because they DO have the imagination to anticipate what is going to happen next.And those that have heard them cry can be in no doubt but that they feel abject terror.

ejmaztec · 27-02-2013 11:18PM

archer22 wrote: »

Then why do they start crying when they are caught then?..I will tell you why because there is only one logical explanation..Its because they DO have the imagination to anticipate what is going to happen next.And those that have heard them cry can be in no doubt but that they feel abject terror.

No doubt some of the "fans" will tell you that they're crying with laughter.

Big Bottom · 27-02-2013 11:26PM

Hares are made to run away very fast so its not that bad a sport really.

nervous_twitch · 27-02-2013 11:55PM

Big Bottom wrote: »

Hares are made to run away very fast so its not that bad a sport really.

Quality point.

JupiterKid · 28-02-2013 12:11AM

Coursing is a bloody, violent and disgusting form of animal cruelty that passes as "sport." It has no place in 21st century Ireland and
needs to be consigned to the dustbin of history.

I'm shocked that 40% of posters here don't think it should be banned.

archer22 · 28-02-2013 12:29AM

JupiterKid wrote: »

Coursing is a bloody, violent and disgusting form of animal cruelty that passes as "sport." It has no place in 21st century Ireland and
needs to be consigned to the dustbin of history.

I shocked that 40% of posters here don't think it should be banned.

The 40% is probably because they alert their supporters when their is a poll.

Hare Coursing

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