The Gun Counter

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Big whoop. I'm not giving up fried soft-shell crab.

This is BS. There's no two ways about it. Utter manure.
I've seen these kinds of studies before, but usually about fish. It was used by the environutties here to try and get all fishing banned, they got as far as banning the use of live bait. After a flood of bad press they realized they were about to loose too much credibility, and "reinterpreted" their new law to only be about selling live bait for use in other waters.
The fun part with that whole mess was that the environutties claimed that "it's only fish, not crabfish or crawfish, they dont feel pain". Which of course they changed a few months later, trying to get a ban on the traditional crawfish season.

The studies are crap. I dont need to read it to know that, the people doing these studies dont know anything about neurology. Fish and crustaceans lack the neurological center that register pain. Without that nervecenter, they can not feel pain in the sense that the word is used.

If anyone is interested, I can supply documentation of this. The leading expert on neurosystem in fish and crustaceans work is a professor at the´University of Hawaii, he has studied this area for over 20 years, and he also says these "studies" are crap.

Sorry, but this is a huge pet peeve of mine.
After an election a few years ago, the environutties was rewarded/paid off with their own "Department of Animal Rights", and they managed to get all kinds of weird regulations through using "studies" like this. They banned livebait, banned having cows outside unless they had built shelters they could use, and was about to start working up to ban pets("animals shouldnt be kept in captivity")
Fortunally the current administration was elected and kicked them out. But I expect them to be back, riding on the GW wave.

Life sucks.

"I didn't spend billions of years rising to the top of the food chain to eat CARROTS. ... That's not food -- That's what food EATS."

/Ron White

Of course they feel pain. Anyone who's ever listened to them scrabbling in a boiling pot knows that - I could have saved them millions of dollars if they'd just asked me.

It's damn near impossible to eat without causing pain to SOMETHING. I've seen "studies" that claimed plants do too -- I remember the claim that trees issue a hyper-sonic "scream" when their limbs are sawn...

Big deal. Starvation causes ME pain, and my pain is more meaningful than YOURS, it's CERTAINLY more meaningful than any lower life-form (AKA "FOOD"). Don't get me wrong - I DO believe we should cause food as little pain as is practicable - so PLEASE...

Make your pots as hot as possible. Do it for the FOOD!!

BTW -- the best fish fillets come from fish that are filleted alive. It's considered "good form" to sever their spinal-cord before continuing...

DD

Self preservation isn't pain. A fish chased by a predator will try to get away, so will any crustacean or any other living thing. If they get caught by a predator, or thrown up on land (or in a boiling pot) they will try to escape. This is not the same as "feeling pain" in a neurological sense, it's self preservation.
Best comparison is if a human is caught down a deep hole, or on a deserted island. They will try to escape, but they do not feel pain just being there.
The word "pain" as it's used in these studies is just a way to humanize all animals, to promote an environutty/leftist agenda.

And yes, I've seen that study of plants feeling pain too, it's a valid scientific study and I like to bring it up to vegans whenever they wont stop bothering me. (I can find that source too if needed)

The fact that they dont feel pain is no excuse to treat them bad. It's a moral and ethical requirement that if you catch fish, crab, crawfish, or a rabbit, that you kill it as "humane" as possible, whether they feel pain or not.

Erik - I agree that we should treat our catches as humanely as possible! Sever the spinal cord before cleaning, and get that pot hot, and hold down the lid!

they still taste good

Here is a prime example of not weeding enough people out of the gene pool.

I cannot come up with an ethical or moral reason not to kill an animal for food, so long as 1) the kill is done with the least amount of pain and suffering to the animal possible, and 2) as much of the animal is consumed and/or used as possible. I'm not for banning sport hunting; I'm just laying out a minimum moral floor here that works for me.

I had a rousing debate with a guy over hunting -- specifically, what the law considers "poaching" -- out of season. I raised the example of a man who needed to feed his family. In the opinion of my opponent, it was wrong because it was illegal. PERIOD.

I said - and STILL say - that for a hungry man to kill a game animal - in or out of season, with or without a required "license" is right. For another man to kill a healthy buck - in season, with a license -- then saw off his antlers and leave the carcass to rot is WRONG - even though the law permits him to do exactly that.

There's what's legal, and there's what's RIGHT. Occasionally the 2 agree.

DD

Actually, DD, everywhere I've lived, letting a game animal be wasted is a crime, prosecuted as hard and actively as poaching, and looked upon with the same level of disgust by the local outdoors community. We really don't like needless waste.

That said, I hunt two ways. The first is for game/food. When I'm hunting in this mode, I use everything I possibly can from the animal, with minimal waste. The second is for varmint/vermin control. Depending on if the hides are worth anything, I may skin, but normally the animal feeds the crows. Quite simply, this is for controlling damaging vermin. In both methods, the shot is to be as clean as possible.

Personally, if it's starve, or kill an animal out of season, I'm going to live. That's where my line is, at my own survival.