I am going to upset DU hunters here …

[blueinindiana]

I want to talk about this term hunters now use, ‘Harvest’. I ‘harvested’ a deer; it makes it sound like I cut down some corn. I am no bleeding heart PETA member just think this term is just silly and something a Bush, Inc bot would say.

[havocmom]

1. If you are not vegan, I would suggest you

DUCK!

[Rick Myers]

2. Dick 'harvested' a lawyer!!!

[Maru Kitteh]

9. Oh my................ there we go! I LOVE that. I'm going to use it!

Harvested a lawyer. That's hilarious!

:rofl:

[zanne]

3. I made the same comment on another hunting post.

If people want to hunt, they should just use the honest word "kill". Otherwise, it sounds like self-justification. If they don't think there's anything wrong with hunting, they shouldn't use words like "harvested" and "released".

[KittyWampus]

11. Do you "Kill" a carrot when you pull it from the ground and recycle it

into your own body?

[zanne]

15. What utter garbage.

Killing an animal is killing an animal is killing an animal... Don't try to justify it.

[DenaliDemocrat]

21. Why would I feel the need to justify it.

You are correct, I certianly do kill an animal when I harvest it. I eat it too.

However, just because someone else kills/harvests/snuffs out the brief candle of your dinner, does not make any animal you eat any less dead.

It does not matter if it is a deer, a cow, a pig, a grouse, or a dove.

Dead is dead is dead.

[KittyWampus]

33. killing a veggie is killing a veggie is killing a veggie

Vegetables AND animals all come from the same Sacred Source.

[rodeodance]

22. nope--just pull'em up

[Maru Kitteh]

4. Well I am a bleeding heart card carrying member of PETA and pretty damn

proud of it.

Euphemism. It's when you pick a nice word to cover up the bloody truth. Harvest = slaughter. It's a common tactic of the bushbots. Peppered. No Child Left Behind. Superficial wounds. Patriot Act.

[blueinindiana]

8. Sorry about PETA comment

I guess i got defensive.

[Maru Kitteh]

10. Oh no, don't be sorry about it, I'm not :-)

No offense taken at all. :hi:

[EstimatedProphet]

39. Slaughter. Why not 'Murder?' Why not 'Tormented to Death?'

"Harvest" happens to be scientifically oriented, for one thing. Biologists talk about a deer harvest because they are talking in management terms.

[Katherine Brengle]

41. Ditto and amen! n/t

[H2O Man]

5. That's certainly the central issue here .... n/t

[laruemtt]

6. dh and i moved to wv

in 1991-2. the first time i saw a "harvest" on the local news and being a vegetarian, i called them and told them i was terribly offended by having to look at their "harvest" on tv. was i naive or what...... took a while i had to learn the when in rome thing and keep my mouth shut. and hey, i've got lyme disease from hundreds of miles of hiking so if anybody has a right to have it in for the deer, i do! but i don't - just happy to be part of the food chain....O8)

[Maru Kitteh]

7. I forgot to say WELCOME TO DU!!!!

And happy Valentines day.

[bigscott]

13. it is harvesting

as opposed to hunting when you drive your car up and shoot a farm raised animal that is not afraid of humans -

[Double T]

12. killing for sport................

and you don't think there is something wrong with this???

[ClintonTyree]

14. Just a NRA coined term........

to make the murder of defenseless animals more palatable to gullible Americans. Hunters kill animals, they don't "harvest" anything.

[MyNameGoesHere]

16. People that hunt out of

necessity do not talk like that. People who kill for the thrill do.

[RebelOne]

18. Hate to say this, but the majority of hunters kill for the thrill

and the trophy. They would prefer killing a buck to a doe. Does don't have antlers.

[DenaliDemocrat]

28. That is an ignorant statement

and totally off base. In Colorado, most people would much rather shoot a cow elk than a bull elk. However, the game managers strictly regulate how many cow elk are killed, males are considered less biologically valuable, and most tags can be purchased over the counter.

Some hunters do hunt strictly for the horns, but most of us hunt for the experience and the meat. Go to the DOW in Colorado homepage and see how many hunters killed cow elk vs. bull elk....you might be surprised.

[MyNameGoesHere]

30. Well i suppose i would not call them

hunters and i hate to call myself that, but i have killed a few times for meat. It was better than the alternative which would have been starving. And hunting has never thrilled me, it kinda suxx sitting or walking in the cold just to get a 50/50 chance at killing food. I much rather buy it.

[Maru Kitteh]

23. Excellent observation

I don't have a problem with some sustenance hunters (half or less maybe), most particularly in other portions of the world but guess what? Most people in less developed portions of the world expend more of their energy on grains, legumes and other plant foods because it's vastly more efficient for most of them. Not all, but most.

[MyNameGoesHere]

31. I agree

i just cant get them damn beans to grow in the snow. And the lettuce just suxx when the freeze hits.

[KittyWampus]

17. I consider killing animal pests for food as harvesting

and the seperation out of vegetables from animals as deserving less respect, consideration or protection as somewhat bogus.

Plants, minerals, animals are all sacred and my kin. So just as you harvest veggies from the garden, one harvests animals that are too numerous. It is, in fact, the Humane thing to do.

Here are pertinent defintions of Harvest, all of which apply:

HARVEST-

1. a mature crop
2. the quantity of a NATURAL product gathered in a single season
3. the product or reward of exertion
4. reap

I have a massive veggie garden that supplies my food. Unless you actually do something like that and NEED that food in the winter and then watch that garden get destroyed by herds of pestilent deer which occupy too small an area with no predators... please spare the rest of us.

[rodeodance]

19. i have helped havest organs. It is a word that says what is done.

[Maru Kitteh]

26. It's a word that avoids what is done.

It's lipstick on a neocon.

[truebrit71]

20. I think hunters have serious issues....

...unless you can't eat the food that is neatly killed and packaged for you in the supermarkets there is no reason to grab a (penis-extension) gun and kill a small, wild animal...

[KittyWampus]

24. "food that is neatly killed and packaged for you in supemarkets"?

Sorry, but I don't think it's hunters with the serious issues.

[truebrit71]

35. "Neatly killed" refers to the fact that it happens away from our eyes....

...there is NOTHING neat about the slaughter of our foodstock, I was being facetious..

[DenaliDemocrat]

29. You are fooling yourself

Just because it is sterile, cellaphane wrapped, random chuck of meat does not mean an animal did not die. A living creature, which was once a doe-eyed calf, died so you could eat the Mc Donald's burger.

[truebrit71]

34. Couple of things that have been missed...

1) I fully understand that an animal had to die in order for there to be food in the supermarket....

2) You are making a MASSIVE assumption that the "meat" in ANYTHING sold at McDonald's bears ANY resemblence to a cow, young OR old....

;-)

[DenaliDemocrat]

36. You are right there......

McDonald's is kind of like eating road kill, and EVEN I won't touch road kill

[Jacobin]

25. I'm a hunter. I don't use euphemisms and agree with you

When you shoot something in the woods you kill it. You don't harvest it.

I'm an omnivore. I kill and eat other living things, or have it done for me by people who sell meat to the grocery store.

[sui generis]

27. It's not speaking plainly to use the word "harvest", which

is traditionally used with non-sentient produce, to describe killing an animal.

I understand WHY someone would use it though, if they had an agenda or thought the word "kill" was too icky to use.

Say what you mean; leave doublespeak to republicans.

[sybylla]

32. I'm a hunter and I don't like the term "harvested"

but in its defense, it is used by my Department of Natural Resources when they talk about how successful a hunting season was in controlling a population of animals. From there, it's been borrowed. Me? I take animals or I shoot animals. I don't harvest because I find the word as disrespectful as you apparently do.

[EstimatedProphet]

37. Alright. Do you have a word you would prefer?

[KT2000]

38. Target practice

with living things! That is what Cheney was doing. If he drives into the field, then tame birds are released from a cage or bag - the shooter is conducting target practice.
Hunting and harvesting just do not apply to this situation.

I think I understand the ease with which he has sent people to war so easily much better.

[Xithras]

40. The more common term is actually "take"

Last year, I went hunting and took two deer.

[Hobarticus]

42. "Harvest" is a wildlife official/game warden term

I have never known a hunter use "harvest" to describe what they do. They "bag" or "take" or "kill".

Wildlife officials monitor the yearly "harvest" of each species, and make sure that they don't have too many hunters taking too many of any given species.

[flvegan]

43. Just like "hunting." It sounds better than "shoot and kill."

Though I will say that there are those that truly do "hunt" but that's not the majority of today's "sportsmen" I don't think.

[Squatch]

44. While we're at it...you don't "buy" chicken breasts at the store...

you're actually contracting a slaughterhouse to do your dirty work for you.