Ignorance Runs Deep

© By Othmar Vohringer

(Originally published in the Merritt News)

Is it just me or do people become more ignorant as the years go by? Just last week I had a conversation with a person that did not agree with hunting. While I can perfectly understand that not everyone likes hunting, or hunters, I felt that this particular person’s reasoning was astounding. As a vegetarian the person didn’t like the idea that animals are killed for food. He argued that he as a vegetarian does not contribute to the death of animals. Unfortunately many vegetarians believe the myth that their lifestyle saves the lives of animals.

Has it ever occurred to diehard vegetarians that in order to grow vegetables animal habitat has to be destroyed and animals have to be killed? Vegetable farmers go to considerable lengths to rid the fields of mice, insects and other creatures. From my brother-in-law, who builds greenhouses, I learned that greenhouse operations for all intents and purposes are almost as sterile as a hospital operating room. Animals of any kind are unwelcome in these operations and are destroyed wherever they show up.


The simple fact of life, be that for humans or animals in the wild, is that in order to survive something else has to die. Nature works on the principle of death to provide life for something else. That also holds true for vegetarians. Just because they do not eat meat does not free them of the ‘guilt’ of killing animals.

Vegetarians are not the only ignorant people. There are others too like the person who once said to me that he, unlike me, could not live knowing that he killed an animal intentionally and therefore always buys meat from the store. I almost laughed when he said that and replied. “Some people take the responsibility of killing their own food while others let someone else do the dirty deed for them. But that does not make you innocent.”

Another time I helped a friend unload a deer that he shot earlier in the day and proceeded to hang it in his garage. My friend lived in the city and there was no backyard shed where we could hang the deer unseen by others. As we unloaded the deer my fiend’s wife came home with her sister who had her two kids with her. The sister-in-law demanded angrily: “Close the door! I do not want my children (both teenagers) to see that dead deer. It could traumatize them for the rest of their lives.” Here is an ignorant twist that I just can’t wrap my head around. These two teenagers liked to play video games in which the player can obtain a high score by the number of people killed. Apparently, and this seems to be very common these days, it is less traumatizing to play violent games where thousands of people are killed or watch movies showing similar violence against people. Yet, somehow when it comes to the reality that animals have to die to provide food it is considered offensive. Ignorance is running deep.

###

This blog post has been brought to you by Othmar Vohringer Outdoors