Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, November 21, 1993                   TAG: 9311200259
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Cody Lowe
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

IT'S OPEN SEASON ON THE MORALITY OF HUNTING

The great deer debate started up again this past week. Time for the annual arguments over the morality of hundreds of Virginians heading for the woods to try to outwit the state's native deer.

From one point of view, it is an orgy of blood in which helpless woodland creatures are mercilessly slaughtered to satisfy the sadistic urges of testosterone-crazed (and sometimes estrogen-crazed) people with guns they can't legally use on each other.

From another vantage point, it is a season in which humans can get in touch with their primitive past, become one with nature, infiltrate the world of wild things and stalk a wily prey to replenish the family larder for the winter.

That there is a public disagreement about such a subject says something about our culture.

We've come a long way from the notion that humans can mistreat animals with impunity. We have laws against cruelty to animals. ``Sports'' that involve animal fights - between dogs or cocks, for instance - have pretty much died out, partly because of public pressure and partly because you can get arrested for watching one.

In countries where bullfighting has been culturally acceptable for years, there is growing sentiment against it. Though the matador may risk injury, the fate of the bull is never in doubt. We fail to see the ``sport'' in it.

Like shooting a fish in a barrel, we have decided it is ``unsportsmanlike'' to give the animal no route of escape.

The notion that there is ``sport'' in hunting continues to legitimize it.

Because hunting is no longer necessary, strictly speaking, to provide food for our tables, we've come up with a sporting ethic for it.

That ethic was drilled into me, as it was to millions of others, from childhood:

Kill only what you are going to eat. To kill more is wasteful, an affront to God who created the creatures of the woods. Follow the rules of conservation. Hunt only in season, primarily for males.

Though hunting purely to bag a trophy for the living room wall continues

, there is, I believe, a growing unease with that. Its associations with the annihilation of species - such as African elephants - solely to provide ivory or footstools made from elephants' feet have turned many away.

Hunting game for food - deer, rabbits, squirrels, turkeys and the like - seems as strong as ever, though. And the emotions attached to hunting - from the National Rifle Association to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals - are likewise as strong.

Most of us live in the middle of the extremes those two groups represent. And almost all of us stake out moral positions that aren't absolute.

We decide it is OK to eat deer, but not horses; all right to shoot something we'll eat, but wrong to kill an animal for ``fun.''

In taking our moral positions, however, we can come up with some combinations that seem at least a bit incongruous.

Some people who have no qualms about abortion act as if killing ``Bambi'' for supper is the act of a person with less moral character than Stalin. Some who would not allow an abortion under any circumstances see no ethical dilemma at all in hanging a lion's head over the fireplace.

It is probably fortunate that we are not people of consistent moral ethics. That would likely be too confining for comfort. But we should be people who consider where those ethics lead us if we follow them to their logical ends.

If we opposed killing any living things for food, we wouldn't eat. After all, plants are living things, too. If we oppose only killing animals, we have to ask why animal life is more sacred than plant life - which, you may recall, is reported to scream when picked. If we decline to kill dogs for food, why is it OK to butcher pigs?

What we cannot help but agree on, I think, is that our culture's views of hunting are changing.

So, while I find it perfectly acceptable for people who like to eat venison roasts or rabbit stew or squirrel dumplings to go out and kill their own meat - and donate some to my freezer - I have to acknowledge that I don't know whether in 100 years or 500 we humans will still find that acceptable.

We can only hope our general agreement that we shouldn't eat each other will stand the test of time.