Quote :

"There is, I think, a reasonable argument to made for a difference between "killing animals to eat them" and "killing them for our own entertainment or out of negligence." In the same sense, the law makes a distinction between killing a person in self defense and killing them for some other reason. There is also an (admittedly less defensible) argument for a difference between an animal that has coexisted with us for 40,000 years as a helper in various capacities, and one that we domesticated in a much, much more recent timespan as a food source and little else. Beyond even that there's the strong connection between cruelty towards animals and future violent crimes against humans. I like the law. This shit is disgusting."

so deer hunting is immoral if i don't plan on eating the meat? that is just silly.

6/24/2010 6:19:47 PM

Not sure how you got that from my post. But if you're killing a deer just to watch it die, yeah, that's kind of immoral.

6/24/2010 6:45:25 PM

^

6/24/2010 7:03:47 PM

Im with grumpy. I can understand the need to control the population though.

6/25/2010 6:22:18 PM

I predict in the near future R2D2 will have a law named after him... tis only a matter of time.

6/25/2010 11:20:43 PM

^I'm not sure I get the point of your post.

6/25/2010 11:34:28 PM

Quote :

"I can understand the need to control the population though."

Can the same be said about humans? Or do they just get a free pass because they have opposable thumbs and iphones?

6/25/2010 11:41:37 PM

ITT we defend eugenics

6/25/2010 11:43:37 PM

Overpopulation, among humans, tends to take care of itself in extreme situations...sadly.

But im all for if you cant feed yourself, you dont need to have children. But I bet most of you would oppose forcing BC.

6/26/2010 12:33:25 AM

I just want to point out that WRALs Redundant Department of Redundancy Department is doing a great job in the OP article.

6/26/2010 1:20:31 AM

Quote :

"Can the same be said about humans? Or do they just get a free pass because they have opposable thumbs and iphones?"

Haha, well, it depends on what you mean by "free pass." I mean, aside from your inaccurate implication that humans are overpopulated, the whole point of population control is to prevent an even nastier series of deaths and other problems down the road.

6/27/2010 12:28:57 PM

Quote :

"aside from your inaccurate implication that humans are overpopulated"

We'll just have to disagree there.

6/27/2010 4:08:07 PM

^
No fucking way. That Grumpy piece of shit of an excuse for a human cannot be let off that easily.

Quote :

"your inaccurate implication that humans are overpopulated"

STFU, you drunk fucking idiot.
Anyone who believes in a god loses their credibility in matters like this, anyway.
To you, the notion of human overpopulation is impossible.
You god damn idiot.
The fact that you can wake up each morning and continue to believe the most ridiculous assertion that has ever been made,
(that humans aren't already [way] overpopulated)
is nothing short of mother-fucking crazy. Go worship your god and drink a fifth, you bumbling fucking fool

6/27/2010 4:30:29 PM

Jesus christ dude, chill out. ^ is way over the top.

6/27/2010 4:33:13 PM

Fuck off.
Grumpy's incorrect assertion is the most dangerous and false one anyone could ever make.
If he were crossing the street, I would not brake for his sorry ass. The world does not need mother-fucking idiots like him.

6/27/2010 4:43:20 PM

^ Isn't it time to suspend Willy Nilly again?

6/27/2010 4:44:57 PM

^^

6/27/2010 4:58:49 PM

Quote :

"Humans are in control of their lives, so their suffering is most often deserved."

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/africa/05/23/koinange.rape.war/index.html

That's way worse than being chained up to a pole for a few days.

I agree it's wrong, but is this really that big of a deal? Just a few years ago this kind of stuff was institutionalized:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloodsport

6/27/2010 7:36:54 PM

Quote :

"STFU, you drunk fucking idiot. Anyone who believes in a god loses their credibility in matters like this, anyway. To you, the notion of human overpopulation is impossible. You god damn idiot. The fact that you can wake up each morning and continue to believe the most ridiculous assertion that has ever been made, (that humans aren't already [way] overpopulated) is nothing short of mother-fucking crazy. Go worship your god and drink a fifth, you bumbling fucking fool"

Alright, let me pick through all the bullshit there and get to the crux of the matter, which is that you think humans are overpopulated. OK. Prove it. In fact, don't even prove it, just give me a little more evidence than your say-so and some religious red herring.

That said, I'll lay out my case.

1) We make enough food to feed ourselves. We currently have enough fresh water to drink. If people aren't getting these things, it may be the result of corruption, underdevelopment, or them simply living in the wrong spot -- not because of general human overpopulation.

2) Cary, North Carolina has a population density of 2,246 people per square mile. I hope we can agree that Cary is not a teeming morass of humanity. It turns out that all mankind could live with a Cary level of spaciousness in an area smaller than that of Brazil. Even after you take out mountains, deserts, and tundras -- that's a lot of space left over.

I'll quote wikipedia here, because I least trust them not to make up the Earth's land area:

Quote :

"If Antarctica[and water area] is also excluded, then population density rises to 50 people per km² (129.28 per sq. mile). Considering that over half of the Earth's land mass consists of areas inhospitable to human inhabitation, such as deserts and high mountains, and that population tends to cluster around seaports and fresh water sources, this number by itself does not give any meaningful measurement of human population density."

OK, so we'll double the density figure to take into account the inhospitable areas, leaving us with a density of 258. That's about the same as Austria, that notorious population bomb.

Of course, the quote plays down the significance of this figure -- but let's take into account that a lot of Austria isn't inhabitable, either. Besides, the issue here isn't population distribution. I'll grant that some areas, taken in a vacuum, are overpopulated. (Fortunately no place exists in vacuum!) The issue is whether or not there are too many people overall, and quite simply there are not.

3) I never said that the notion of human overpopulation is impossible. It is possible, but we're not there yet. And, by most of the reasonable projections out today, we don't get there, ever. The population is looking to peak in our lifetimes, at which point it will decline for a while. Of course, projections can be wrong -- as people like Paul Ehrlich, champion of overpopulation hype, knows quite well.

---

Now, let me ask you some questions:
1) What would be an acceptable human population?
2) How should we reduce our apparent overpopulation?
3) What is your definition of overpopulation?

6/27/2010 8:55:50 PM

Has Indy even been here long enough to know that GrumpyGOP is a drunk idiot? very interesting...

6/27/2010 9:10:44 PM

Humans aren't overpopulated because we can control our environment. We can plant and raise our own food, we don't have to depend on it just being there.

6/27/2010 10:21:27 PM

Sure, but at what cost to species that already inhabit that area? Humans are masters at looking at the rest of the world and saying "Fuck you, got mine." and surely you can see how that is not a sustainable attitude. We have an intrinsic connection to the other inhabitants of the earth whether we chose to see it or not while sheltered in our stick-built homes and SUVs. Pushing plants and animals into extinction merely for convenience* is rather barbaric.

*Medical reasons aside.

6/27/2010 10:47:56 PM

I didn't know moron thought I was an idiot. Now I'm kind of

I think OopsPowSrprs has it right. I remember when Willy Nilly and I got into an argument about this he immediately flew off the handle, started with the spew of insults, and flat refused to provide any sort of argument because he (by his own words) thought it was so abundantly obvious as to not need any.

And of course Kris is also correct. There's no way we could support this many people through hunting and gathering. If we did rely on those things, we'd never get anywhere near this number of people.

Which makes sense. By any reasonable definition of "overpopulated," you can never be it for any length of time -- you'll start dying in droves from starvation. We've had our current population for a while now with no die off, and without anything in the way of starvation.* That alone is a pretty good sign that we aren't overpopulated, but it sounded too much like saying "we're not overpopulated because we're obviously not overpopulated," which is of course indy's style.

*-To be clear, and so I don't have to clarify every time, "starvation" in this context means "famine related to an actual lack of enough food for everybody" rather than that caused by corrupt or incompetent leaders, wars, natural disasters (especially in connection to the other two factors), or other specific, localized, temporary causes. When we stop producing enough calories in food to meet the needs of the species, that is what I'm referring to.

---

Quote :

"Humans are masters at looking at the rest of the world and saying "Fuck you, got mine.""

And how does that make us different from any other species? I don't care about barbarism; this isn't a moral question. If indy had said "Humans do bad stuff to the planet," I'd have agreed. We're talking about overpopulation, which is not something we'll have achieved until we've actually inflicted so much harm that we can no longer sustain our own survival at that population.

[Edited on June 27, 2010 at 10:57 PM. Reason : ]

6/27/2010 10:55:45 PM

what if i just enjoy hunting for the sport of hunting. i get no sadistic pleasure out of watching anything die, and train and practice so that my kills are quick and minimize pain, but i am not hunting because of my own need for food or clothing. i'm just hunting for the sport of it. population control is a need with deer, but that is not a motivation for most hunters.

6/27/2010 11:59:10 PM

You're employing a potentially useful skill (hunting) in such a way that provides a legitimate purpose (population control). Your personal motivation is not ideal but on the whole it beats the hell out of employing a useless skill (getting dogs to fight each other) for an illegitimate purpose (entertainment) for a terrible reason.

6/28/2010 12:03:43 AM

Quote :

"I didn't know moron thought I was an idiot. Now I'm kind of "

Haha i don't...

6/28/2010 12:49:48 AM

Eh, I got over it. Though it disturbs me that I read all these comments and never even remotely responded to charges of my drunkenness. For what it's worth all my posts on this page were made without a drop in my system.

6/28/2010 1:01:02 AM

Quote :

"But it's tough for me to be that concerned with the welfare of very specific breeds of animals we attribute human like qualities to when there are actual humans that suffer far worse around the world."

Let's not do anything about something bad because we can't completely fix something worse...

6/28/2010 3:29:36 AM

I'm bumping this in hopes that indy will provide us with some response on the question of overpopulation.

6/28/2010 5:49:51 PM

You'll probably get something like this...

Quote :

"YOU CAN'T STOP, CAN YOU? NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT THAT PHRASE EXCEPT YOU"

6/28/2010 5:58:26 PM

Quote :

"Let's not do anything about something bad because we can't completely fix something worse..."

Let's put them in jail longer cuz that's really going to fix the problem.

6/28/2010 7:36:19 PM

I'm glad Susie's Law passed. Unfortunate to hear that the puppy mill ban didn't. Well not so much ban, but requirement that they follow some the same basic rules as shelters & pet shops. It stood a shot, but then the pork lobby killed it.

http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/07/03/563609/puppy-mills-escape-again.html

Quote :

"Angie Whitener, the Pork Council's lobbyist, said her group does not oppose puppies so much as the bill's main backers, the Humane Society of the United States. "Our opposition is solely based on the proponent of the bill," Whitener said. "We're very worried about this powerful, very wealthy animal rights organization." The bill, which did not address livestock, was narrowly approved by the Senate last year. The House sent it to its finance committee, where it stalled this week because, according to the chairman, it was "too divisive.""

Quote :

"Whitener said the bill was about more than just dogs. She said she believes the Humane Society's end goal is to eventually stop meat production for human consumption."

The pork lobby's argument was that if we can't abuse a few puppies, where will it stop? We'll tell you. Your family will starve!

Granted its a really stupid argument, but nothing the slightest bit controversial could survive this short session. Its got a good short for next year since 1) its a long session so you can take up more stuff without having to prioritize the stuff that will easily pass for the few weeks you're in session 2) there wont be the same level of election concerns which means things that are controversial only for stupid reasons wont get auto-killed.

[Edited on July 14, 2010 at 11:46 PM. Reason : stupid pork lobby]

7/14/2010 11:43:55 PM

Death to America...and puppies.

7/14/2010 11:57:03 PM

^^
Wow. God damn. (stupid pork lobby)


Bacon just became less tasty. (boycott NC pork)

7/15/2010 7:14:35 AM

Quote :

"Bacon just became less tasty."

Inconceivable!

7/15/2010 10:24:51 AM

http://www.digtriad.com/news/local_state/article.aspx?storyid=146827

Quote :

"Phoenix Has New Foster Family Cami Marshall Created: 8/19/2010 Greensboro, NC -- We have an update on the little dog that's stolen many people's hearts. On July 17th, someone brought a four-month-old lab/pit bull mix, that's since been named Phoenix, to a Greensboro veterinary hospital. He had burns over 45 to 50 percent of his body, and the injuries were severely infected. Now, Phoenix is living with a foster family. He comes back to the shelter every day to have his bandages and burn cream changed. "

Quote :

"Three juveniles and one teenager have been charged in the case. The teen, Harvey Gales, is charged with felony cruelty to animals, felony burning of personal property, and felony conspiracy to harm personal property."

WTF... why do people set dogs on fire?

I'm glad at least that there seems to be decent news coverage of such events, as sad as they are, to keep up the pressure on animal welfare issues... although I'd rather there just be less idiots setting pets on fire. But maybe the news coverage can help with that too if they keep hitting the message that if you set someones pet on fire then you are going to pay heavily.

8/23/2010 4:50:33 PM

^

Quote :

"...... Some humans ain't human . . .. . .. -John Prine "

8/23/2010 5:03:52 PM

http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/09/15/683631/apnewsbreak-nc-lab-halts-work.html

Quote :

" RALEIGH, N.C. -- A North Carolina lab has stopped doing research and is surrendering all of its animals a week after an undercover video showed what activists allege were workers cruelly treating dogs, cats and rabbits, federal regulators said Wednesday. U.S. Department of Agriculture spokesman Dave Sacks said officials are trying to find new homes for more than 200 animals that were at Professional Laboratory and Research Services Inc. He said it was the company's decision to give them up and stop research. The USDA inspected the site this week and has started a formal investigation. ... Another clip shows workers trying to remove a tooth from a dog while acknowledging that the sedation drug expired years ago and may not be working."

No reason for excessive violence and very expired sedatives.

9/17/2010 12:21:41 AM

Since its election season, here is an animal welfare group endorsements (they were perhaps the main backers of Susie's Law):
http://ncvaw.org/2010-endorsements/

Non-partisan as far as I can tell, and they get into local races, not just state ones.

10/29/2010 6:47:26 AM

NC Claws, an animal rehabilitation group, van crashed yesterday which was their only real means of animal transportation. They helped take a lot of the workload when Piedmont Wildlife Rehabilitation had to shut down a lot of their operations. If anyone can support them, or wants to support other local groups, you can here (I put up the item donation wishlists, but the $ donation sections are pretty easy to find too). NC Claws can take donations through pay pal.

http://www.nc-claws.org/wishlist.htm

http://www.trianglewildlife.org/wishlist

http://www.goathouserefuge.org/daily-needs/

http://www.wakegov.com/pets/donations/default.htm

11/7/2010 11:55:56 PM

jailtime is pansy bullshit.


eye for an eye will teach them.

11/8/2010 4:36:48 AM

Quote :

"Usually, but it should always be a felony."

Felony? For assault? You realize what assault is, right? If I say "I'm going to beat your ass", then draw back a baseball bat, I have just assaulted you. I don't even have to hit you with it.

Even if you mean battery, you mean to tell me that you think that kicking someone's ass should always be a felony? Sometimes people deserve it, and there are also different levels of ass-beatings. Beating someone half to death for no good reason is a different deal than punching someone in the face because he had it coming.

11/8/2010 7:21:49 AM

Quote :

"that kicking someone's ass should always be a felony"

Yes. Period.

Only a bully like you would disagree. (You war-mongering thug.)

...

I suppose simple assault should remain a misdemeanor, but felony assault (aggravated) should also remain.

Also, consent is important. A truly consensual fight is not a crime.

Quote :

"had it coming"

Would you please describe a situation where someone "has it coming"?
What general rule should be applied to know when it's okay to punch someone in the face? [without their consent]



[Edited on November 8, 2010 at 9:49 AM. Reason : (You must think you're some cool cowboy/hero dude. You're nothing but a violence apologist.)]

11/8/2010 9:24:47 AM

Oh good, indy's back, maybe he'll pick back up our overpopulation discussion.

Quote :

"Would you please describe a situation where someone "has it coming"?"

From when I worked at bars, pretty much any combination of "starting trouble" + "refusing to leave/stop" = "has it coming."

To continue the math theme, "me punching one guy in the face" > "that one guy inciting a massive bar fight." (Though it wasn't ever me punching the guy -- I was lucky in how many such incidents I missed or was able to defuse through the ready availability of a police officer or the angry displaying of an aluminum bat)

So I guess the general rule would be "whenever punching someone in the face prevents an even worse outcome."

11/8/2010 10:40:57 AM

Quote :

"A truly consensual fight is not a crime."

Maybe in your (and my) ideologically pure utopia, but not in reality. I mean, maybe in certain circumstances (like the time in college when my roommate and I were boxing, and I knocked him out, he landed on his head, busted it open, and had to go for a little ambulance ride...the cops showed up and questioned me, but there were dozens of witnesses to say that it was just recreation gone bad). However, if you were to have a dispute with someone and both agree to fight about it (which describes a large percentage--if not a significant majority--of fights), I guarantee you that claiming "a truly consensual fight is not a crime" will not do you much good if the cops show up.

Quote :

"You must think you're some cool cowboy/hero dude. You're nothing but a violence apologist."

You say that like it's a bad thing, or that those 2 things are mutually exclusive. Anyone who says that violence has never solved anything has obviously never properly used violence. Violence is a tool. It usually isn't the right tool, but occasionally it's fantastic.

Quote :

" Would you please describe a situation where someone "has it coming"? What general rule should be applied to know when it's okay to punch someone in the face? [without their consent]"

Well, let's see...I can think of a few times offhand when I've roughed people up:

-Slapped me in the face, unprovoked (class clown/bully in HS who was starved for attention and knew that if nothing else, I would respond. I punched him hard in the solar plexus; he went down hard. Never had another problem with him. Score 1 for violence.

-Dude beating his wife's ass SEVERELY at a concert. I strangled him. I don't know how things worked out for them, but after he woke up, he didn't lay a hand on her for the rest of the night.

-Several dudes beating up on one little scrawny guy over some petty bullshit. In the interest of fairness and because we figured a fucked-up move like that constituted "having it coming", I strangled one; another friend roughed up one of the others.

-Fight broke out at a party. Don't know what it was about. I did see a dude who had no "dog in the fight", so to speak, jump in and just start punching and kicking people for sport, as he was drunk and being an asshole. Wrong answer. That constituted "having it coming." I took it pretty easy on him, though, because he was a friend/acquaintance.



there's one more I can think of...HUGE brawl broke out at an club concert...to the point that the bouncers were struggling to contain it. Being better than the average bear at that sort of thing, I choked out a guy, trying to help out. Only problem was that, in all the confusion, I got mixed up and started to strangle a bouncer by mistake. I realized the mistake quickly, though, before I made him go nighty-night, and let him go (another bouncer started trying to choke me, and he said something that made me realize I had the wrong guy). Oops.


...so as you can see, the great majority of the altercations I've been in have because of someone else being victimized. In most/all of those cases, I could have gotten in legal trouble. If not for the chance of that repercussion (and how I can't really have the trouble that would cause me nowadays), I would get involved more often. There are shitloads of people out there who really should get kinetically recalibrated.

Quote :

"Only a bully like you would disagree. (You war-mongering thug.)"

I wouldn't say that I'm a war-monger, but I'm not opposed to killing people who suck. The Taliban, for example, pretty generally fall into this category. I never got to personally kill any of them, but I did a good bit of flying in support of a lot of highly classified missions/units where we killed a good number of those motherfuckers. Facilitating that was a good feeling, even if I didn't get to drop the bomb or squeeze the trigger on them.

11/8/2010 11:30:09 PM

All excellent points, though of course indy will decline to respond to them.

TAUNT TAUNT TAUNT

11/9/2010 12:14:36 AM

Quote :

"There are shitloads of people out there who really should get kinetically recalibrated. "

I'm stealing this.

11/9/2010 9:57:51 AM

Smoker4's sister is the one that got the law passed. Funny he never saw this.

11/23/2010 6:42:47 PM

I was pretty confident the ban for the worse practices of puppy mills would pass next time around, and that they only avoided it b/c they didn't want to get into anything even slightly controversial in a short session before elections if they could avoid it (it was only controversial b/c the pork industry fought it). But I was really sure it would pass next time around. Now that the GOP has taken control, I imagine they have a long to do list built up over many years, and I doubt this is anywhere near the top. I won't pre-judge though. We'll see if it passes in the next session or not.

11/23/2010 7:23:22 PM

This law starts today. Tonight is a party/fundraiser in gboro and Susie will be there.

Greene Street Club
113 N. Greene Street
Greensboro, NC

6-10pm

For those interested.

12/1/2010 2:22:29 PM