Haunani Hess

21 hours ago, Doug Pazienza said:

I have great respect for Cheryl Alexander but I only half agree with the premise of her article.  To shift the full responsibility for Takaya's murder onto society and the democratic government it elects is to absolve the hunter of her moral responsibilities to the community of living beings and releases her from the implicit social contract we each have with humanity.  She violated and breached both of those when by her own will and volition she gunned down a defenseless animal in cold blood for no reason other than that she could.

Before the identity of the hunter was even alluded to (and her name has not been released to my knowledge), I watched a clip of the video of the murder scene and I swear to you, I "smelled" death.  I can't explain how that's possible but I sensed an environment imbued with morbidity.  Quite why Takaya didn't sense the malevolence of these killers, leaves me to speculate.

The whole matter of hunting needs to be examined in our culture.  I do not subscribe to the binary pro- and anti-hunting rhetoric.  Personally, I have turned against hunting but I do not seek to abolish it.  And currently I think there is a justifiable movement toward the abolition of the hunting of carnivores.

What most concerns me is the subculture of recreational / trophy hunters who are infecting traditional hunting.  There has been a long history of that, i.e., African safaris, etc but we are now seeing a militarized and politicized movement toward the annihilation of species by people who are conflating hunting with conservation and the right to bear arms, even if those firearms are assault weapons.

We need to take this very seriously.

I am a registered counsellor, psychotherapist and clinical ecopsychologist and I am alarmed that this woman (who I suspect killed Takaya) who might very well have a narcissistic personality disorder and is clearly prone to psychotic behaviour is permitted by law to own and use firearms.  Her social media pages are awash with killing.  It's nauseating. 

And her beliefs that she is somehow acting in the interests of conservation are utterly delusional.

Yes, government policy must be changed and the more difficult challenge of dealing with the psychopathology that indulges wholesale killing of our beautiful wild animals will require a great deal more than the stroke of a pen on new legislation.

The first order of business is to stop the legalization of wolf hunting and on that point, I am in full agreement with Cheryl.

 

Her psychopathy is made clear when she says "the more you hate the more I kill".  We do need to take this very seriously.  It is not hyperbole to say these individuals are psychopathic and merely pacified by killing animals.  These individuals are not in any way shape or form, safe to walk freely in society.   Stopping the legalization of wolf hunting is a natural result from pointing out the glaring truth about this dangerously criminal behavior. 

We're in a time where old systems are giving way to the necessary emergence of new systems.  This is why systemic racism, ecocide, laws for nature, defunding the police and a plethora of transformational social change is shifting towards justice and equality.  Wildlife management is included in this shift, and the complexity makes it difficult to navigate a path to justice because of many variables entrenched in the old system of doing things.  What's happening to wolves, to what happened to Takaya, have many valuable contributions towards the argument for protecting not only wolves but wildlife, and the natural world.  What killed Takaya was an anthropocentric mentality of violent entitlement.  I am convinced by facts, that hunters of wolves in particular, fit the profile of serial killers, and I think it's safe to say the community of hunters at large also fit this profile.  There is a consistent desire for repetition, a greater thrill, there's a dopamine rush from the kill and a need to take pictures as a trophy.  I believe these people are not only enabled to become more and more psychopathic, but are cultivated and protected to do so, and are only temporarily pacified by killing animals.  If there's any moral question about the violent depravity of a passionate hunter, try discussing the option of taking their right to kill away and the reaction is categorical psychosis, a response as if their life is in danger.  There seems to be confusion as to why these people are allowed to carry on like true psychopaths, such as coyote whacking, and it's because state governments are using fish and wildlife as a gateway for facilitating the theft of public lands for expansive private ranch use, and the permission to kill natural predators for predation in their own habitat, the banks are complicit as well.  The lack of law and justice, and order is appalling as these people deserve to be in jail, and poaching is a great example of what happens when laws are not enacted with appropriate severity for crimes and those who commit them.  These people, the hunters, the officials keeping the gate open to abuse fish and wildlife programs, the bankers and the ranchers are all complicit in the unraveling of ecosystems through sheer stupidity, greed and violence.