Alligator Gar

Here's a web site about alligator gar fish. Again, we kill and make trophys of what we don't understand.

http://www.thejump.net/fishlist/alligatorgar.htm

Applied Ethics

Here's some cheerful news... Today up in West Dover, there was a hit and run fatality, pedestrian vs. vehicle. So if you're going up to Mount Snow, take Coldbrook Road. That's so monstrous, how in the hell do you kill someone with your car- not a dog or a cat, but a person - and then keep going while they die on the side of the road? It makes me sick.

Turkeys...

Saturdays I work on my fiance's family farm. So yesterday we split wood for a good part of the day in preparations for sugaring. Grandpa Henry and Uncle Rob were already down the road past the sugar house, so Papa sent me down with the tractor while he finished up in the barn. The land is so beautiful, especially with the fresh snow fall. Down the sugar road past the barns, the river bisects the hay fields from the sugar bush, with the old stone walls still in place from when Vermont was sheep country. The only sound was the steady engine of the tractor and the clink of the chains on the tires. I was a flock of about a dozen wild turkeys spread out through the woods. Some were on the path, while others were settled on the frozen river. At my approach they took wing, one by one, and headed deeper into the woods. They were absolutely beautiful in their freedom, just going about their own business. And if at the end of their lives, a couple are taken by a hunter, it would be no worse, and probably more merciful a fate (if you're a good shot) then they would meet at the claws of another creature wanting turkey for dinner. Even as they live in captivity, we have surely killed them, breeding them on commercial farms to mature and fatten in as short a time as possible so their carcases can be wrapped in plastic on display in the grocery stores. The land itself is beautiful, hay fields, sugar lot and pastures alike, yet there are those who would destroy everything without a second thought so they could build more condos and second homes for the tourist population. Although no one wants that, as the taxes keep rising they become increasingly difficult to pay. The turkeys will be driven off another property as their circle of freedom decreases into ever smaller section.

Surrogacy

How ethical is surrogate motherhood when there are thousands of children waiting to be adopted in our own country alone. While it is understandable that an infertile couple would desire to have children, from what I understand only the father is related by blood. Although the adoptive mother can have close contact with the surrogate mother, she is still adopting the child. So how is it that woman are paid to create more children when so many are already out there wishing for a loving home?

Muppets

My fiance recently purchased season two of the Muppet Show. On one of the episodes Sam the bald eagle is giving a speech about how disgraceful it is that there are people out there who go around wearing absolutely nothing underneath their clothing. There are animals who are completely naked beneath their fur and finally there are birds who wear nothing beneath their feathers... until he realizes that he is such a bird and edges off the stage, hiding behind the sheet of paper that his speech is written on...
It just struck me as funny considering our discussions on naked vs. nude. Beneath it all, we are just ourselves, yet few appreciate us for just us.

Just Looking...

Of course people interact by looks, but I have never stepped back and given much thought to gazing as a consumer. What do we look for? Just what do we consume? We judge and critique, but how do you really judge a living being in such a fashion? “I like this one.” “That’s ugly.” We objectify what and who we look at with no regard to the being. What gives us the right or capacity to judge is so degrading a manner? We have become so accustomed to such actions that we now perform them without though.

NOW

Instant gratification
I want, I need
NOW
Why should I wait

Why should others receive my consideration
Mommy, the animals are sleeping
Make them wake so I can see

In the aquarium tap the glass
Inexplicable earthquake effects
Ripple through the water
Terrifying the inhabitants
Trapped within the glass

Waiting in the grocery store
Blame the clerk
Stupid girl
Why is she so slow
Not earning her pay is she
Yet you only wait ten minutes

Food now
Unworthy waiter
No tips
The kitchen was not fast enough
Damn dishwasher, lowly worm
Making minimum wage
Beneath my contempt

Every demand and want
Fulfilled now
Driving down the highway
Waiting at the stop sign
Swearing, slamming the steering wheel

The wallflowers wither and fade
Backed protectively into a corner
Overwhelming fast pace
But the desire to slow down
And look around,
Appreciate the meadow soon to be replaced by a Wal-mart
Remains unheeded

Pets

Pets have no privacy
As we monitor their every function
We assume they do not value
Such as we do
But did your “loyal companion”
Ever go in the other room to eat a biscuit

Pets are selectively bred
Features of face
Pointy ears
Perky tails
Fluffy fur
Yet all so pliable

Pets are disposable
Yet they are given greater care
Than battered women with no where to go
Spend Thousands on a surgery for a poodle
While a person ides of an easily preventable disease

Throw Fluffy away
And replace with Buffy
He chewed the carpet
She destroyed my plants
Put a bullet in its head
And replace, perpetuate the cycle

Chicken Little

How does one combine ethical business practice with animals? While business ethics dictates fair trade; an exchange of equal value, complications arise when the variable of the merchandise is introduced. Have you ever seen the mail orders for chicks and ducklings that seem to become so prevalent around Easter time? Have you ever received such a package? Often there is at least one dead creature, withered and crushed into the straw at the bottom of the box. Once freed, the fragile little birds rush to the water dish and heat lamp… if you had the foresight to provide them. The stronger animals survive given the right care, but the weaker ones drop off, going “gimpy.” There is very little you can do for them as they flop and wobble, unable to fully support their own weight. Hobbling, wings splayed for balance, their eyes retreat behind nictitating membranes. And how do you put a chick out of its misery? Bullets and drugs are worth more than the animal, so you tonk it with a shovel…
Profit for what price? Not very long ago it was human beings being treated in this fashion as the slave ships crossed the Atlantic. Are we any more justified?

From Wolf to Chiauau

While mankind has certainly exerted control over animals for personal benefit, such as agriculture, where do pets fit in? Do we have a propensity for dominations or have such practices stem from emotional attachment? Indeed, why do we keep pets and how have they evolved to fill emotional voids in our lives? We have altered animals so much via domestication that for a goodly percentage, survival is impossible without a caregiver. Such alterations then surely give mankind a responsibility care for such creatures. How did we ever from wolf to chiauau? And yet we use and abuse animals, maltreating them until they are no more than a carcass to be consume and cast away. While the ethics of meat consumption is another issue, animals should not be maltreated as they are. Our abuse of creatures is merely a symptom of the sickness so society.