Category: Let's talk
The following is very graphic, at least for us blind folks, the sound is definitely there.
For those trying to paint nature as a 'loving' entity, I issue the following:
Two male lions slowly killing and eating a warthog!
These two predators didn't grapple the creature in a sleeper hold, nor extinguish life quickly. In fact, they expended lots of very uselessly and inefficiently spent energy in the process. If you, like me, tend to look at nature as a inanimate and extremely inefficient set of processes, you won't be surprised.
However, if you deem animals to have rights, which by definition means they have responsibilities, you're looking at a couple of sadistic perverts here. Two full-grown male lions could very easily have subdued and nearly instantly killed their prey. One could easily argue that from an evolutionary standpoint, a quick subduing / rendering unconscious would make a ton of sense: the least amount of energy for the highest net gain, like free markets. Remember this is two male full-grown lions against a single warthog, a creature with short stubby legs that, when pounced upon, is pretty inefficient in defending itself. It would be nothing for these two to terminate the prey very very quickly.
However, we're looking at a very sloppily-contstructed, maybe even perverse, system here. If you grant animals with any sentience at all, these guys are Class A perverts.
Now I grant you this, many of us that don't support animal rights do support animal wellfare, be literate enough to know the difference when responding but seriously. How could one consider nature animate, and animals at all sentient, without seeing these two as a couple of serious sadistic pervs?
A male lion's jaws could very easily sleeper-hold a wart hog's neck (which would have rendered the prey speechless and unconscious in a matter of a few seconds).
But they did not. Either gross inefficiency in the engineering, or, if you claim they have sentience, they are evil personified.
I dare you to listen to it with headphones on, loud enough so you can hear it, all the way through.
Compare that to the single shot of a hunter which downs the prey nearly instantly.
For the record, I'm not for the unnecessary pain and suffering caused by weirdos with a hundred dogs in a trailer, or such like, but before claiming nature to be some benefactor or benefactress, and before claiming animals have rights (which means responsibilities), watch these two, either sloppily-engineeered insaentient creatures inefficiently acquire their food, or these two perverts sadistically destroy prey, inefficiently using up needless energy for their own enjoyment at the prey's expense.
Either way, it's not an admirable situation. We're not looking at an efficient acquisition of food, resulting in the necessary termination of a prey animal. We're looking t two full-grown male lions on one warthog, either they're really really inefficient, or perverse.
Unfortunately, we can't put animals in jail. Otherwise, I would say the animals should be entitled to the same punishments. Of course, what good would this do, since they wouldn't understand the meaning behind it. Many animals have a mean streak. It's part of the natural process. Is it my favorite part? Absolutely not, but it exists, and unless you would like to go out, look for all the animals that kill their prey the way they did in this video, that's just the way it is.
I would love to see war, crime, hate, abuse, and neglect all vanish from the human society, but even if I turned into a vigil anti, and went out murdering people who exhibited such behavior, it won't stop completely.
I wouldn't waste time rounding them up either, but this is fodder for thought, for those painting humans as the all-too-great evil and all animals as good ... surely we make a ton of mistakes out of greed, shere stupidity, and cruelty. But the video illustrates animals of other types may be no different.
So far as we can tell, we have the only record for even considering the plight of other animals. The very fact there are nature lovers makes us different, profoundly so.
I only issued this video as a challenge.
O yeah. I do agree with you, but I don't think that's an excuse for us to go out and hurt innocent animals either. Imagine what a jury would say to that one:
"Oh, well I only did it because animals hurt each other". True, but that's not going to get you out of the sentence, most likely.
That was never my claim. I think a more honest look needs to be taken at the situation, especially by those who claim we are the only perpretrators and they the lovable victims.
Hmmm, somehow, Lord of the Flies comes to mind.
also, I'm hungry and craving McDonalds, which is Lord of the Fries.
Hmmmm. interesting topic Leo. Being a wildlife conservation major, there are a lot of things that could be at play here. THe lions could have been abandoned by their mothers at an early age and not taught propper hunting technique, they could have been released in to the wild by conservationest, which would, again affect their hunting techniques, or possibly they were starving as many large cats do in the african jungles. Resources are not as abundant as they once were and an animal starving, could not be bothered to take the time to kill their pray before eating it. Animals cannot make informed decisions by theirselves, they go off what they observe, are taught, and of course instinct. I do not feel the lions did this out of any pervercity or sadistic manners. Simply instinct or like i said the many other things that could have been at play. Nature is a beautiful thing. Even when u take up all the tragedies of it. Things like this simply must happen. But the lions did not conciusly make the creature suffer. They were most likely either rehabilitated cats who werent taught propper hunting technique, or the other scenarios i mentioned.
That being said though, it must also be noted that cats often don't kill their prey before eating. Big cats are famous for this, but I don't know if I'd go as far as to say that they do it for the sole purpose of making the prey suffer. Adrenaline influx is known to make meat, even meat we eat, taste sweeter. Maybe that's why they do it. Maybe they like it super warm and wriggling. Maybe, as mentioned above, they weren't taught propper hunting. This doesn't excuse what they did, it simply puts another light on it.
You can observe even domestic cats playing with their prey. In fact, all you have to do is wiggle a wand toy at a cat and watch how they hunt. They never kill it on the first catch, never. Why should we expect the big ones to be any different? Perhaps they are sadistic, but there's little point in assuming they are because we cannot know.
FM
Every animal, both as a group and as an individual has their faults. It's a shame, but it doesn't make me love nature any less.
My family members all have at least one thing I don't exactly praise about them, but that doesn't mean I don't love them. I'm sure the same can be said for me.
Nature may be beautiful, but it is also ruthless. Wasps, which perhaps possess less sentience by common standards than lions, will often kill other insects simply because they're capable of it. That's just one example.
I respect the hell out of nature as a whole, because the natural world is being too heavily encroached upon and because there are many things to love about it, but that doesn't mean I have to approve of everything that happens. Is it fair when a wolf pack bullies an essentially defenseless deer? Is it fair when a gang of dolphins, far smarter and more numerous than a single shark, drive it into the shallows where it essentially chokes to death? Nature is rife with cruelty.
I would, however, like to point out two rather important things. First of all, perversion is an awfully heavy claim on these lions, given that we do not know the true psychology of large cats; all of our experience is filtered through human emotions, which will by their nature tint the lens, so to speak. The other thing I'd like to say is that inefficiency doesn't matter a heck of a lot when you're at the top of the food chain; how many times a day can one observe people proving this in spades? It is not necessarily a sign of evolution going bad, it's a sign, in some cases at least, of complacency on the part of creatures sentient enough to be self-satisfied. As to whether or not a lion has the capacity to enjoy cruelty or suffering, more than just the sweetened taste of the prey's meat I mean, I don't think we'll ever truly know.
Precisely. It is just in the large cats nature. My house cats will never kill a mouse or bird on the first katch, they like to play with it. But it isn't a mental thing? They dont think, ooooo i just feel like being sadistic let me play with this dying creature. It is something that is instilled in them from birth. For example, dogs are very oppurtunistic creatures. If a piece of food is dropped a dog will go after it if not previously corrected. Cats, have a curious nature. If they didn't play with the pray, they would never discover the best way to kill efficiently. And on second thought, that attack wasn't that long and drawn out. It usually is worse. But it is the way of nature and, this, does not at all change my love, respect, and admiration for the beauty, majesty, and essence of the big cat.
However, there species in nature which will attack another creature, as far as we can tell, simply to do so. Dolphins will commonly kill maniti, simply for being a maniti. We can't figure out any reason for this, it can't be over food or territory, they simply do it. I think evil exists in all creatures, and sometimes we act on it. If we are more powerful than something else, we lord that over it. the only way animals can lord power over another animal, is by killing it, and sometimes killing it slowly. Does this mean that nature is bad or evil, no, it simply is. Evil and good are totally subjective to interpretation.
Oh dear. I don't really see this as a good-and-evil thing. First off, I don't believe in good and evil in an elemental all-powerful one-side-or-the-other sense, as some do. Some animals, like humans, seem to exercise power with more flair than they strictly need - cats are a good example of this, but not the only one - but calling them or their acts "evil" is a bit of a stretch. Cruel, needless and brutal, yes, sometimes, but...that's about it.
I think the sad thing here is the direct coorelation between self-awareness and a creature's penchant for unnecessary pain upon its fellows or its prey. And, in retrospect, I also agree with Kayla; this kill might have been nastier than it needed to be, but ninety seconds or so - no matter the eternity it might've seemed to the dying warthog - isn't exactly "lording it over" the poor thing, either.
OK I used the terms to draw people out.
It's the most drawn-out lion killing I've ever seen. Many killings done by lions or even cheetas are much quicker, more akin to what I described.
All I put forth is that if one can't blame the animal, and if you also somehow conclude that animals are no different from us, then you equally, using all the above reasoning, could logically not blame the human who engages in this sort of behavior.
I find that conclusion, though extremely logical and reasonable, very difficult. If you know someone's beating on an animal all the psychobabble in the world won't keep you from stopping them.
I wasn't armed with this video when a few of us more logical types ran into a PETA member back in college, basically with the same arguments: look at the logic, and what one must conclude.
Personally, I don't think they're sentient. Of course they feel things, all animals and perhaps all life to some degree can 'feel', but to claim it's all equal would mean no skating around it, equal responsibility for how it acts. The very arguments put forth here demonstrate nobody at all really believes we're all equals, humans and other life forms. As to the "we don't know what intents are", pseudo-quotient, we do in fact know what outcomes are.
As to the evolutionary argument, most real predators spend a majority of time conserving their energy and resources, in fact, an efficient use of energy seems to be a high priority on their list.
But as to equality, look at all the exceptioning going on you'd think it was a B tree gone wrong and sideways: they are obviously not at all equals, or they would need no exceptions.
And for the record, this'll take the fun out of it for some political types: I'm no animal hater or nature hater. You can't really hate what's inanimate. It's just a machine, albeit quite a complex one. There simply is a gross difference between your cat that purrs up a storm when it thinks you're about to feed it, and a wasp who first tears the legs off a spider, then injects it with two things: a paralyzing chemical and its eggs. The eggs hatch and eat it, alive, from the inside out.
What would you call that, by your own definitions of cruelty, were a human to engage in said behavior? That is all.
Simply put: greater self-awareness denotes greater culpability for one's actions. In general, one will feel more outraged with a person who is willfully cruel than they will at a person who made a terrible mistake and unwittingly subjected someone or something to a horrific death. The same goes for animals...and since we cannot in good conscience presume upon animal psychology, it is a high-minded and self-serving idea to lay the exact same level of blame on a lion that you would upon a serial killer. Be outraged at the atrocity the lion perpetrates. Be sad for the victim. By all means, do these things, because the lion isn't killing by accident and isn't drawing the death out for some purpose we can easily label "noble" and therefore attempt to justify...assuming anything at all can justify that sort of thing at all, of course. But don't assume that the lion understands everything about what it's doing or, for that matter, that the warthog (or any other animal in a similar situation) understands a great deal about the way it's being killed. The hog knows it's in terrible pain which is being inflicted by a predator, but does it know that death should be swift? Can it think to itself, in some fashion or other, "This slow death isn't right"? And thus, given that it is less self-aware (or might be), can we assume that the impact of the lion's behaviour is as great as it might be on a more self-aware creature?
This whole thing is an interesting topic of debate, because there are so many unknowns to play with. The fact is that because we understand our own psychology passingly well but do not fully comprehend the level of self-awareness possessed by most animals, we can become flippant, as a species, about our superiority. It becomes easy to think, "We're more self-aware than they are", because evidence points us in this direction. Maybe we are, and maybe we aren't. If we are more self-aware, to the point that the lion does not think of "cruelty" and the warthog doesn't really understand the lengthy death to which it's being subjected, then we must take great pains not to juxtapose our wider awareness atop the limited capacity of the animals. If, on the other hand, we are actually -less self-aware on the whole - an argument I don't particularly agree with but which I will allow for - then, to borrow a specific turn of phrase, god help us all.
Good point greg. But there is a difference. The psychology of a predatorial animal and a serial killer cannot be compared. A lion kills to survive simply put. An animal that kills to survive and a human that kills for the adrenaline rush, mental problems, or simply just to kill are 2 completely different things. The lion does not make a concious decision to be a predator. That is its instinct and what it needs to survive. Nature is harsh yes, but it is also the most beautiful pieceful thing. Those who do not observe and respect the delicate balance and happenings of nature, should not call themselves a nature lover.
I agree with those who say it's difficult to compare the psychology of these animals to that of our own. Some of it may be similar, but we don't know that. Survival is fairly easy for those of us living in typical neighborhoods. All you need to worry about to survive is having enough money to go to the store and buy food, and making sure it's adequately prepared. Most animals have much more to worry about. Maybe they feel it's necessary to kill their prey the way they do. Again, we don't know. Does that excuse the behavior? No, but nothing goes without its flaws. We can try to understand why all we want, but until we live as those animals, we won't know for sure.
Kayla, you're correct in saying that you can't compare the psychology of a lion to that of a serial killer, but the reason is far simpler than you make it look. You can't compare them because you don't truly know the psychology of the lion; everything you know is filtered through human experience, and probably always will be. The "you" here is a general you, not a specific one.
Ultimately, speculation is about all we can manage. We have every right to wonder, to be awed or disgusted or even a little frightned or intimidated by nature, but to try and stick labels on it, or to try and make humanistic assumptions about animals? No.
Humans and other animals are not equal, but the only reason they aren't is because we don't have enough insight into the lives of other species to judge ourselves against them one way or another.
I just put it out as food for thought, especially for the Peta types.
I've watched a lot of predator / prey situations on video, a majority of which are extremely quick. The exception seems to be domesticated animals. So, as someone earlier stated, these two may have been raised in captivity.
Precisely Greg. Lions cannot be compared to humans because we do not know how their psychology works because of our habbits of using human experience to compare things to. But the behavior of many predatorial animals has been extensively studied. When creatures of a particular group display the same behavioral patterns when hunting it is not simply a coincidence. Although we may not fully understand these creatures, there are scientists who are able to suspend humanitie's bias and judgments for the sake of studying predatorial animals. One thing that can be said in truth, is that lions don't kill just to kill, they kill for survival. It is not fair to compare a lion to a human. We do not kill for survival, a lion must kill to survive. This fact alone, should have killed this topic long ago. The psychology of an animal that has to kill to live should not even be touched upon by humankind because we don't have that same necessity. If anything, humankind finds it a necessity to kill defenseless animals for the sake of expantion, sport, belieffs, or materialistic reasons such as mink coats or ivory statues. Now, I am no PEDA member, but the cruelty of humanity surpasses any cruelty you will find in the wilderness. Just to support my statement, 3 of the original subspecies of tigers have become extinct in the past half a century. The Caspian, Javan, and Bali tiger subspecies were completely wiped out due to human development. THe EndoChinese tiger only remains in captivity with only 10 members left. Conservationests cannot even attempt to bring this subspecies back to their original standing because humans have illiminated their habitat. So, in my opinion (note the word opinion,) humans are more cruel, selfish, and greedy than any other member of the kingdom of animalia.
A carnivore ate an herbivore. Shocker.
Lions do not consider the feelings of their prey, nor do prey animals consider the needs of the lions. The reason they don't do this is because they don't have the time to waste evolving these fickle and inefficient brain processes - they're more focused on, you know, carrying on their genetic line.
Warthogs and other animals often have a "failsafe" in their brains - a system that sends their body into shock after a certain amount of stress, injury, blood loss, etc., so that as they die their nervous system shuts down and they stop feeling pain. They may be aware that they're dying, but they do not stop to consider how well they lived their lives, because animals do not have time for this.
Very few animal species have the concept of self-recognition, time (past v present v future), or culture. Cruelty doesn't exist in nature because humans are the ones who declared cruelty existed. Time doesn't exist in nature because humans created it, and so on.
Very well said.
Defend the human hunters, then, those who hunt for their food, with equal or greater vigor then. You'd have to: a single gunshot (not minutes of chomping when a couple seconds of a sleeper hold would do it).
With all these defenses, those who hunt for food / fill their freezers with venison are equally defensible to this particular two-against-one scenario, where the one was so much smaller than even one of the two it was able to be dispatched with quickly.
Would love to see these same arguments laid at the feet of those opposed to animal slaughter for food, those against hunting for food, etc.
I only used the terms, after all, that Peta uses against human hunters of animal prey.
Crucial difference: Carnivores hunt down the weakest prey because that is what they can catch with their own body strength. Humans hunt down the strongest prey because they need to prove their dick is bigger than the next guy's.
Natural predator hunting benefits the population of a the prey animals by weaning out the genetically inferior, the old and the sick, so that there's more food/shelter/land/breeding partners available for the healthiest animals.
Human hunting destroys ecosystems because it overtaxes the population and tends to weed out the biggest, strongest, most genetically beneficial to breed animals because we hunt with easy to use weapons.
I'm not against human hunting for food. I'm just against hunting for sport.
To the last poster: That is fair, and you'd have a lot of hunters who agree with you.
I'm not a hunter, don't even know if I could pull it off if I had sight.
However, unlike what the poster before said, I do know many subsistance hunters out here, maybe that's a difference between being on the west and east coast.
They get a moose or a deer or an elk, one per year (hopefully) and fill the freezer. For poor families - especially made poorer in recent times, it can be the difference between having meat and not having it.
Oh yeah. People who hunt minimally and use all of the animal, kudos to them. But those people are in the minoirty nowadays.