Irish hunting poll

Hi all.

Not strictly a shooting/firearms subject, but it's closely related and has implications for the shooting/firearms community over here.

There's an ongoing controversy going on here in Ireland about an outfit known as the Ward Union Hunt, and their trials and tribulations in renewing their hunt licence.
They participate in an activity known as a 'Carted Stag Hunt,' which involves releasing a semi-tame Red Deer stag into the countryside and chasing it down with horses and hounds. The stag is eventually held at bay by the hounds, re-captured, and returned to the herd.
Think of is as like Fox Hunting with hounds, except with a Red stag who doesn't end up dead at the end.

Latest episode here-
http://www.independent.ie/national-news/anger-over-stag-hunt-ban-1250811.html


Anyhow, I don't have any particular interest in chasing stags (or foxes) on horseback, but this sort of thing has brought out the usual suspects who make no secret of their aims of banning all forms of hunting (including with firearms), and most of them fit snugly into the 'Guns bad, m'kay?' camp too.

As such, we shooters and gun owners tend to lend our support to the other field sports enthusiasts, as we're very much on the same sh** lists of the antis too.
United we stand, divided we fall, and all that.


Can I ask anyone interested to hit an on-line poll from one of our daily newspapers, asking "Do you think stag hunting should be banned?"
It's currently at Yes: 69%, No :31%.
The 'No' vote has been slowly creeping upwards over the last few hours.

You'll find the poll about half way down this page-
[noparse]http://www.independent.ie/[/noparse]


I've voted in support of you guy's gun rights on a bunch of U.S. based polls, so I hope I'm not breaking any rules here by asking this.

Thanks.

Fair enough

Thanks for the support folks, there's another one here-
[noparse]http://www.ireland.com/[/noparse]

macFarlaine: thanks for reading my post and your response. As I said, I don't participate in this, so I'm going on the information I've gotten from the people who do.
Past experience has taught me to be somewhat sceptical of the information provided by the antis, whereas I personally know plenty of people involved in various field sports and would put much more store on what they tell me.

I deliberately left the link as plain text so that the poll servers don't log the links as coming from here, a heavily pro firearms/hunting site.
I've seen on U.S. based polls I've participated in, where the anti side start bleating about 'orchestrated campaigns' to skew the results of 'their' poll.

Of course, if 'their' side aren't interested enough to get organised, what does that tell them about their 'cause?'

Just to clarify my own position on this: I'm not overly enamoured with the whole concept of a carted stag hunt (or fox hunting with horse and hound either, for that matter), and I wouldn't be campaigning for their introduction here if they didn't already exist; they do exist however, and I'm uneasy with the cries of "Ban!"
Most of the leading protagonists on the 'Ban' side of this issue are the same groups and individuals who would see all forms of field sports banned, including hunting with firearms; and they range from 'vaguely' to 'virulently' anti-firearms in general.

Most people I know in the shooting/firearms community here are lending their support to the Ward Union Hunt not because they particularly support carted stag hunting, but because they know that their sport is only a little further down the anti's list, and if we stay silent while someone else's sport is under the spotlight, we'll be on our own when our turn comes.

Thanks to everyone for the responses.

Thanks to everyone for responding, and thanks too to those who felt unable to vote in favour of the hunt, I understand and appreciate your reasons.

As far as I know, Ward Union is the last remaining hunt of this type in these islands (Ireland and Great Britain), and I don't doubt that in time it will go the way of bear and bull baiting; what's giving the shooting fraternity here cause for concern is the way and by whom its immediate demise is sought.

Nobody that I know with an interest in shooting would shed a solitary tear if the Ward Union Hunt were to announce tomorrow that they were folding their tents and stealing away into the night, it's just that for the groups most stridently demanding their ban, killing off the last remaining carted stag hunt is only part of their objectives. Further down their list comes hunting with guns, and then guns in general.

For us shooters, there's more than a bit of "my enemy's enemy is my friend" going on here; a 'victory' for the antis on this one only encourages them to further pursue their agenda.