I meant to respond to this before, but I was busy then i forgot about it...
I personally have a problem with causing intentional unneccesary and unjustifiable pain to any living thing, mostly because I feel that's a good way to show respect for life and the basic order of things in general... so if your snake will ONLY eat live, then it's perfectly justifiable to feed live... I know the argument that they eat live in nature is there... but mice can run away in nature, too, so that's kind of a double standard. Anyhow, I don't panic about stepping on ants while I'm walking from here to there, but I wouldn't let my kids take a magnifying glass to an anthill at the park... It doesn't seem respectful to me. If ants are invading my home, you bet I'd take the whole colony out... If there is a mouse in my home, then a mousetrap is in order. (Yes, even the killing kind) And if the mouse is wise to those, and desperate measures must be taken, then poison may be in order... I think most people don't delight in causing the prolonged suffering of another living thing, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant. I'm an omnivore, you can tell by the kinda sharp teeth in the front, and the wide flat teeth in the back... so I'm not against eating meat or anything, just mostly against the idea of getting joy out of someone else's pain. I know that wasn't remotely the point you were making, you wouldn't get joy out of it... some things have to be done, and I think whacking a mouse on the head to kill it quickly is a lot kinder than prolonging its suffering, so that would be the better way to go, in my opinion... but as someone mentioned before... some snakes will only eat live, so in that case, the snake's gotta eat... perfectly justifiable. Different people will use different rationalizations... those are mine, for what they're worth.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2007-10-05 09:17 pm (UTC)I personally have a problem with causing intentional unneccesary and unjustifiable pain to any living thing, mostly because I feel that's a good way to show respect for life and the basic order of things in general... so if your snake will ONLY eat live, then it's perfectly justifiable to feed live... I know the argument that they eat live in nature is there... but mice can run away in nature, too, so that's kind of a double standard. Anyhow, I don't panic about stepping on ants while I'm walking from here to there, but I wouldn't let my kids take a magnifying glass to an anthill at the park... It doesn't seem respectful to me. If ants are invading my home, you bet I'd take the whole colony out... If there is a mouse in my home, then a mousetrap is in order. (Yes, even the killing kind) And if the mouse is wise to those, and desperate measures must be taken, then poison may be in order... I think most people don't delight in causing the prolonged suffering of another living thing, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant. I'm an omnivore, you can tell by the kinda sharp teeth in the front, and the wide flat teeth in the back... so I'm not against eating meat or anything, just mostly against the idea of getting joy out of someone else's pain. I know that wasn't remotely the point you were making, you wouldn't get joy out of it... some things have to be done, and I think whacking a mouse on the head to kill it quickly is a lot kinder than prolonging its suffering, so that would be the better way to go, in my opinion... but as someone mentioned before... some snakes will only eat live, so in that case, the snake's gotta eat... perfectly justifiable. Different people will use different rationalizations... those are mine, for what they're worth.