h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Another anti-fish article! First it was the infamous gutting-a-fish article, and now this one, suggesting that fishes be pulled out of thier himes by their mouths and then probably gutted! We h2g2 fishes are running out of safe places to swim with so many fish killers about!

As a non angler who is concerned about the well being of fish have you thought who will look after the fish if anglers don't. It is now 20 years since Friends of the Earth identified anglers as the natural custodians of the country's watercourses, Nothing has changed since.

No one else will put in the money time and labour to ensure the continued well being of the aquatic environment. If it was not for anglers and the collective bodies that represent them our waterways would be nothing more than drainage channels strangled by abstraction at their sources and used for nothing more than the dumping of untreated waist.

In short anglers do not hate fish. They certainly don't hate fish as much as the owners of domestic cats who let their pets out unsupervised hate song birds!

Here in Oklahoma most environmental conservationists are hunters and fishermen. They want to protect the environment from unnatural forces. Also, hunting and fishing is regulated in most states to keep the wildlife at balanced levels, ie: keep them from getting so populous they start to starve for lack of food.

It is a necessary fact of life that we must eat other living creatures (be it plants OR animals) to survive. I believe hunters and fishermen are more humane than the rest of us. Instead of hiding their eyes from the slaughter houses that provide most food, they take a part and have respect for the process that brings the food to their tables. Which is worse, trying not to think about your $5 at McDonalds that went towards the death of an anonymous cow, or knowingly taking a deer/fish/fowl and preparing it for your family? A razor sharp knife or broadhead arrow is a lot quicker and painless than starvation, which IS a problem when the animals have no predators.

Well said! Non-hunters/fishermen don't think, or know - or want to know that part of the balance that keep our wildlife and fish stocks healthy are the humans that hunt or fish. In Canada, Ducks Unlimited, made up mostly of hunters, create habitats for waterfowl to replace the natural swamps that have been drained for farming and human habitation. Dear, elk and moose herds are culled by hunters, leaving more grazing land for the remaining animals, thus ensuring healthy stock. The same goes for fish. Fishermen won't toss garbage into the lakes or rivers where they fish. The slobs who tear around these waterways are the ones who throw garbage into the water. Lord, save me from the do-gooder!

I don't know what's going to happen here in Canada. Gun laws are making it near impossible for people to hunt. The ding-bats in cities figure gun registration, and a huge list of restrictions, are going to prevent crime. When that doesn't work, and it won't, the next step is to outlaw guns entirely. Then where will our wildlife be? Starving at the edges of civilization, that's where.

People get upset with me for this, but it's my honest opinion. I am for sensible gun control. I believe guns should be registered, but it shouldn't cost anything. Any gun that isn't registered should be melted down. Anybody possessing an unregistered handgun should be fined and/or jailed. I believe the government should have enough officers to enforce the gun laws. If done properly there would be no need for more gun control. As it is right now gun owners are heading for a showdown in which they will lose their guns, and the strong gun control advocates will succeed in making hunting a part of history, which I think would be a real shame. There is a middle ground, but everybody has polarized themselves and made a controversy where there should be compromise and real solutions.

Agreed. If there was some common sense in the debate, I would be all for registration, but there's just no sense in the way they're going about it. The general consensis is that if you own a gun, of any sort, you're "bad". If you believe it will stop all shootings, you're "good". I simply don't get their thinking. Are the criminals going to register their weapons? I think not. Are we going to have a gun-free society, that is, the police don't have guns either? That would be the day! No, I just can't see this helping at all. Besides, if all the guns disappeared, people would still be murdered. I can think of any number of weapons around my home, none of them guns. How would you like a crack up the side of your head with my cast iron frypan? I have lots of very sharp knives in my kitchen. There's an old baseball bat in my hall closet. If I can get to the fishing tackle, there are a total of 5 filletting knives in my basement.

I think you are generalizing a lot of gun-control advocates. There are a lot of people who want to get rid of guns, but most people in the US agree with our constituiotnal right to bear arms (even though is mentions the right as being part of a well-REGULATED militia). The problem is that criminals get ahold of guns and there is no way to track them. It has been proven that China has been illegaly importing guns to the US en masse for sale on the streets. How many criminals bought guns from honest gun dealers? How many dishonest gun dealers are never touched by law enforcement because there's no evidence? If the guns have to be registered, that really narrows down who will supply black market weapons.

The reason guns get such a bad rap is because they make it easier to kill. Instead of having to brush up on your swordsmanship you just have to point and pull a trigger. It would take a bit of muscle and skill to kill someone with a frying pan if they see it coming. I personally see bow-hunting as more of a sport than hunting with a rifle.

I do not wish to disarm police officers or the military. I believe they need to be better armed AND better trained than the criminals. I don't want homeowners to have to give up guns. I am planning on buying a house a little ways out of town someday in the near future, and am considering purchasing a shotgun. I believe that is my right. There's no more deterrent for theives than hearing the breech of a double-barrel latch in place, granted I'd probably only put rock-salt in the shells instead of shot (it hurts bad but doesn't kill unless they are really too close).

BTW, compare the number of handgun deaths in the US to the rest of the industrialized world. We do have an epidemic on our hands. We need to do SOMETHING other than bicker and point fingers.

That's the problem in Canada, we don't have very many constitutional rights AS INDIVIDUALS, but groups of people raise enough of a ruccas to make the PM give in to whatever they want. That's where all this nonsence came from. Some idiot killed a bunch of women, and everyone started screaming to stop all this killing by taking the guns out of people's hands. If a woman shoots a man, its self defence. If a man shoots a woman, he's seven kinds of animal, then the anti-gun lobby gets busy again, and it becomes, once more, everyone who owns any gun is a criminal.

Thank your lucky stars you're American. If I wanted to own a shotgun, which I have used and become reasonably adept with I have to fill out a whole battery of papers, have a criminal check, a psychological check, and wait anywhere up to 1 1/2 years to have it all processed, so I can buy a shotgun. I don't even want to know what I have to do to get shells for it! By the way, I'm Military Crossed Rifles.