Words Fail Me........

[ToraToraTora]

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-41656188
Is it bad that I want to murder the scum that did this?

[anneasquith]

I can't look at that picture for more than a second :-(

[marval]

Can I do the same to the poachers?

[ToraToraTora]

blame the BBC naomi. It's shocking but we need to be shocked sometimes.

[ladybirder]

You don't need to Anne, a glance and it is frozen inside your head forever.
Many moons ago I glimpsed a shot of an ancient bit of black and white film of a man leading an elephant onto a low metal plate and then electrocuting it. I can still see the poor animal crumbling and collapsing to the floor as clearly now as the day I saw it. Apparently it was an experiment done to determine how much power would be needed to kill a person.

[jno]

poor people need to feed their families. If it was down to saving a rhino or saving a human, I'd go for the human. Speciesism, I suppose.

[EDDIE51]

Apparently Vietnam has taken over from China as the world destination for illegal Rhino horn
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/05/why-does-a-rhino-horn-cost-300-000-because-vietnam-thinks-it-cures-cancer-and-hangovers/275881/
$300,000 of one horn !!!!
At that price killing one rhino would allow a entire gang of poachers to live in comfort for the rest of their life. I utterly condemn the poachers but until you stop the demand someone is always going to supply it.

[ladybirder]

Have they never heard, or has nobody ever told them, about Viagra?

[jno]

ladybirder, yes, rhino poaching dropped off a lot after Viagra was developed. But the horns aren't used only for virility issues, I believe they have quite a lot of (possibly imaginary) uses in Asian medicine.

[emmie]

its a terrible picture, shocking and mind numbing.

[EDDIE51]

^^ That may be the answer to China, but as I have just found, the new market is Vietnam where one Rhino horn fetches $300,000.
The tragedy is that they think it will cure Cancer and hangovers !!

[ladybirder]

Thanks for that info Jno. Most probably all in the mind.

[andy-hughes]

It is a dreadful picture, but let's not imagine a scenario that did not take place.

This animal was butchered painlessly, and a required piece of it was removed post mortem - something that happens every minute of every day in abattoirs around the world.

Only if you are a vegetarian are you entitled to the moral high ground over the slaughter of animals for economic reasons.

And the answer to your question is yes, because it appears that you feel that impotent keyboard fury is the appropriate response to situations like this - when in fact it is education and alternative economics, neither of which are obtained by murdering anyone.

[ummmm]

A bit different killing an animal for food to killing it for a horn!

[Prudie]

But this is a crime and illegal and you have no idea if it was done painlessly. Unlike an abbattoir it's not killed for food. They just left it there. Trying to defend this in any way is disgraceful.

[ducksie]

Humans are cruel, while the rhino is a very disturbing picture of what poachers do to get the horn from the rhino we have terrible trouble here with the horse loving community of the travellers, they beat the life out of the horses, racing sulky's on our roads and when the horse can no longer run, they impale them on those horrible fences we see over sports grounds etc and often along the ring road around our city,the same horse loving community were given free land for grazing horses, instead they moved caravans in :( one horse they dumped in a river and a local put the pics on facebook to get help to pull the horse out
https://www.google.ie/search?rlz=1CAACAJ_enIE683IE683&tbm=isch&;sa=1&q=pictures+of+sulky+horses+in+kilkenny&oq=pictures+of+sulky+horses+in+kilkenny&gs_l=psy-ab.3...24130.32321.0.33059.36.36.0.0.0.0.274.4616.4j31j1.36.0....0...1.1.64.psy-ab..0.15.2259...0j0i67k1.0.mpUDTobhUZ4

[ToraToraTora]

Andy, ridiculous twisted illogic, even by your standards.

[andy-hughes]

ummmm - // A bit different killing an animal for food to killing it for a horn! //

That is merely semantics.

The point I am making is this - someone has killed an animal and cut a piece off it to sell for profit. That is exactly the same reason why animals are slaughtered in abattoirs, and I repeat my point - unless you are a vegetarian, then being upset about the image is hypocrisy.

[vulcan42]

Andy-hughes,
" This animal was butchered painlessly,"
And you know this, how?

[ToraToraTora]

so it's the old meat is murder drivel from the veggies is it Andy? you're better than that, come on.

[ummmm]

Meat helps keep people fed. Horns don't.