>>>Now I can shoot a deer and feel a primary sense of joy and excitment instead of guilt. Sure if it is a poor shot and it suffers, I feel bad. But the feeling of a clean shot and quick kill of a deer is definitely one of the top 5 joys in my life.
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>>And that you feel that way doesn't bother you? If you were living in frontier times and killing that deer meant your family would eat for a week instead of going hungry, I can understand the feeling. But in the modern world, how can killing an innocent creature give you joy?
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>>Tamar
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>It's easy to paint deer as innocent little creatures, but they are a pest here. People die from car accidents with deer, and even if they don't die they can become injured and have their vehicles damaged. Deer eat farmer's crops, and destroy property. They're not something that you have to trek into the wilderness to see.

Not to get into a 'hunting' argument, but what came first, the deer, or the houses? I always find it interesting that if anything encroaches on our 'domain', we deem it a pest, but when we showed up and encroached on their domain, well, they are the 'pests' then too.

>We also eat the deer we kill. We don't shoot for the joy of killing and let them lay to rot, as often hunters are depicted.
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>No, it doesn't bother me that I feel that way.