>I think conservationsist is meant in a sense that they respect and appreciate nature.

These kinds of conversations inevitably involve either special pleading or completely distorted definitions of words like "respect" that we would not accept in any other context.

>I think your second sentence is not well formulated because if one does not follow you line of thought it does not make sense [...]

I honestly have no idea what you're trying to communicate here. Do you want to try again?

> These kinds of conversations inevitably involve either special pleading or completely distorted definitions of words like "respect" that we would not accept in any other context.

And I think this is a bit condescending. You're essentially denying me to have a different opinion because it's just invalid in your point of view. To give you perspective: I am not a hunter, I am a vegetarian and have been very active in environmental protection. I am certainly not advocating for myself or feel the need to defend my actions by special pleading or completely distorted definitions. But I see that hunters fullfill an important role because we don't really have much wild nature here in germany anymore and for most parts it's not possible because there's not enough space and the developed nature is not robust enough. Enviromentalist organisations here often work quite closely with hunters. And I also see that hunters exist that respect and appreciate nature (not because they want to hunt), which you seem to deny.

> I honestly have no idea what you're trying to communicate here. Do you want to try again?

"But that doesn't mean they appreciate nature and it certainly doesn't mean they respect individuals, which they obviously do not." Does not make sense to me because "certainly doesn't mean they respect individuals, which they obviously do not." does not. You say "X does not do Y because it obviously does not do Y." where X is the hunter and Y is respecting individuals. You treat it as given but for me it's not. What I wanted to say is that your sentence only makes sense when one shares your line of thought (it's obvious then), but when one does not then it's a not an argument (it is so because it is so). You treat it as a fact. In spirit it's similiar to my reply above.

We're not talking about differences in opinion here. We're talking about abuse of language. You cannot respect an individual and kill them for entertainment. If you think otherwise, you're using a completely different definition of the word 'respect' and it's certainly not the definition that would be used in any other context. Hunters can be conservationists. They can even be a net positive for nature overall. But they kill other individuals. For enjoyment. Unnecessarily. They don't respect them. And I say this is obvious because it's a simple syllogism.

Pretending that there is some sort of subjectivity to this discussion is disingenuous and intellectually dishonest. You keep trying to shift this back to opinions and points of view, which I find is a common tactic when discussing animals, but we're not talking about anything subjective.

> Pretending that there is some sort of subjectivity to this discussion is disingenuous and intellectually dishonest. You keep trying to shift this back to opinions and points of view, which I find is a common tactic when discussing animals, but we're not talking about anything subjective.

Well, I think this answer is even more condescending. A discussion from here is not possible since you entirely deny every other opinion on the topic and assert yourself the objective truth. You ignore the various aspects of the problem, for example professional hunters. A quick search reveals philosophers discussion the question and coming to different or complex answers that depend on various factors (most importantly: why does the hunter hunt?), so I can't be the only one not buying into your line of thought. I originally was honestly interested in you opinion, but it seems there's no depth to it. You can't even defend it, you're just reinforcing that you're right.

EDIT: since there's another answer in a similiar spirit there's at least one other opinion that rejects or doubts your statement.

EDIT2: An interesting example to reinforce my arguments is that the statement "women, who have abortions, don't respect human live, because they obviously do not" is seen as trivial by some but rejected by others. These things do not live in a mathmatical world where axioms are stated, agreed and theorems derived using proofs and pure logic. So one talking about those topics can never assert the obvious truth to his statements. There are no right or wrongs in philosophy and ethics (in a mathmatical sense), just statements the people agree on.

You can keep calling me condescending, but that's not an argument. If you have a definition of "respect" that includes unnecessary killing, great. Provide that definition and then tell me that you use the same definition for ones treatment of humans. If not, you're guilty of special pleading. If you have citations of philosophers who make an argument that you can hunt an individual for sport while respecting them, I'd love to see them.

If you want to express a difference in opinion, do so. You keep repeating that you don't like my statements and there are other opinions, but you have not yet been able to articulate what that different opinion is and how it applies to the conversation.

Hunting and deriving enjoyment from it does not mean you can't have respect for the individual animal. Obviously there are sociopathic people out there who kill animals (and other people) without respect but you are arguing that there isn't an alternative. I would argue that hunters that respect animals vastly outnumber the hunters that don't.

Unless you have zero capacity for empathy, it is impossible to not have a massive respect for life when you take direct responsibility for death. Every aspect of our mass produced lives causes death. Unless you are 100% off grid, everything you consume from the vegetables and meat you eat to the clothes on your back are the products of death. Hunting forces you to take direct responsibility.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think this aspect was what you took offence to, but it was the idea of enjoyment. I was raised as deer hunter and cried after my first kill. I challenge you to ask any lifelong deer hunter what they enjoy about hunting. Sure, they enjoy finding a big one but none of them find enjoyment in seeing an animal suffer or in the act of killing alone. They become better marksmen so they can kill as quickly and painlessly as possible and they eat what they kill. They enjoy the craft of marksmanship, tracking animals, and land management. They enjoy being alone in the woods all day doing nothing but watching and listening to wildlife. And they enjoy having visceral connection to nature, our past, and what we consume.

I'm not asking you to agree with any of this. I only ask you to try to see that there are other perspectives outside of your bubble and to not flippantly dismiss discussion about them as 'disingenuous and intellectually dishonest.'

>Hunting and deriving enjoyment from it does not mean you can't have respect for the individual animal.

I'll ask you the same thing I've been asking the other commenter. What is your definition of respect that includes the unnecessary killing for sport and will you apply that same definition to humans? I haven't made any arguments about sociopathy, which is a straw man. You went down a long rabbit hole about what hunters enjoy about hunting. None of that is new information to me and none of it is relevant to my point. I'm simply pointing out that any definition of respect that I've come across would not include the unnecessary killing of someone. Whether you enjoy the act of killing and whether you enjoy other aspects of hunting make no difference to the 3 relevant premises: 1. Hunting for sport is unnecessary. 2. Respect for an individual requires not killing them unnecessarily.

Tell me which one of those statements you disagree with. And again, if it's the latter, you can't apply that specifically to prey animals without that being fallacious. We're all completely talking past each other; neither of you have pointed out any issues or disagreement with my reasoning, just that you don't like the outcome as expressed.