Friday 6 December 2013

Why it is ethical to kill deer but let the badgers live

Culling wildlife has a bad name right now. The government's badger cull has been a disaster on its own terms and a catastrophe by any sensible assessment. But Britain is divided, and not just over badgers. While the culling of badgers in the West Country is condemned by conservationists, in the Highlands wildlife charities are seeking to dispatch large numbers of another majestic native: red deer. And many nature-lovers would cheer an intensified cull of deer populations across the country. To philosophers of animal rights, "conservation culling" is an Orwellian atrocity – "speciesism" in action. And conservationists – and I include myself in this group – sometimes flounder in the face of such clear and principled thinking.

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