Foxhunting is an utterly barbaric activity that should have no place in what we like to think is a modern and progressive Ireland - Read ICABS Campaign Director Aideen Yourell's Letter to the Editor in the Westmeath Topic...
Foxhunting - a “cruelty that cannot be justified”
Westmeath Topic
27 February 2020
Dear Editor,
How sad and disappointing that last week's edition of Westmeath Topic featured a full page of photos of foxhunting supporters at their annual hunt ball in Mullingar. Topic referred to "scenes of glitz and glamour" at this event, which was nothing short of a celebration of animal cruelty and a fundraiser for same.
Foxhunting is an utterly barbaric activity that should have no place in what we like to think is a modern and progressive Ireland.
Just last September 2019, a RED C poll revealed that 77% of Irish people agreed that foxhunting and hare coursing should be banned, but our legislators lack the courage and compassion to consign these cruel activities to the dustbin of history, as has been done by our neighbours, England, Scotland and Wales.
Westmeath foxhunt goes out twice weekly, between November 1 and mid-March, hounding and killing foxes for "sport" and their wanton cruelty has been well documented in hunt reports published in the Irish Field and the Farmers Journal down the years.
For example, A 2011 Farmers' Journal hunting report told of how sixteen mounted followers of the Westmeath hunt, along with 29 hounds, found a fox that was caught and "chopped." Later on, another fox was "overhauled before he managed to put any distance between himself and them." Both "chopped" and "overhauled," in hunting terminology, mean that the fox was caught by the hounds and brutally killed by being ripped apart and disembowelled.
Even proponents of foxhunting agree that it is cruelty that cannot be justified, as Nicholas O'Hare, a hunting columnist with the Irish Field, wrote in 1992: "The problem for both Irish and British hunting people is that their sport, no matter how traditional or how highly eulogised by its supporters, is a minority sport with the damning spectre of cruelty hanging over it. This is the key issue. Is hunting cruel? The answer, of course, is that it is. How can such cruelty be justified? The answer is that it cannot".
Aideen Yourell
IRISH COUNCIL AGAINST BLOOD SPORTS
PO Box 88, Mullingar
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ICABS ACTION ALERT
Contact the leaders of Fine Gael, Fianna Fail, Sinn Fein and the Green Party to tell them that you want fox hunting, and all bloodsports, banned.
Leo Varadkar
Leader, Fine Gael
Government Buildings,
Upper Merrion St, Dublin 2
Telephone: 01-619 4020
Email: taoiseach@taoiseach.gov.ie; leo.varadkar@oireachtas.ie; finegael@finegael.ie
Tweet to: http://www.twitter.com/@LeoVaradkar
Leave a comment on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/LeoVaradkar
Micheál Martin
Leader, Fianna Fail
Constituency Office
137 Evergreen Road,
Turner’s Cross, Cork
Email: micheal.martin@oireachtas.ie
Phone: 021-432 0088
Leinster House: 01–618 3000
Leave a comment on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/michealmartintd/
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/@MichealMartinTD
Mary Lou McDonald TD
Leader, Sinn Fein
Tel: (01) 727 7102
Email: marylou.mcdonald@oireachtas.ie
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MaryLouMcDonald
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/MaryLouMcDonaldTD
Eamon Ryan
Leader, Green Party
Tel: 01 618 3894
Email: eamon.ryan@oireachtas.ie
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EamonRyanGP/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/EamonRyan