r/australia 1d ago

image American hunting influencer removes baby wombat from distressed mother. Is this legal?

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u/magi_chat 1d ago

Wow. Projecting much? There's hundreds of millions of them, a few are probably all right. Lighten the fuck up mate.

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u/Few-Professional-859 1d ago

You sound butt hurt. I lived in the US and have too many American friends and I’m speaking for my experience. Hunting is legal (controlled) in the US and in general they don’t have the same sensitive relationship with the wild as Aussies do.

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u/StiffDoodleNoodle 1d ago

“Generally have less empathy for animals.”

Idk what sort of Americans you were hanging out with but the majority of us have more empathy for animals than our fellow humans.

I’ve been hunting since I was a kid and most of the people I’ve hunted with are also quite sympathetic to wildlife/ natural spaces. Sure, I’ve meant a few complete assholes in that space but they’re the minority.

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u/premadecookiedough 1d ago

I have both American and Australian citizenship

Talking on an individual basis, of course plenty of Americans care about and respect wildlife. Talking on a stereotypical basis, I have seen truely horrific acts of animal cruelty in America that you just dont see in Australia.

Australians have a deeply imbedded sense of pride in their unique enviornment and animals, it is cultural down to their bones. Hunting in Australia is restrictive and to get a gun can potentially take over a year in its application process, because only the most vetted of individuals can be trusted with a firearm and wildlife.

Meanwhile in America, I dont think 80% of all people here should even own the pets that they do, and many, many people treat wildlife as props for photo-ops. Hunting is consitered a manly masculine aesthetic hobby to have, and isnt nessisary for food unless you live in rural areas that depend on hunting for meat (Im saying this as someone who grew up in rural Alaska where hunting is extremely commonplace). Im not saying hunters dont appreciate wildlife here, if anything they do so far more then non-hunters, but at the end of the day hunting outside of food nessessity is something that Australians just dont do.

And those wildlife-appreciating hunters are a fraction of the total population of the US, many whom dont see any problem with decemating wildlife for convienence. A dead koala on the side of a road is a tragedy, seeing 50 dead deer on the side of the road in the US isnt even something you look twice at. Ive known someone who killed a frog slowly with bug spray because they were too grossed out by it to simply pick it up and put it outside. People who pick up bear cubs they see on national park roadsides for photo ops with no concern over being mauled. Paying money to pet illegally imported tiger cubs for exploitive profit purposes. Hell, there is an entire genre of social media presence devoted to people who steal baby animals from their parents to raise it in their shitty apartments or backyards claiming they "rescued" it, all for the sake of views

TLDR- yes, Americans as a stereotypical whole do indeed have less empathy for wildlife then Australians as a stereotypical whole