[paraclete]

If you can't wipe out guns when guns kill people, sorry people kill people with guns, will you wipe out bears who kill people, or will you be as protective of the bears as you are of your guns. Wait! There is no bear amendment is there? So the bears have no rights, unlike the guns?
Six people mauled by bears in the US in one day

[joypulv]

Beary punny.
I tend to be sort of literal, so some of the subtlety is lost on me.
Let's see... we have animal rights for the bears. We have rights for people to manufacture, sell, own, and use guns. Guns don't have rights. We are free to break them to bits out in our backyard.
Bears were here before guns, and even belong to the same clade of endothermic amniotes as we humans.
They can go extinct, unlike guns.
The teddy bear has many of us growing up liking bears.
Oh - and bears are pretty damn smart and I admire that. A gun is pretty damn dumb, but I admire the inventors.
People who get mauled by bears I'm very sad about, but many just aren't knowledgeable and prepared.

I have a gun and I also live in an area of bears. I might shoot a bear with my gun, but I would prefer to scare it away with pots and pans.

Not sure how any of this really responds to your wit; maybe it doesn't.

[paraclete]

Scare bear and he will come back, shoot bear and he will not. So you need a gun even to scare bear successfully.

The point here is bears are more protected than humans. Is this because there are less of them or because humans are fundamentally stupid?

[joypulv]

I'd rather a bear comes back than wound him with my piddly 22 and my less than perfect aim.

I'm not sure I agree with your premise that bears are more protected than humans. Generally a bear who harms a human in the US is hunted down by the local DEP and killed, if they know which bear it was, and they might even get the wrong one and kill it anyway, and none of them are mirandized.
Only a few subspecies of bears are protected in the US. We have only two species, black (which can be black, brown, or even white), and the brown (which includes the grizzly).

[paraclete]

Obviously it is stupid to take on a bear with a .22 you might scare him by firing in the air but the point still stands. People are not protected in the US

[joypulv]

The world wide animal killer is the mosquito.
Historylist.wordpress.com says that the US average deaths of humans by animals are this:
Bee/Wasp 53
Dogs 31
Spider 6.5
Rattlesnake 5.5
Mountain lion 1
Shark 1
Alligator 0.3
Bear 0.5
Scorpion 0.5
Centipede 0.5
Wolf 0.1
In 1912, one shark off NJ killed 5 people in one week, and even swam 5 miles up a river to attack some people.
(Horse and bull riding, and deer collision related deaths are not attack deaths. Zoo and circus animal attacks that kill are not included because of the confined environment.)
And now we have the invasive Burmese python, which has killed a 2 year old. I think Florida actually has a bounty on them.
Some have argued with this list.
I wonder what this killer centipede is.
And of course this is deaths, not maulings.

[tomder55]

I've seen some stupid people around bears... you know the type ;the ones who try to get them on video by coaxing them with food . This time of year ,the bears begin to get ready for winter and I have to be careful about when I put out the trash.
The problem isn't bear rights . The problem is the same with deer here . Too many of them . Now I know that we encroached on their habitat . But that doesn't explain the population growth. What explains it is the lack of a legal hunts.

[joypulv]

Where I live (CT) the state as a whole is more forested than it was 100 years ago, as farms dwindle but don't necessarily get built on. So there really is more habitat. But bears don't know state lines, so of course some of them are illegal aliens.
Nobody where I live puts trash outside. 4 kinds: compost, recycle, non-foody trash, foody trash. My foody trash is very small and stays in the freezer until I get to the dump.
The girl who pretended to be dead sounds smart and brave to me!
Being attacked while out walking - who carries bear repellent, not me.

[talaniman]

obviously it is stupid to take on a bear with a .22 you might scare him by firing in the air but the point still stands. people are not protected in the US

Yes they are if they choose to be. I mean its foolish to be in the woods and not know what to do about any critter you may encounter that lives there.

Maybe you should quit watching all those Grizzly attack movies about dope smoking teen agers being stalked by a vindictive bear.

[N0help4u]

Thank the animal rights groups like PETA that say animals are re important than humans

[joypulv]

I wouldn't mind the planet having fewer human animals and more non-human animals.
But that ain't going to happen until we nuke ourselves and start all over from blue-green algae.
UNLESS some special mutant virus or gene or bacteria wipes people out only...

[paraclete]

Maybe you should quit watching all those Grizzly attack movies about dope smoking teen agers being stalked by a vindictive bear.

I don't watch teen horror movies but there are dangerous animals everywhere, fortunately we don't have bear here, not the big and viscious kind anyway, what we have found is that the most dangerous animals are the imported kind particularly the american pit bull dog which has accounted for an number of attacks including deaths

[joypulv]

There are over 2 million pit bull mixes in the US with the characteristic shape of head, but most aren't American Pit Bull Terriers (started in England). That's why it's so hard to enact legislation against them as a breed.
The breeders of the Terrier swear that they are a very friendly dog and that it's the training and environment that teaches them to be vicious. I am willing to believe it.

[paraclete]

There are over 2 million pit bull mixes in the US with the characteristic shape of head, but most aren't American Pit Bull Terriers (started in England). That's why it's so hard to enact legislation against them as a breed.
The breeders of the Terrier swear that they are a very friendly dog and that it's the training and environment that teaches them to be vicious. I am willing to believe it.

In all the pit bull attacks the animals are described as a friendly family dog but they must be territorial or take exception to outsiders a number of the attacks have been on children and the elderly. I would not trust such an animal

[talaniman]

I just find it strange you would be so worried about Americans being so helpless and assaulted by our bears and you have a dog problem. Do you shoot them on site, or what?

Where I live snakes and gators are what you most worry about.

[paraclete]

Tal the dogs are put down following an attack and there is a move to ban them altogether, I recently had a problem with a pit bull cross at my daughters house but the owner spirited it away before the police were called and we haven't seen it again. Very concerning where there are young children around

Yes we have some fun snakes here, I personally leave them alone, in other parts of the country crocodiles and sharks are a threat and of course spiders. But the absence of large predators is why we don't feel the need to be armed got to watch out for the drop bears though

[tomder55]

I don't watch teen horror movies but there are dangerous animals everywhere, fortunately we don't have bear here, not the big and viscious kind anyway,

There are no mean and vicious bears .
Pit bulls have to be bred to attack Actually the idea that they are vicious is a recent event. For most of the 20th century when someone thought of a Pit Bull it was the lovable dog in the Little Rascals series or Nipper the RCA dog that appeard to be part Bull Terrier.
So what happened ? Dog fighting made a comeback in the country . Drug dealers started training them as guard dogs. There were a couple of well publicized maulings by these dogs ,and America over-reacted . Dobermans ,German Shepards and other large dogs are also bred as guard dogs . But there is no significant movement to ban the breeds.
The problem is one that afflicts the western world .Human resposibility is marginalized.

[speechlesstx]

I think the problem is overstated.

Over the past 110 years, a total of 63 people were killed in 59 non-captive bear attacks, most of those occurring in Canada and Alaska, said the study published in the Journal of Wildlife Management.

You're more likely to be struck by lightning.

[tomder55]

The worse I've seen was during a drought year. The black bears here began to forage for food and water real close to the homes . One drank water out of the pool my daughter was swimming in . Another took down our bird feeder and drank from a bird bath in our yard. Setting off the car alarm took care of the situation.

[paraclete]

Tom we take a different view to you, german shepards must be muzzled when off their property and there are some states where they are not allowed unless neutered. Pit bulls have been the cause of most recent dog attacks for whatever reason. We have huge populations of sheep and any predatory animal is not allowed. I personally put down my own german shepard for attacking stock and I have known people who will shoot any dog on sight on their property. If there had been a bear or wolf population here they would be long gone and the native dog exists on sufferance