Should fox hunting be banned?

[sweetheart]

The british public is hung up about fox hunting, and it seems all a bit silly from american eyes. I saw a fox hunt close up, and the dogs, horses and red coats really were amazing and quite cool to see in the flesh (my last experience in the beatles sg. peppers album ;-))

The issue has roots in that the working class does not like the "rich" people who can afford horses riding across their land and screwing up their gardens. My local fox hunter drives around in a land rover with a spotlight after midnight and culls foxes with a long range rifle by the glint in their eyes at night.... The modern form kills more foxes, but is deemed "legal".

Don't laugh, this issue is more important to the british than any WMD'S or the BFEE. Perhaps the dems need an issue like fox hunting for mass distraction.. ;-)

[Oggy]

1. I have to dissagree

I think we are more intrested in why we were lied to about WMD. There have been questions asked of the Government why they are using valuable Parliment time for Fox hunting legislation instead of the more important issues that need time.

Having said that, you are right about it having a Working class/Upper Class basis for the roots of the issue. These days though the chances of a hunt being on land without the owners permissions is pretty remote. I think the issue now is steeped in Animal rights, which is a very powerful voice ( just look at the attempt to change the laws on halal meat ), although those from country areas see it as an Urban war on the way of life for coutry folk. As someone who was brought up in the country and moved to the city, I can see both sides of the argument. There are a lot of people who will be affected that have nothing to do with fox hunting, as it will stop people catching rabbits with dogs etc. I do think a ban is probably the right thing to do, but I think it is insane that they are doing now, there are far more important things that Parliment should be spending their time on.

[T_i_B]

2. I support fox hunting....well I TOLERATE it!

Maybe it's the fact that I work in a town which is quite big on Fox Hunting (Maldon in Essex does have a wee fox hunt around Christmas/new year time and the locals are pretty strongly pro-hunting) but I do support fox hunting.

A fox is not an endangered species but a farmyard pest and if a bunch of upper class twits want to have some fun getting rid of them then that is fine by me, even if I don't do it myself. Neither is fox hunting a big issue with me it must be said.

Fox hunting is an issue which both left and right get very worked up about it indeed. A real hot button issue. This can be seen by the 400,000 who marched with the Countryside alliance in September. Of course the Countryside Alliance has more issues than just hunting but that is the issue for most CA supporters. I'm not a Countryside Alliance supporter as I think they are the biggest bunch of hypocrites going on the issue of the EU Common Agricultural Policy. Mind you, I do think they have every right to march.

[Oggy]

4. My local village..

.. back at home also has a Xmas ( well boxing day ) hunt. I wonder if the Maldon one is the same sort of set up? i.e. 20 odd folk set off from one of the local pubs at 9:00. The other 500 residents being extremely happy with the early pub opening proceed to get smashed out of their minds for the next 15 hours.

[T_i_B]

5. Bigger than that

In fact it sometimes get's national media coverage, lots of pro & anti hunt types invade for the day. It's still got the same sort of piss-up element to it though!

I can't remember whether or not it's Boxing day or New years day but one week it's the hunt and the other it's the Maldon Mud Race where lots of strange people run along a VERY muddy river bank in the middle of winter for charity! We do like having funny events like that over here in Maldon!

Personally I tend to stay rooted at my workplace when the fox hunt is on. Pro & anti hunt idealogues are something I prefer to avoid.

[deutsey]

3. NO!

We love to hunt FOXES!!!


We lahk their big Amuraken breasts! The Festrunk Brothers

(Sorry, I couldn't resist...)

[RetroLounge]

6. No, Fox hunting should be encouraged...

The hunt should start with O'Reilly and then go after Hume...

[sweetheart]

16. The greatest fox hunt of them all.

It started at the democratic caucus of 2004. Everyone came prepared for the fox hunt, and around the country they went, the american version of Mao's long march... hunting neeoocons.

Bob Huxley of Montgomery Alabama proudly displayed the neocon skins and trophys on the back of his pickup truck. "This year'z gonna be GREEAAATTTTT huntin'."

"The hunt already has five hundred thousand horsemen ridin after them varmits, and 2 million dogs.... the dogs smell out the neocon hair spray and underwear, and then the hunters step in... just regular folks with hedgeclippers and carving knives.... its very civil this hunting season... none of them neocons dies a painful death at the dogs.. once an arm is chewed off, we cut the throat within a minute... no worries."

As the horsemen and dog militia surround washington for the final cleanup, the world is in jubilant celibration... at last, those nasty pests are hunted to extinction... like smallpox, nobody appears to be sad at the end of neeoocon.

:-)

[SoCalDem]

7. ....Y....E....S....

:(

[Bunny]

8. Don't the foxes die a horrible death?

I'm not in Britain, so I really don't have a strong opinion about fox hunting. I don't have a problem if a bunch of rich people want to get snockered and ride around the country side with horses and dogs.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought that the dogs chased the fox, cornered it, and then ripped it to pieces. Seems pretty brutal to me. I mean, can't someone shoot the poor thing first, to spare it from such a gruesome death?

[sweetheart]

10. The foxes horrible death.

I'd take a fox hunting death over lethal injection. At least i'd be free until the last, and the possibility that i'd might survive is left open to nature a bit.

The big island of hawaii has a tradition of a man being accused and hunted to his death unless he reached a sacred ground first, in which case, he was pardoned by the gods. The place is on the southwest of the big island south of kona...

A local man hunts the foxes on the 1000's of acres around here of common grazing ground. He uses a roof-spotlight panning across the peet... fox eyes shine bright in the light, and a rifle scope takes 'em down quick and dead. He's killed 7 foxes so far this year in this area around the lamming (time of year when little lambs are born..april/may).

To complain of a foxes plight as it might be killed by dogs vs. rifles, is myopic in the extreme... what about all the human beings being murdered, and tortured... in britain alone, those allowed to die from overdose by stupid drugs wars on disenfranchised people. The ability to prevent pain and death is all over in life, and to narrow it to the tiny tiny tiny tiny fraction of foxes who experience pain while dying in the mouths of dogs....? Its the stupidist liberal argument i've ever heard... if its liberal to change something that has been a tradition for hundreds of years.

There is a whole economy around horse running, hunting, and all that... a huge huge countryside economy, partly barter running under the veneer of this argument, and it is an ecnomnic disempowerment of those people who, as fate would have it, are mostly common labour people... show me the toff who grooms his own horse.

I killed about 15 rabbits last year with my car. Some times the death was ugly, and maybe prolonged as just a leg was crushed in the dark night or so.... now lets ban driving to keep potentially poor little rabbits from getting their feet squished.... and what about fly swatters and pesticides... anmial rights nutters indeed. ;-)

[SoCalDem]

13. I don't consider myself an "animal rights nutter"

I just think that if a bunch of people want to go riding and take dogs with them, great.. Just leave the foxes out of it.. They probably have a hard enough time with "civilization " encroaching on their territory, without being hunted down and torn to bits by dogs..:(

If foxes start invading the neighborhoods in gangs and start killing the pet dogs, then by all means eliminate those foxes, but for the ones whose home the hunters are trampling through, give them a break :)

[sweetheart]

18. what is common grazing?

Hunting foxes in the many hectares of open land between villiages is very similar to american rattle snake hunting... they are a danger to sheep, almost everywhere in britain from the open moorland to the far south... but fox extinction is hardly an issue.

I used to keep pet mice years back, and i thought they were clean and cute... now i get farm mice in my kitchen and i use traps that smash the head... you know... grandma's rat traps... If a fox killed your little puppy dog, you'd get out a rat trap... so methinks the fox is more of a pest than the ideology would have it.

I am for regulated hunting... let them do it and not be nasty to the fox in its moment of death. The simple solution is the middle path.... do nothing. Let them continue to hunt, just whisper in their ears to take it easy on the foxes, and be polite.

I've seen the hunts in the countryside, and nobody there, from landowners to tenants were unhappy to have them chase away that damn fox. Methinks, fox hunting is the british "abortion"... prone to causing whacky insanity in otherwise politically normal people.

I wonder if we killed foxes with trident missiles, if anyone would give a hoot. Perhaps, its just the dogs thing... i'm sure explosives and stuff is totally cool. Perhaps the hunters should get on board with shrub to build an offensive, space based fox hunting system.

[Bunny]

14. So who pissed in your Wheaties?

Excuse me for giving a shit about a fox being torn to death by a pack of dogs FOR NO GOOD REASON.

Clearly, this translates to: I do not care one whit about the needless deaths of any human beings, or other animals. (sarcasm off).

For Chrissakes, take a pill why dontcha?

[sweetheart]

19. you and your imaginary foxes

I watched dogs flush a fox from underbrush and a hunter's bullet take him down in ayershire near glasgow in scotland. The hunt was beautiful. I think the nutters have been creating really fascinating propaganda like babys in incubators.

Please i don't mean anything personal. My wheaties are made of piss. :-)

[ott]

39. There was a whole economy around slavery

That justified it for a lot of people too. Not liberals, who stood up for what was right and changed something that had been a tradition for hundreds of years.

I agree given the context fox hunting, as well as hunting in general is by far one of the less extreme forms of animal abuse. There are people that speak out against it probably as they're eating some fast food hamburger whose factory farmed donor cow suffered far more than a few measly foxes ever did.

I guess I commend you for coming right out with your bigotry instead of being a hypocrite about the whole thing.

However, by your logic I should be shooting squirrels for fun because people are being ethnically cleansed in the Congo. I should just dump my used motor oil down the drain because tankers spill all the time.

It's like saying your car broke down on the side of the road and you're just some nut bitching about stupid little things when someone stops and slashes your tires. Not like you were going anywhere anyway.

It's simply wrong to make an innocent creature suffer, especially for pleasure, dietary or otherwise. One wrong doesn't make a lesser wrong right.

...and a fox hunt is about as beautiful, graceful, noble, and sporting as someone beating a lame dog.

[sweetheart]

45. kucinich... we agree

To be honest, i'm not inclined to make judgements about fox hunting. I've seen it now in various forms, and nothing i have seen indicates an activity that i think needs excessive regulation. No person i know in the countryside thinks that animals suffering is funny or desireable.

I merely point to how such points of view marginalize the REAL issues and also the balance of the people with those views. An end to suffering of all animals is certainly my bigoted hope in it all... that 400,000 people will march on london to save a fox, but not to legallize drugs so their kids won't die from overdoses... it all seems twisted and sick.

The left gets marginalized by the treee hugger stereotype, that will deploy an empire's miltary bombers to mass murder a few thousand people, but who's ethics are seriously bent out of shape by a fox getting killed by a natural predator.

I agree that its a really trivial thing this fox hunting, but as it got you to stick me with "bigot", shows how much this seemingly minor issue can result in angry feuds.. like abortion can in the US... in real life, i would accept any solution on fox hunting mr kucinich would suggest... and after hearing all the parties involved, he would likely see the political traps set around the issue to divide a naturally cooperative electorate... and he would find a way to do justice to foxes and the people who make their living from the hunt. slowly slowly, if it ain't broke don't fix it.... and fox hunting is not broken in britain, but a lotta things are.... that there is time to fix fox hunting must mean the other issues must be all fixed up round now.... and this is not true... the parliment is playing dirty as democracy has been subverted by campbell, blair, * and the lies.

[TheUnionDemocrat]

29. Natural Deaths are pretty brutal too...

Ever seen an old suffering fox who can't move to get water or food but lives for days before finially dying?

Or worse yet, ever seen what a coyote does to a fox?

Neither are pretty.

[molly]

9. YES - it is a horrible "sport"

[AP]

11. Interesting 'community standards' aspect to this issue

The UK is a society in which there is an intense love for animals. It's really apparent if you come from abroad. There are so many animal shows on TV, and the RSPCA has a very high profile. In the UK, most people would probably want to jail someone who neglected their pets. Contrast this to the absolute brutality of fox hunting (the dogs tear the fox to pieces -- it is an absolutely viscious, inhumane sport which has no parallel), and you begin to wonder why there's one community standard for 99.9% of Brits and another for the fox hunters.

[AP]

15. There's also an interesting land use/land reform issue here

Generally, (according to Joe Stiglitz) an economy functions well when land ownership isn't concentrated in the hands of a few, and when it's being put to its best economic use. Fox hunting has a peculiar effect of holding on to an old, unproductive use of land, and creating a slight barrier to the shift to uses which are better for the economy as a whole, and which distribute income in a more democratic way. People who like fox hunting argue that it's good for rural economies. In fact, it (along with a host of other things) prevents rural economies from progressing.

[sweetheart]

17. ok i'm sold

That rings true to me... economic reform issue, rather than issue of pain for foxes.

Part of the irony in this if not reported in the US, is that britain's parliment has found the time to ban fox hunting recently... as if investigating going to war with no reason was not important... it is a sign of the decline of "new" labour and the rise of populist old labour... not a good sign to take such a personal attack on "some" tory toffs... as truth be told, the people who are most likely to be put out are "torys", and the attack is as personal as the neocon disempowerment of the IT economy.

It is an old punch old labour has long harboured, and has wisely kept in check until now... tony's moment of weakness... it is a stupid move to reform it in this way... wasting sooo much political capital... but i can't argue the logic of the stiglitz... it sounds good... just who will kill the foxes in the common grazing ground round my villiage next year?

Like it or not, we trap rats and pests around farms... the dark side of all that pastoral bliss is the sheep in severe pain with an infected udder because the vet bill is worth more than the sheep. Come see pain in a farm and dying animals... let only someone who has seen a fox die in a hunt speak out on that one... anyone?

[AP]

20. Incidentally, fox hunts NEED foxes for fox hunting.

If the problem is pest control, there are more effective methods for farmers which protect farmer's economic interests. Fox hunting isn't about pest control. How long would fox hunting be an interesting sport if you only found a fox one time in 20?

[FlaGranny]

22. In addition, if fox hunting is for control,

it is an extremely expensive method of control. I doubt that the local sheep farmer would keep 50 dogs and several dozen horses to control his local foxes. More than likely, he would use traps and a shotgun. Let's face it, it's just a rich man's sport, NOT fox control. A day's hunt to catch and kill 1 or 2 foxes? How many more could you catch with traps? If I were a sheep farmer, I'd opt for the traps.

[AP]

23. The farmer would be better off...

...if he could take care of the foxes himself, if the fox hunt guy went out of business, if all the resources used in the fox hunting went into farming, if those resources went into farming, and then farmers were able to be more competitive economically, which then led to lower prices for domestically harvested farm products, and the money saved by british middle and working class consumers were used to buy vacations, or weekend homes in the country, which then created tourism/entertainment dollars for people in the country.

The way it is, .00001% of Brits who like fox hunting are holding back rural communities from developing economically by holding on to an outdted use of land.

OK, so the links are tenuous...but I haven't done any research. I wonder if there's evidence out there to support my theory...

[sweetheart]

25. outdated use of land is all related to CAP

The european subsidy system actually rewards the farmer for overgrazing the land. The stupid system of benefits for farmers has people hearding sheep for subsidy-subsistance when it is not economically viable otherwise... even then... sheep crofting is a hobby more than a business, with the only profit being able to make your own food, and in a total breakdown/war situtation, this is valuable, but today in the west? Its a lotttttttta work to keep a farm. The animals are like children requiring 24x7 care of some sort, from getting out of the fence, falling off a cliff and getting stuck on a little beach, needing to be chased away from the road.

They keep sheep and create an artifical economy around making too much farm product... the old pouring milk down the drain to keep the price of milk up problem... fox hunting may be the symptom of a failure to adapt to rural land conservation. People don't understand that the land doesn't need "care" (read "grazing"). John muir was scottish from the highlands himself... that one with a trail named after him in the california sierras. John muir lead conservation in america, when it is also sorely needed in his native scotland... farming is NOT conservation... hopefully european CAP reforms will make this work better with the recent changes.... but really, you'd think that educated people could design a rural subsidy system to provide for a diverse and healthy economy.

[T_i_B]

41. Excellent Post sweetheart!

The Common Agricultural policy is at fault for most of the countryside's troubles, and with UK agriculture in deep depression that is a lot of trouble! Personally I think that we would be better off if it was abolished altogether. We can do without such a massive beuocracy, food mountains and protectionism that dooms the rest of the world to abject poverty.

Anyway, I thought that I might as well complement this with an old Will Self article being beastly towards the Countryside Alliance!

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/articles/1367917

It would give them a taste of their own medicine if all the community charge payers along the route of the Alliance's two marches were to dig up the Tarmac, or swivel the signposts. That's what a lot of landowners do if there's a public right-of-way running across their precious wheat. Precious indeed, because a third of the farmers' income is provided by Government and European Community subsidies.

So, which of your paymasters do you hate more, you country folk: Blair or Brussels? A mere 25 per cent of British farms produce 80 per cent of the food, the rest are uneconomic hobby enterprises sustained by cash handouts and sentimentality.

Marching for your livelihoods, are you? Where were you lot when the miners or the steelworkers lost their jobs because the Tory Government would have no truck with subsidies?

The landed gentry always prate on about the livelihood of their peons, but for them all God's creatures are the same, whether they be foxes or stablehands, beaters or pheasants. The important thing is that the country show must go on, the "traditions" must be maintained - the traditions of elitism, snobbery and highly selective breeding (of people).

Yes, Countryside Alliance, you're the Tories who can't stand the free market; you're the libertarians who can't handle homosexual rights or decriminalising drugs; you're the defenders of Fortress Britain who get bankrolled by Brussels. You aren't old MacDonald - you're bloody senile.

[Interrobang]

24. No they don't.

Fox hunting isn't a big issue here in Canada, but people do it. (In fact, you can see the web site of my local Hunt Club here:

http://www.londonhuntclub.on.ca/ )

For many of the hunts they have, they don't use foxes at all. They conduct them similarly to a "hunter pace," only to keep the hounds happy, they drag a dead rabbit or other small game animal (available from the local butcher's) around on a predetermined course, and then hide it at the end of the route. That way, the huntsmen get their cross-country ride, and the dogs get something to eat at the end, nothing gets killed by being torn apart by dogs, and everyone's happy.

I've never actually ridden with the hunt, but I've been on a couple of their open hunter paces, and they're fun. (Sigh... Now I want to go riding again!)

[chimpy the poopthrower]

47. that seems like a sensible solution -- why don't they do that in England?

:shrug:

[Man_in_the_Moon]

34. inhumane sport which has no parallel

Erm, well across the pond from the 'evil upper-class fox hunters'...

We hunt boar with dogs, or hunt bear with dogs, and hunt raccoons with dogs. If the dogs catch them in a place where they cant escape (such as climbing a tree), the dogs will tear, or attempt to tear, whatever it is apart. I know one gentleman who hunts boar with his dogs and he doesnt even use a gun, simply a knife.

But it does not parallel in that usually the people involved with these other types of hunting arent dressed up in nice pretty red coats.

[FlaGranny]

12. Faux fox hunting is fine.

The dogs can chase a fox scent just as well as a real fox. The dogs would be just has happy with some nice hamburger at the end of the chase. The only thing missing would be the trophies for the hunters, poor fellas.

Edit: I have no problem with animals for food or hunting either, but fox hunting is a rather brutal control method.

[Blue_Chill]

21. Yes of course it should

However, being a beagle owner myself, I worry about the fate of the thousands of these dogs once they ban hunting. I certainly don't trust hunters to be compassionate.

Oh yeah hunting is evil blah blah.

[Classical_Liberal]

26. and didn't the poor have their hunting rights restricted

relative the rich and titled. It wouldn't happen in America because it isn't exclusively a rich thing.

[sweetheart]

27. symbolic gestures of class warfare

Excellent point. Without the class-identity thing of lords riding horses and "poor" victemized, its just riding horses... which everyone does... Where a brit stands on fox hunting says more about them than anything they might say about bush.

[TheBigGuy]

48. Enclosures of the commons.

....to create big estates...throwing people out of work and off their lands......

....also permitted fox hunting.

[sweetheart]

50. administrated lands

The scottish highland area where i live had the "clearances" where the duke of sutherland cleared the river valleys inland of inhabitants by burning houses.. to get the grazing... all driven by the controlling government in london... not the local people... empowered local democracy in britain has put in place all the mechanisms for justice to arise... one would hope that would not be so petty as revenge against a percieved oppressor. (fox hunters)

Indeed, fox hunting is a masque with which all these evils can be painted... but more accurately, in scotland, all people from london government are viewed rightly with suspicion, as they have a centuries long history of mismanaging scotland like a conquored land of savages. Justice has been long in coming, but is ending the hunt in 2003 (in england, not totally in scotland).. really what the world needs right now from westminster parliment? perhaps not... they are avoiding the real issues of the day, as well as the omens of parliment being sidelined by an executive that spins faster than a top.

[TXlib]

28. I think Fox News hunting should be encouraged

I'd personally like to have Rupert Murdoch's stuffed head mounted on my wall.

Next to all the heads of the evil PNAC fucks.

[sweetheart]

30. if you get rupert's head, can i come visit?

As i'm dying to spit on his disembodied head... and the whole chamber of heads for that matter. :-)

[TXlib]

32. Sure. But I plan to use them to wipe my ass.

[AlienGirl]

31. A middle road

Why couldn't there be a middle-road approach, like the one taken by fox "hunters" in the eastern US? There, the dogs chase the foxes, but at the end the fox is allowed to escape. The point seems to be to listen to the distinctive calls of the dog, and the "hunters" actually view the fox in a sympathetic light--one hunter even took a fox who had collapsed from fatigue into his truck for rehydration and a snack, then let him go when he had recovered.

Tucker

[sweetheart]

33. class warfare is irrational

Your idea is the sane approach, but this fight about fox hunting has been stewing in britain for hundreds of years.... it has gathered a life of its own. People define their whole lives by it... like nutty rightwing christains travelling the US to throw rocks at abortion clinics... not a lotta rational thinking influences departed when the whitehouse stops using "rational thinking" also, who's to blame the youth.

Good story of the fox needing a bonio between hunts...

[Classical_Liberal]

38. This is hardly as important as "choice" and they aren't as

persecuted as abortion clinics, and my country could use alot more class warfare (selfdefense), since the rich have already declared it, the Sam Waltons of the world. BTW, you seem to be alot more worked up over this than WMD yourself. You also gloss over the fact that it was outright illegal for the lower classes to hunt until they were already mostly urban(the enclosure laws) with better and more democratic entertainments like soccer, and other athletic events.

[T_i_B]

40. Class warfare is often desirable

But class warfare is most desirable on issues that matter such as Taxation, Health & Education in order to improve the lot of poor people, and create a more equitable & fairer society.

Fox Hunting is not an important issue and I can't see banning hunting improving the lot of poor people. We would be better off choosing maters such as building a better health servce and helping kids from disadvantaged backgrounds to have a better education than we would from banning hunting.

The thing is....fox hunting is an issue that polarizes people and which guarantees a heated political argument. The fact that it is a relativly unimportant issue passes a lot of people on both sides by.

[sweetheart]

44. actually i'm saying pick your fights

To waste a liberal majority on a trivial issue when a real one could take its place is a travesty. It is NOT as important as choice i agree... explain the hundreds of thousands marching about fox hunting... someone thinks its important.

Fox hunting comes from an unfair history of class persecution, i do not argue this... just in the present current NOW moment.... this persecution is no longer a force... just sporting activity for those who choose.

It stinks this new ban on fox hunting... it stinks of tony blair selling out to the class warriors of the labour party because he lacks power due to his lying about WMD's. THe fox hunting ban is a symptom of an illness, because tony picked the wrong fight... an illness of the decline in third way influence within labour... an omen of the continuing transformation of the global left and left-centre.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

35. absolutely!!!

[Skittles]

36. YES

IT IS F***ING DISGUSTING.

[WoodrowFan]

37. NO! They'll starve

If they can't catch mice and voles and stuff, and, oh wait, you mean the hunting OF foxes, not hunting BY foxes!! nevermind...

[Southsideirish]

42. Yes, yes, yes.

It is a wretched activity (not a "sport" unless the fox has a "sporting chance" to kill you, too) and de-means anyone involved with it in any way.

[Moosenose]

43. There's an idea!!!

Let's ARM THE FOXES!!!! ;-)

[TheBigGuy]

46. In Britain this is alot about class...Robb Johnsons "Boxing Day"

Boxing Day was when the landlords gave the local peasants "boxes" of maybe food, after Christmas. It was also a day for a customary foxhunt.

This great song by the English polit-folky Robb Johnson sort of sums up these class resentments that are tied up with foxhunting ("Reynardine" is of course the fox).

Boxing Day

And it feels like winter spit to eat and hell to pay
It feels like Reynardine on Boxing Day
It feels like winter spit to eat and hell to pay
It feels like Reynardine on Boxing Day

When I sit down at my table, clasp my hands and bow my head
Should I thank my heavenly landlord for my daily crust of bread
When the hunters in his stable and the hounds in his pack
Get the pickings of the harvest on which I break my back
There's a fence around the common land put there by the law
It's called hunting if you're gentry but it's poaching if you're poor
And the law forgives your trespass like the hounds forgive the fox
You must number all your blessings with the ha'pence in your box

Now the forest is a shipwreck and the field is full of stone
It's hard to find a blade of grass some bastard doesn't own
And they stopped the earth up for us and they drove us into town
Now they say there's no work for us and they've closed the factory down

They're still meeting in the country for the hunt and for the course
You can join the bloody gentry if you can afford a bleedin' horse
And we raid along the railway and we pray we don't get caught
God damn you merry gentlefolk for your money and your sport

When I sit down at my table, clasp my hands and bow my head
Should I thank my heavenly landlord for my daily crust of bread
For the whip and hand that feeds us and keeps us in our place
One day we'll turn and wipe the smile clean off your bloody face

[tinanator]

49. hell no!

Id like to mount Ruperts head above my mantle, myself.
-and I intentionally didnt look for all the other similar jokes that were already posted. obviously.

[retread]

51. Wasn't it Oscar Wilde who described fox hunting as

"the pursuit of the inedible by the unspeakable"?