i don`t think that it matters if these antis are "lefties" or right wing.it`s the media that we have to be careful of,they print sensationalist stories about angling,shooting,hunting etc that are miles away from the true facts.over the years i have seen much written about the "savage blood lust"of people that go hunting\shooting,by people that have probably never been near to any of these activities.joe public has been led to believe that all foxes,deer etc are "torn to bits"which simply is not true.yes,a small percentage of foxes got killed by the hounds,but these were always the sick and injured,death in these cases was instant,instead of a "natural" death,which is slow starvation caused by inability to catch food.as for stag hounds,they were trained not to attack the deer,which were usually cornered and shot.yes accidents happen and these were the incidents that were portrayed as the everday goings on within the hunting fraternity.personally,i never liked stag hunting and i thought that all hunting and shooting groups should have brought in a few new guidelines to modernise hunting,eg,muzzle the hounds,that would have stopped the odd fox being accidentally killed.just like we do,the hunts used to look after the habitat of their quarry and disliked the idiots that used to indiscriminately kill deer,hares and foxes with unsuitable guns and lurchers etc.
if the antis ever target angling with the determination that they have with hunting(and now shooting)we will see pictures in the gutter press of fish in disress through being caught,deeply hooked etc.its fact that in most angling mags etc,people have written that too much fishing pressure leads to a fall in the condition and possible deaths of fish such as pike and barbel etc.it is fact that a small percentage of fish die from mis handling at the hands of novice anglers and sometimes even experienced anglers.you can be sure that the gutter press(fed with info from the antis) will tar us all with the same brush,just as it has with the "discarded tackle" left by us anglers,in their eyes,we all leave line on the banks and it leads to the death of thousands of birds every year.
no matter what we say,in their eyes,we get pleasure from sticking hooks in fish and dragging them from the water,thus getting pleasure from injuring an innocent fish!