Slouched at a computer, the hunter perks up as a 12-point buck eases into view on his screen. Maneuvering his mouse, he swivels the rifle and focuses the cross hairs. With a click of the mouse, the rifle fires a bullet, mortally wounding the deer.
Gary Harpole, an Illinois hunter, says remote-control hunting negates what the sport is really about: "getting outdoors, experiencing nature."
Call it hunting by remote control. And though it is still more concept than trend, lawmakers in several states have set their sights on stopping the practice in its tracks.
Illinois State Representative Dan Reitz has proposed banning such hunting in his state, saying that such ready, aim, click kills, or the prospect of them, push the ethical envelope and violate the spirit of fair-chase hunts.
“I just think it’s wrong,” Reitz said, adding that the use of such technology — which features a Web camera and a .22-caliber rifle atop a remote-controlled rig — would “give all sportsmen a black eye.”
Technology that enables people to stalk online and kill real prey has alarmed hunters and lawmakers intent on pre-emptively blocking the practice. About two dozen states already have outlawed the method, which the Humane Society of the United States calls pay-per-view slaughter.
“The animal has no chance,” Arkansas State Senator Ruth Whitaker said earlier this year while introducing a measure that calls for banning potential cyberhunting in her state.
“There’s no challenge for you — except knowing how to use a computer and push a button,” she said. “You never left your tufted sofa. What’s sportsmanlike about that?”
The issue emerged in early 2005, when an entrepreneur from Texas, John Lockwood, set up a Web site that allowed subscribing hunters with a high-speed computer connection to shoot antelope, wild pigs and other game on his 220-acre San Antonio spread via remote control — from anywhere. Lockwood offered to send the animals’ heads to subscribers.
During a demonstration, a friend of Lockwood’s used a computer 45 miles away to shoot a wild hog as it fed at Lockwood’s ranch. But, according to news reports, he only wounded the animal. Lockwood, who was on site, finished the kill.
Lockwood’s venture barely got started before Texas lawmakers shot it down. Since then, other states have hustled to get something on their books barring the practice.
Even die-hard hunters are opposed, saying that shooting an animal via computer is not sporting and does not require the element of fair chase in conventional hunting through forest, field or marsh. Some states have posed similar objections to hunting big game in captivity as trophies.
“We believe sick ideas have a bad way of spreading, so we want to make sure we nip this in the bud and ban it in all 50 states,” Michael Markarian, executive vice president of the Humane Society, said of cyberhunting. The group is also pressing for a federal ban.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/11/sports/othersports/11hunt.html?_r=1&ref=technology&oref=slogin
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