Killing is “a Blast”

I didn’t want to have to talk about this again, but on NPR yesterday afternoon I heard an interview with a man who hunts alligators (the season opened here in South Florida this week). For your personal edification, hunters cannot use bullets to shoot catch the alligators; they have to use something with a line so the animals can’t swim away.

This particular gentleman said, " We’ve been doing this for a couple years. We use bows or harpoons . . . it’s a blast!"

Here’s my query: Exactly what part of the hunting and killing of the alligator is a blast?

• Is chasing and terrorizing an alligator a blast?
• Is it the part where the alligator is suffering in pain after being shot that’s a blast?
• Is is the taping of the alligator’s mouth and the roping of his arms and legs that’s a blast?
• Is the final blow, in whatever form it takes, the blast part? Really, I wanna know.

Alligators have the exact same capacity for suffering and pain that humans have. Or that dogs have. Or that cats have.

Would it be a blast, I wonder, to do to a child, a dog, or cat, what is done to alligators? Is causing terror and agony and death really that much fun?