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- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
- globalnews
- [email protected]
A ringleader in a global monkey torture network exposed by the BBC has been charged by US federal prosecutors.
Michael Macartney, 50, who went by the alias âTorture Kingâ, was charged in Virginia with conspiracy to create and distribute animal-crushing videos.
Mr Macartney was one of three key distributors identified by the BBC Eye team during a year-long investigation into sadistic monkey torture groups.
Two women have also been charged in the UK following the investigation.
Warning: This article contains disturbing content
Mr Macartney, a former motorcycle gang member who previously spent time in prison, ran several chat groups for monkey torture enthusiasts from around the world on the encrypted messaging app Telegram.
âReintroducing predatorsâ I always find this equally ridiculous. Like first off. Why? In your weird value world, why does it matter if a hunter or a wolf kills the animal? Who does it make it better for? Certainly not the deer or the deer population, because wolves are notoriously bad at doing statistical analysis that the felling amounts are based on. Even if the wolves had their own researchers, they probably wouldnât understand âfelling quotasâ, would they?
Okay, humour me: if you were sentenced to death, which of the following would you choose?
Being shot at some random time you wonât even be aware about (in this hypothetical you agree to the execution and then get mindwiped so you wonât know itâs coming), with a single bullet that kills you instantly
A pack of wolves runs after you and tears you to shreds and eats you while youâre alive.
Personally, Iâm pretty sure that option number 2 is closer to torture than option number one.
"Most of Europe has no wild wolves. Do you think those areas donât have deer browsing them? Because they do, and those populations have to be controlled, and have been, by people, for centuries.
âThey donât fear the cameraman and behave like very smart and inpendendent dogsâ
No, they donât. They do not do that. Sigh. This is frustratingly naive of you. Betrays a deep lack of understanding of the difference between wolves and dogs, and even if they behaved like âsmart and independent dogsâ, youâd actually allow them in population centres in Europe, and all because you feel like itâs immoral that the deer are being shot instead of violently mauled to death?
Wolves eat too many deers, become hungry and die, then there are more deers, wolves have more food, there are more wolves.
Iâm talking about human effect on nature, youâre talking about cruelty.
Cmon, so serious. I just like wolves.
Anyway, a wolf usually wonât attack humans. If itâs hungry and irritated - yeah.
I donât think itâs immoral, I just think itâs ideologically dirtier for humans to perform the function of wolves.
Why did you skip the part where I ask how and who is it better for if there are wolves instead of hunters?
What sort of mental knot have you tied yourself into? Do you not have empathy? Weâre talking about the experience of dying. Which is more cruel to inflict on ANY creature; being shot dead with a single shot without you even realising it, or being torn to bits by wolves?
You have no idea how wolves behave, which is evident from your ridiculously naive take: >Wolves eat too many deers, become hungry and die, then there are more deers, wolves have more food, there are more wolves.
Thatâs just, incredibly ignorant. The science of populations studies in animals is incredibly complex, and the wolves wonât care about the ecology of the area where theyâre hunting. They could hunt a deer population out and then move to another area. These are known as wolf packs and thereâs a reason humans have historically avoided living in an area with a large, HUNGRY pack of wolves. Can you guess what it is?
Or do you think that when the deer of a certain area are finished, the wolves will just stay there and starve to death instead of eating other things?
Again, you donât understand how wolves behave. They donât behave like they do in your animu-shows or documents from tame wolves. If you saw a pack of wolves while standing on a field, and they saw you and happened to be somewhat close, and you started running, thereâs a pretty good propability theyâd start chasing you down and tearing you to pieces. If you just stand your ground though, not a high chance. Reading this, youâll disagree, even though you have no basis to, and then youâll wonder why I even wrote that, and then youâll open this and learn about what coursing predators are.
They arenât aggressive to people, but to say that âa wolf wonât usually attack humansâ is clearly indicative you donât think theyâre dangerous. So you would literally unleash packs of coursing predators to central European areas, and think it would somehow be morally and otherwise better than hunting. And you canât even say why itâs better to be torn to bits by canine teeth than it is to be shot, but you are saying it is better.
Same as with dogs.
Should have left me a choice, LOL.
Wolves arenât dogs just like a kitty-cat isnât a lion. Thereâs fundamentally different behaviours ingrained within them. If you had hounds and made someone run away from you, yeah, they would catch that person up, but unlike wolves, they wouldnât necssarily tear it to pieces (unless commanded), because those dogs have been conditioned for thousands and thousands of years by humans, changing their very nature. Canis familiaris has 5-10 times better ability to digest starch than canis lupus, although I donât expect you to understand the implication.
So explain to me how it is more moral to cause more suffering to animals by making them die by being ripped to shreds instead of being shot or not dying at all? Because that is causing the deer more suffering.
Tell me, why do you think the wolves will âstarve and dieâ once the deers are eaten, instead of roaming to population centers and causing problems for people? Theyâre just so polite, that they think âno we donât want to disturb the people, weâll rather just dieâ (because thatâs how you like to think of wolves as, and you clearly disregard any reality)? Or is it that you think wolves physically canât eat anything other than deer? Because they wouldnât attack people, right? Hungry wolf packs in central europe wouldnât do that, why would they, wolves are always just looking for scratchies obviously.
You might like for wolves to be cutesy little puppies that you can give hugs to. Theyâre not. Iâve been into wolves since I was a kid, but Iâm not delusional, unlike some people.
I meant - same as with groups of homeless dogs.
There the same species FFS.
Not significantly. Mostly dogs behave differently because they are trained and donât when they are not. Of course a smaller and weaker dog will behave differently.
They totally would if theyâre hungry homeless dogs.
Canis lupus familiaris from wild kinds of canis lupus, you mean? They are the same species.
You are right, I donât understand your implication, but races of homo sapiens also have such differences with lactose and chitin and maybe something else.
It rids us of moral ambiguity in evaluating people who hunt for fun, for example. Yep, it is more painful for the deer, but we wonât live in the same society with that deer and we will with the hunter.
(Itâs not an attack, just one variant of answering your question.)
I donât, they will, unless they live behind a fence. And if there are protected forested areas, putting that fence there seems to not be such a bad idea.
You just seem to imagine this to be something very scary.
One brown bear is scarier than a pack of wolves.
Eh, no, in that stage I liked tigers and lions and snow leopards more, ha-ha.
They are cutesy little puppies. Naturally with their own instincts, and they are carnivores, and pack animals, and so on.
Theyâre* and no, theyâre not.
A wolf is a wolf. A dog is dog. They are separate species, every definitively. And no, being able to have wolf/dog hybrids doesnât mean theyâre the same species, even though Iâm sure you think thatâs how species are defined.
Canis familiaris is a dog. A canis lupus is a wolf, not a dog.
This has been my point the whole time; you think wild wolves are the same as pet dogs, and refuse to accept reality.
Typing errors happen.
Yes, they are. Why are you arguing with something which can be checked instantaneously?
Thereâs no such thing as canis familiaris, itâs called canis lupus familiaris, familiaris is subspecies.
Other subspecies are various wolves.
By classification they literally are.
Also I have a big dog, a person lives in the same building who has a big dog which is in fact such a hybrid (or maybe just a wolf). They, eh, have more experience than most dog owners, but the difference between a dog and a wolf is not qualitative.
Also could you stop with that tone? You donât seem smart arguing truisms if thatâs not clear.
Most ironic thing Iâve read in weeks.
Yes, some consider it a subspecies of the wolf, and it is named as such, but it is not the same species and you wonât find anyone credible to argue they are.
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.1700398
Dogs are literally hypersociable canids that can eat starch (and the genes for that function 28x better than in gray wolves, to amend the earlier 5-10x estimate. and no, being able to digest starch is nowhere near the same as being sensitive to lactose in adulthood).
They literally arenât.
They share a common ancestor. Thatâs it. A very close common ancestor, but both of which they evolved from. Saying theyâre the same species is like saying Neanderthals are the same species as homo sapiens sapiens. I wrote sapiens twice, because you seem to try to be anal with linnaean nomenclature, thinking itâll compensate for your overt ignorance on the subject. It doesnât. Linnaean taxonomy isnât always prescriptive, as names can be given before we have a complete understanding of something. Yes, it is âcanis lupus familiarisâ, but the animal the dog evolved from is properly âcanis lupusâ and the gray wolf we refer to as âcanis lupusâ is actually a subspecies of canis lupus, yet to be distinctly named.
Why are you arguing with something which can be checked instantaneously?
https://biologyofbehavior.wordpress.com/2014/02/09/are-dogs-and-wolves-the-same-species/
And again, you propose to introduce packs of wolves into POPULATION CENTERS, saying itâs gonna be better for everything and everyone and most of all, more moral. That ignores the fact that unlike you think, they arenât hypersociable, and unlike you think, they wonât limit themselves to deer and then die off. Dogs work better together than dogs do, and theyâre highly intelligent. Why on Earth would you make an inane argument such as âwolves eat deer out, wolves die of hungerâ, which first of all, supposes that the wolves get rid of the entire population of deer, which wouldnât be healthy (which is why itâs called âdeer population managementâ, not âdeer exterminationâ), and secondly that wolves wouldnât attempt to find a secondary source of food or that an entire population of deer didnât grow the numbers of wolf packs and that wolf packs are never dangerous to people.
You must have lead such a sheltered life. Too bad, I bet you could understand a bit of what Iâm saying if that werenât so. Iâm against hunting wolves, and single wolves arenât a threat to people. But large wolf packs are. Itâd be beyond childish to pretend theyâre like a litter of puppies, like youâre doing. Itâs beyond ridiculous.
This is what youâre proposing to do in Central-European population centres, because you personally feel icky thinking about the fact that death is a natural part of life.
Youâre even a self-proclaimed meat-eater. I donât eat industrially farmed meat. Iâm a flexitarian, but I have morals. You donât. You stuff your face with burgers without thinking a second about the what the cow went through to get that beef. Yet you DARE criticise the morality of people who actually care for nature and conserve itâs ecology?
It isnât.
Thatâs like saying a group of feral cats is âthe sameâ as a pride of lions. Itâs. Just. Not. The. Same. I donât think you understand how large wolves are compared to dogs. I mean⊠you clearly donât.
You just donât understand the difference. You pretend wolves are dogs. Theyâre not. I donât think youâd consider a tiger as safe as a housecat, even if the tiger was fed, would you? Why not? âTheyâre the exact same!â
So you think itâs more moral for you to unleash dangerous wild beasts into population centers than it is to hunt animals in those population centers? What the fuck are you smoking, because I want some too. You think youâre somehow absolved of responsibility of killing someone if you set an animal on them? What the fuck is the matter with you? Why is alright for the deer to die scared, panicking, alone, hobbling on one leg, while being eaten alive, but itâs not right for the deer to die completely unaware of impeding death? Why do you pretend dying in panic and blood gurgles is more moral than being executed cleanly?
You donât have any idea how prevalent deer are, because youâre so far removed from nature and hunting that you donât understand what population control actually entails. Deer are commonplace in POPULATION CENTERS. You need wolves in the places where those deer are that youâre supposing that they would hunt. So you are proposing that popping uncontrollable populations of apex predators into population centers â completely ignoring the fact that they havenât lived here in thousands of years and donât belong here and humans are the natural apex predators the ecology is used to â and think they will control the population in a way that will be better for everything in that environment?
Youâre being ridiculous.
I have no fear of wolves, because Iâve actually hung out with some. Iâm just not delusional or poorly educated, so I understand the reality, which is that âreintroducing apex predatorsâ is about as realistic as thinking storks bring babies. Why do you pretend to understand wolves when youâve demonstrated ignorance about their behaviour, size, biology and a million other things?
Deer have to be hunted and thereâs NOTHING immoral about hunting deer for population control just because youâre afraid of the most natural thing there is; death.
No, I am talking about dogs and wolves, and this youâve made up.
A group of maine coons gone feral compared to a group of forest cats may be a better comparison, if cats are what you are thinking about.
Anyway, Iâm not advocating for keeping wolves as pets. Just for limited restoration of ecosystems including them.
I donât think you understand there are, first of all, different subspecies of wolves, which makes this point not worth arguing really.
I donât. You seem to really like arguing with yourself.
Some day someone may open your eyes to the fact that every part of the world is different.
No, I donât. You are imagining things where you like them and then complain that what I say doesnât fit. It wonât and it shouldnât.
I mean, I didnât have a chance to demonstrate anything between your walls of text consisting of you imagining what others think and condemning that as if anybody could care.
I also donât think Iâm more ignorant than you on frankly anything.
So? This doesnât have anything to do with anything Iâve said.
âLimited restoration of ecosystems including themâ
No, you arenât. Youâre literally proposing that we use wolves for deer population management in places where population management is needed. Thatâs been the topic the entire time. Hunting isnât immoral.
So you plan to introduce wolves into places where theyâve never been naturally occuring? That doesnât sound like ârestorationâ of any sort, does it? Or is it your ignorance about wolves again? You donât know where they live and where deer live, do you? You donât know much they overlap, do you? :)
And no, itâs not the same as comparing feral maine coons to forest cats. Thatâs you being ignorant again, because you just donât have any idea how ignorant you are about the subject. Itâs paradoxical, I understand, it must be confusing. The difference is much closer to tiger vs a house cat. Not physically as different, but behaviourally, yes. Which you would know if you ever read anything except some tumblr posts. You didnât even open the actual science I linked.
The difference youâre imagining is much closer to the difference between a dog and a dingo, not a dog and a wolf. You have no idea how different wolves are. No idea. And you seem to be willfully ignoring anything that might contradict your thoughts. Not a very constructive way of thinking, Iâm afraid.
âbetween the walls of textâ = âIâm having a hard time concentrating for the entire 1min 30s it takes the average reader to read a half a page of text, but I donât want to admit that or stop replying, because I donât want to admit how silly I was beingâ
Okay buddy.
Oh doesnât it?
âideologically dirtierâ
You think itâs âcleanerâ to have someone go and rip someone to shreds and eat them alive, because you donât want to âfeel dirtyâ? And it wouldnât even be you doing the shooting, since youâd never make a hunter with that understanding of nature. There is not a single benefit to reintroducing wolves and SEVERAL MASSIVE downsides to âreintroducing predatorsâ to central Europe.
You definitely didnât even open the links, so Iâm just gonna have to read them for you, sighâŠ
https://biologyofbehavior.wordpress.com/2014/02/09/are-dogs-and-wolves-the-same-species/ (itâs a wordpress link, but itâs an actual study which references the sources)