For Environmental Balance, Pick up a Rifle by Nickolas Kristof

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Recommended: Difference between hunting and gathering and agriculture

Final Argumentation Essay: In Support of Meat
More than ten years after the essay in our textbook, “For Environmental Balance, Pick up a Rifle,” first appeared in the NY Times, the author, Nickolas Kristof, continues to write for the NY Times as a columnist. This long-term relationship with The Gray Lady is quite an achievement for a writer in a tough market of New York readers. The original essay needed aggressive wording to grab attention of readers who peruse the paper while crowded into buses and trains. It is engaging, humorous, and compellingly holds the readers’ attention right through to the end. Kristof is correct in his claim that the solution to the deer over-population lies in thinning out the herds through hunting. Alternate methods of deer population management do not exist in the suburbs. We certainly do not want to restore the natural predators of deer, because humans would be on these predators’ menu, too. Deer food laced with contraceptives has limited effectiveness because deer migrate regularly over an area of up to 25 square miles. Therefore, the deer who ate the contraceptive might not be the deer who winter over in that area and give birth in spring. Once the medicinally-laced food is put out, no guarantee exists that deer would be the only ones to eat it.
Another significant problem caused by the over-population of white-tailed deer is the prevalence of auto accidents involving deer. Each November, deer become more active, especially around sunset, for the mating season. This coincides with suburban commuter hour and with shorter daylight hours that come with fall. Collisions with deer cost the insurance industry in excess of one billion dollars annually and kill approximately 200 people. Over one...

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...eer Management Alliance. CT. March 5, 2005, WEB. Apr. 30, 2014
Kristof, Nicholas D. “For Environmental Balance, Pick up a Rifle”. New York Times. Rpt. in Current Issues and Enduring Questions. Barnet, Sylvia and Hugo Bedau. Boston. Bedford/St.Martins. 2011. Print. 183-185.
McBroom, Patricia, “Meat-eating Was Essential for Human Evolution.” UC Berkeley. University of California at Berkeley. CA. Jun 14, 1999. Web. 28 Apr.
Soller, Ken, “Head to Hoof: Inside the New Meat Movement,” Newsweek. Newsweek L.L.C., NY, Jan. 7, 2009. Web. 25 Apr. 2014.
Taylor, Alexander and Sunaura Taylor, “Is It Possible to Be a Conscientious Meat Eater?” Rpt in Current Issues and Enduring Questions. Barnet, Sylvia and Hugo Bedau. Boston: Bedford/St.Martins. 2011. Print. 199-204.
“U.S. Meat Production,” PSR, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Washington, D.C. 2014. Print. Web 1 Apr. 2014.

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