The following information was sent this morning:
I have just read your Facebook post and feel my 22 years of experience on the debate surrounding fox hunting might be of help in explaining what is happening in an attempt to clear up any misunderstandings.
The confusion surrounds a genuine attempt by the police to investigate law breaking by hunts using evidence propagated through social media. However the evidence placed on social media, although claiming ‘illegal hunting’ has taken place, is not intended for the police but instead the press, they will use it to generate fake news. Hunt sabs and activists prefer to imply illegal hunting has taken place as this can be forwarded to achieve their overall objective of a complete ban.
This quote was taken from the League Against Cruel Sports (LACS) number one monitor, Terry Hill, in Oct 2018 in a case at Jedburgh magistrates court in Scotland.
“Mr Hill, 52, told the court that his primary purpose for covert filming at hunts was to gather evidence for the league’s campaign to convince the Scottish Government to strengthen the legislation, but he added that if he witnessed any illegal activity he would also film it so it could be of assistance to any potential police inquiry”
The game plan – Show what can be mistaken for illegal hunting with edited videos and place on social media for the uninitiated, impressionable and the left wing press (usually Trinity Mirror group), who routinely troll hunt sab Facebook pages for a story. The press then write a biased story for main-stream readers and they in turn write of their disgust to an MP. Surprisingly, this immoral way of raising a concern up to political level has been going on for nearly 70 years and was documented in the first ever government inquiry in 1951. For full comment see Appendix 1.
“In the main such organisations seek to convert public opinion to their point of view by pamphlet, advertisements and press propaganda, and by Parliamentary action instigated by pressure on Members of Parliament which is both direct and indirect, through letters which constituents are invited to send to their representatives”
It’s important to note that before social media it was IFAW, RSPCA & LACS generating fake news for their very lucrative campaigns against hunting. It worked, its true to say we have a ban today purely on the back of fake news.
They pulled it off because hunting was not illegal and false claims in newspapers are of no concern to the police. Instead the Countryside Alliance had the very time consuming job of dragging them to ASA hearings where they were given a slap on the wrist. Here are two such adjudications against fake news, further examples given in Appendix 2.
Complaint upheld: The ASA determined that the RSPCA’s claim that “Independent polls have consistently shown that most people in this country agree with us” was not true.
Complaints upheld: The ASA determined that the IFAW implied a 30-year-old practice was current; that ‘full of soil’ was an exaggeration; that submitted evidence was insufficient.
So whereas the RSPCA, IFAW & LACS had exclusive access to the press to achieve the ban, now in 2019 we have hundreds of copycat extremists generating fake news looking to turn their actions into a profession and earn money using social media. The problem with that is they are so convinced by their reasoning that even if they set hunts up it doesn’t matter because the hunts will, in their mind, be breaking the law at some stage anyway. And this is giving the police their biggest headache, of course they don’t want to come forward after claiming they have just witnessed ‘illegal hunting’, they are making it up.
This can be seen in the two videos of Terry Hill of LACS up in Scotland, this association to a charity you would hope would keep him within moral guide lines, but even he gets caught trying to setup a hunt by claiming no guns in the area. If you flush foxes in Scotland you must have guns present to shoot the foxes, so clearly the objective is to obtain film showing no guns present.
https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=2383499858413130
Just after that the 2nd gun was filmed, Terry himself was filmed passing a third gun:
I fully accept the police want to be seen as impartial on this highly divisive issue, but the middle ground is saying you will investigate any real evidence of illegal hunting along with false allegations that waste police time. Until that is made publicly known then it will be taken the law favours the extremists.
Appendix 1.
‘There are, on the other hand, some organisations which have been formed solely for the purpose of securing the prohibition of a particular sport or all field sports. In the main such organisations seek to convert public opinion to their point of view by pamphlet, advertisements and press propaganda, and by Parliamentary action instigated by pressure on Members of Parliament which is both direct and indirect, through letters which constituents are invited to send to their representatives. Such organisations do not as a rule themselves investigate the facts of the practices to which they object, and the evidence they placed before us was for the most part based on reports appearing in the Press or other publications.’
Appendix 2.
Complaints upheld: The ASA determined that LACS was misleading and inaccurate in their use of a quote from the Burns Inquiry.
Complaints upheld: The ASA determined that LACS was misleading and inaccurate in a pamphlet about hare hunting and coursing, including using no-longer accurate data from 1951 when current information was easily available.
RSPCA – In an advertisement concerning stag hunting, the ASA upheld a complaint that the advertisement gave the impression that stags are caught and killed by hounds. In fact, stags are brought to bay, (a defensive posture), and shot with a licensed firearm or humane killer, a fact which the advertisement concealed.
The photograph in one advertisement claimed to show a hunted fox that had been killed by disembowelment. In fact, as the RSPCA later admitted, the picture was of a fox that had been shot dead, then partly eaten by hounds some time later. The ASA upheld a complaint that the picture was not genuine, and did not represent what happened to a fox killed by a hound. The ASA also asked the RSPCA “to ensure that they could demonstrate that the pictures used in future advertisements were representative.”
The RSPCA advertisements claimed that foxes are not an agricultural pest problem, citing the Ministry of Agriculture’s position as “the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food estimates the number of lambs taken by foxes to be not significant.” The Countryside Alliance submitted to the ASA an actual text of the Ministry’s position, which reads “The Ministry does not consider foxes to be a significant factor in lamb mortality nationally, but it should be stressed that this is against a background of widespread fox control by farmers.” The ASA asked the RSPCA “to ensure that they did not select quotations in a way that could mislead in future advertisements.”
thealdenham 