IG Wild beim Wild against child abuse in hunting

Years of research have shown that children can be seriously harmed by witnessing violent animal abuse, such as during hunting or bullfighting.

The effects include a progressive erosion of empathy and a normalisation of violence, which has been demonstrably shown to develop into violence against people and property. According to the law of cause and effect, violence always leads to counter-violence!

The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child has recognised these effects and issued recommendations that children should not be exposed to violent animal abuse.

The insight that we protect children by protecting animals is groundbreaking.

These recommendations to various countries implicitly assume that children are affected by all forms of violent animal abuse because they have an empathetic relationship with other sentient beings, regardless of species.

In May 2021, the world's foremost child protection body, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, published a recommendation to the Tunisian government. It addressed the effects that the shooting of animals can have on a child. In the document, the Committee called for the “elimination of societal violence against animals”. This was followed by a university study showing that the capacity for empathy in children who witness violence against animals can partly diminish, and that children may come to regard violence as normal over time.

The committee is fundamentally concerned about children who are forced to witness violence against animals — across different species. It is therefore not about any particular species, but about the acts themselves. Research has repeatedly shown that children feel compassion for all kinds of animals. This in turn means that children can be seriously harmed by being made to watch violence being inflicted on a living creature — regardless of what kind.

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) is the foundation for all of UNICEF's work. It is the most comprehensive declaration of children's rights ever created, and the most widely ratified international human rights treaty in history.

Swiss Hunting Association

Hunting is a decidedly diffuse parallel world dominated by cult-like ideologies that have spread throughout our society. Unfortunately, it has become entirely normal for children to receive an unnatural form of indoctrination in the context of nature experiences organized by the hobby hunters of the Swiss Hunting Association. Children who love animals are introduced to weapons, ammunition, and killing in an appealing way. Through children's innocent love of animals, attempts are made to groom them into killers. They are allowed to shoot at taxidermied animals with crossbows, bows and arrows, or firearms — and may even send live wild animals off to the great hunting grounds in the sky. At small knowledge quizzes involving animal or track identification, knives are offered as prizes. The joy of killing, violence, and the proper handling of weapons for a trophy is thus playfully instilled in the next generation.

In Switzerland, there is no association whose members are demonstrably involved year after year in four-digit numbers of legal violations — such as breaches of hunting law, poaching, arms smuggling, environmental offences, animal welfare violations, traffic offences, corruption, and many other criminal activities — as is the case with the Swiss Hunting Association.

Hobby hunters have no pedagogical calling, yet they proselytize all the way into primary schools. The distorted vision of hobby hunters regarding nature has nothing to do with biology, ecology, or wildlife protection — quite the contrary! Hobby hunters kill out of passion. This alone makes any claim to neutrality impossible.

Members of the association Jagd Schweiz have connections to representatives of power in general. They also employ violence or other means suited to intimidation (fearmongering, propaganda and lies, hunters' tall tales, etc.) in order to exert influence on politics, the media, public administration, the judiciary, and the economy. Practically everything that is cruel, unnecessary, and heartless is promoted by the association Jagd Schweiz. Jagd Schweiz primarily cultivates disrespect and a culture of violence — the exact opposite of what a civilized person in our society should aspire to. 

Court ruling Bellinzona, 17.7.2020

There are no associations with legal status in Switzerland whose members are as deeply rooted in criminal activity as those of the association Jagd Schweiz.

The IG Wild beim Wild calls on child protection organizations and policymakers to take to heart the recommendations of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child and to support programs that bring an end to violence against animals.

We call for imagining a world in which humanity lives in harmony with nature and in which wildlife and other living species are respected.

Added value:

• The Crossing of a Mighty Bridge (Sparks interest, informs, and invites participation)
• European Link Coalition (Extensive details, including on the connection between the UN Convention and the UN Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development, to which all UN member states have committed.)
• Violence in schools — and hunters?