Is This a Good Idea?

[Nathan Tow-Arnett]

For someone that claims to have a 189 IQ you have some pretty poor spelling.....

Quite hypocritical on your part wouldn't you say since you "only buy animals from the best in the hobby that have the same "veiws"

With an IQ of 189 my guess is he has more important things to worry about than correct grammar about spelling and that I actually don't care as long as it's legible, I've wasted so much time going back and needlessly correcting spelling errors when I could be using that time better.

 

[Nathan Tow-Arnett]

The big majority of hot keepers do not free handle their hots...... There are a very very small number of people that do....

Do you know all the hot keepers in the US? Europe? And other countries? You know for fact that a very very small number free handle?

 

[Nathan Tow-Arnett]

And if you must know, I only buy animals from the best in the hobby that have the same veiws on how these animals should be respected as I do....

So only the best in the hobby have the same "veiws" as you? Do you know any of the best in the hobby that have bred Mangshan vipers???

 

[Nathan Tow-Arnett]

People like you just speed up the banning actually......

Actually when I read comments like these below I start to wonder who's side Gregg is on?

Plus free handling hots and photographing it is just about the stupidest thing one can do......

There is absolutly no good reason to free handle a hot......

Even medicating or force feeding a sick one can be done without beig so exposed to it......

No matter how you slice it your acts and reasoning are beyond dumb and do no good for this hobby that is slowly being taken away from us.....

When comments like this are made public it can only be used as ammunition to strengthen the argument to uphold any ban of keeping venomous snakes (which is technically unconstitutional especially when venomous snakes are being kept in locked cages in the privacy of your own home) because city governments will say look at Gregg an expert in ALL "poisonous snakes" and he acknowledges that poisonous snakes shouldn't EVER be free handled because of how too unpredictable and incredibly dangerous poisonous snakes are to let citizens keep them as pets. His comments testify that people who keep poisonous snakes are unstable because such extreme measures need to be taken to keep and handle these vicious creatures not any sane person would keep such a deadly creature that could go berserk at any moment inside their home.

Anyone really think city governments haven't thought of how they can create a tactical advantage to give credibility by posing as a "poisonous snake expert" to push and perpetuate the ban of venomous snakes?

Now Gregg may not be a wolf in sheepskin clothing but how he has formulated his comments of his opinion reveals to me that his expertise level of handling venomous snakes is limited and based off of assumptions and opinions

 

[Nathan Tow-Arnett]

Ehh... he mentioned Irwin as some kind of positive and took photographs of himself freehandling. The guy is clearly a moron. End of story. No debate. I have spoken.

Haha please riddle me how Irwin was not positive? Sound a little jealous

Besides you're stating your opinion as fact.

You are entitled to your own opinion,
You are not entitled to your own facts,
Base your opinions off of facts,
You'll never be wrong.

Ignorance begets confidence more frequently than does knowledge, is it those that know little and not those that know much that so positively assert that this or that problem can never be solved by science.

 

[Nathan Tow-Arnett]

Okay so we've got a genius here. Apparently English is his second language because he can't spell, cannot use punctuation correctly and doesn't know where to use capital letters except when he NEEDS it. LOL

Why is it that I can tell by the way you wrote this comment thinking it was so clever you have one of those really obnoxious laughs. Yeesh.

 

[hhmoore]

Is there a reason that you just made 11 consecutive posts to a thread that had been dormant for 10 yrs?
I have no objection to people dragging up old threads to renew a discussion with constructive comments, new information, or even seeking information from participants...but making antagonistic posts to people that haven't even logged onto this site in over 5 yrs seems unnecessary. Worse, this seems typical of your recent posting style (yes, you'd already been noticed)

 

[Nathan Tow-Arnett]

Freehandling a venomous snake is asking to get bit. It will not be an accident if you get bit and it will be YOUR fault.

Still safer than riding horses. Riding horses is asking to get a spinal cord injury, head or various types of other unpleasant injuries. So horse accidents aren't really accidents because the person is asking to get hurt so it is THEIR fault.

 

[Nathan Tow-Arnett]

Is there a reason that you just made 11 consecutive posts to a thread that had been dormant for 10 yrs?
I have no objection to people dragging up old threads to renew a discussion with constructive comments, new information, or even seeking information from participants...but making antagonistic posts to people that haven't even logged onto this site in over 5 yrs seems unnecessary. Worse, this seems typical of your recent posting style (yes, you'd already been noticed)

Sorry I didn't notice the date. Yes there was a purpose. Also I try to respond to each unfounded comment that caught my attention individually. Given how some of the comments were made how is a legitimate response not antagonistic? I'll PM you. Give me a little credit I switched over to the forum like you had asked to carry on a debate. But yes there is a definite purpose Mr. Moore to this argument and I'll finish it up.

 

[Nathan Tow-Arnett]

Here's a story that proves that no venomous snake is "safe" to free handle:
(sorry but I couldn't find the newspaper clipping and I'm trying to get it from the newspaper) This happened in 2001 in Pilot Knob, Missouri. The snake was a timber rattlesnake.

Two guys killed a rattlesnake. They cut its head off. One guy took the head home and the other one took the body home. The one w/the head managed to get bit by the head while fooling around with it and his wife took him to the ER for treatment. According to the guy, it was about 1 hour after they killed the snake. Oh, they took the head to the ER too. Can you say stooopid.

Thank the Travel Channel for airing whichever outdoors camping show that the host was like if you see a rattlesnake like this while your camping, grab a large stick, pin it, cut the head off and bury it all while showing how he did it on camera. Made it look like as easy as a walk in the park. Telling people to mess with a wild venomous snake and try to kill it is definitely a remedy for disaster.

What you should do if you see a wild venomous snake. LEAVE IT ALONE.

I don't own venomous snakes, I'd like to have a copperhead some day and I don't want any more legislation or for that matter a total ban on them because of people like you who can't act responsibly and handle a hot correctly

.

You don't own venomous snakes yet you think because you watched a friend who has venomous snakes how he cares for them that you're going to speak as if you're an expert on the subject on how to handle a hot correctly?

You post a story with stating that no venomous snakes are safe to handle yet you don't own any, have no facts to back up your argument and you have one friend who does a good job at preventing himself from getting bit with some nice cages and you're going to state your opinion as fact when you have no credible grounds to do so?

You do more harm than good for the venomous culture when you pose as an expert because you THINK you know what you're talking about. Legislators uses comments like yours to perpetuate the false validity to why bans are needed because you're disillusioned with what is called the Dunning Krueger effect. I wouldn't want someone handling venomous snakes either with that mentality if I feared snakes. Do the real experts a favor as with most of you who aren't truly experts, keep your do good but actual harmful comments to yourself and leave the venomous snakes handling to people who want to become real experts. Not just keep a venomous snake or two because they feel like a rebel bad ass.

 

[Nathan Tow-Arnett]

Showing the public venomous snakes aren't as scary as people who fear them is what needs to happen. That will include free handling by those that have taken the time to learn how to correctly free handle venomous snakes by being careful but confident without being afraid. Free handling venomous snakes is not for everyone nor can anyone do it. Kind of like many things in life, hey what a coincidence. What you people should be doing is looking for experts that have taken venomous handling to a level of expertise that many venomous snake handlers fear and use them to promote why the minority of venomous keepers should be allowed to keep venomous snakes because they aren't as scary as everyone thinks they are. Should venomous snakes be respected? ABSOLUTELY but when so called experts need to keep them in a way that looks like we fear our snakes no wonder cities don't have any confidence in people keeping venomous and want to ban them.

Can venomous snakes be handled NUMEROUS TIMES WITHOUT BEING BIT? Obviously the answer is yes. Well to you who have such an opinion with no actual facts to back up your argument obviously disagree. Look at every other recreational activities where people get hurt and die and is quite the norm? Well all of that is legal and far more dangerous than free handling venomous snakes. Not all venomous snakes can be handled given the individual but that shouldn't put fear in to promoting not free handling any venomous snakes much less chastise the ones who do.

BTW I've been free handling since age 16 and never been bit while free handling.

 

[Lucille]

Showing the public venomous snakes aren't as scary as people who fear them is what needs to happen. That will include free handling by those that have taken the time to learn how to correctly free handle venomous snakes by being careful but confident without being afraid. Free handling venomous snakes is not for everyone nor can anyone do it.

They would remain as scary to all the people who can't freehandle, who realize that it only takes one bite for injury or death to occur. And for the confident but not afraid freehandlers? That one bite can still happen.
I think that many have an entirely different perspective of those who keep venomous with all the usual precautions, handle with a hook, etc. and those who freehandle especially in public, with no precautions.

 

[Nathan Tow-Arnett]

A lot of people I've educated on snakes aren't as afraid once they have a better understanding of snakes. For whatever reason people think snakes will attack unprovoked if it sees them which is simply not true and once that is established many friends who had a fear of snakes are curious to know more about snakes. In general people are highly afraid of what they don't understand and can't comprehend. Educating the public in a positive approach without trying to make people uncomfortable is necessary to get the majority to understand venomous snakes are not programmed to bite people any chance they get.

Respecting what a venomous snake is capable of and being afraid of it are two different things. A free handler cannot be afraid of the individual snake he or she is holding. It takes a lot of time, patients and understanding of the venomous snake that is to be free handled. Not all venomous snakes have the same temperament.

Free handling is not throwing precaution into the wind. There are a lot of precaution factors that play a role in free handling. Not every venomous snake can be free handled and the ones that can't that are highly irritable and cranky give warning signs that they just want to be left alone. I've taken many of the recommended precautions with gloves, hook large sized cage etc. Keeping venomous is not as scary as it sounds and should be done by those who have a true passion and have done their homework.

There are risks with a lot of recreational activities that it only takes one time you can die or get seriously injured and they are all legal.

 

[Lucille]

Nathan,
I think this is one of those deals where we will have to agree to disagree.
But I have to compliment you on this last post here. Unlike earlier ones which seemed defensive and strident, this in is somewhat reasonable (I just don't agree).
And I appreciate that you put together a paragraph instead of a string of one liners each in a different post.