In light of the rise in violent crime, many have pondered the question: “How do I know if my neighbor is a psychopathic serial killer?” Well, unfortunately, it’s not easy. Unless of course you happen to live in any number of rural areas across the country where hunters are required to wear blaze orange—then the psychopathic serial killers stand out like a bunch of sore thumbs.

Okay, so maybe it’s a bit hyperbolic to compare hunters to serial killers. Yes, they both obsess on and stalk their victims, whom they objectify and depersonalize in their single-minded quest to boost their self-esteem, and the kills made by both hunters and serial killers are followed by a cooling off period, but serial killing usually has a sexual component to it.

Let’s hope hunters aren’t literally getting off on their exploits.

Maybe a better comparison for a hunter would be to a mass murderer: the inadequate type who snipes with a hunting rifle at innocent passers-by from a clock tower, or fires an AR-15 at cars from an embankment over a freeway.

Either way, the plain fact is cruelty to animals often leads to the killing of people. The perpetrators of the Columbine mass school shooting in Colorado honed their slaying skills by practicing on woodpeckers with their hunting rifles. David Berkowitz, the self-proclaimed “Son of Sam” serial killer, who habitually took sport in shooting lovers in parked cars along the streets of New York City, began his criminal career by shooting his neighbor’s dog.

Why does the public put up with these people in their midst?

The mainstream media downplays the behavior of serial animal killers as though hunting was just another “sport” to report on; like they were covering some Boy Scout Jamboree. They repeat by rote hunter/”game” department jargon like the animals were inanimate objects, using emotionally void terms such as “crop” for deer or “wolf harvest” for the unnecessary torture and murder of sentient beings vastly more admirable than their pursuers.

Any society that looks the other way when people murder animals for fun does so at its peril. Marine biologist, Rachel Carson, author of Silent Spring, had this to say about the growing problem:

“Until we have the courage to recognize cruelty for what it is—whether its victim is human or animal—we cannot expect things to be much better in this world. We cannot have peace among men whose hearts delight in killing any living creature. By every act that glorifies or even tolerates such moronic delight in killing we set back the progress of humanity.”

It doesn’t get much more cruel or moronic than sport hunting.