No, nothing to do with gender. And the original ban was a political statement which had nothing to do with animal welfare - it was the then Labour government making a statement about class, which even Blair now admits: ”I didn’t quite understand, and I reproach myself for this, that for a group of people in our society in the countryside this was a fundamental part of their way of life” and he adds that the result was a “disaster” (presumably because of the loss of thousands of full-time jobs).
Interesting quote from Tim Bonner of the Countryside Alliance:
'It is not illegal to shoot a fox, to trap a fox, to snare a fox or even to gas a fox, but for 10 years it has been illegal to hunt a fox, despite a complete absence of evidence that hunting is any less humane than other methods of control.'
Obviously there is a wider issue about how best to humanely reduce the population of predators like foxes - which, if you're going to have a farming industry, is necessary because the adult fox in this country has no natural predator, which has allowed them to proliferate. This is not just an issue for farmers but also conservation projects protecting threatened species of wild birds, particularly ground-nesting species like curlews, golden plovers and lapwings.
I'd be the first to agree that fox hunting doesn't seem the most efficient way to reduce the fox population, but I think the arguments around it are more complex than vilifying posh people in red coats on horseback.
