Deer

Deer (singular and plural) are the ruminant mammals forming the family Cervidae. Species in the family include the white-tailed deer, mule deer (such as the black-tailed deer), elk, moose, red deer, reindeer (caribou), fallow deer, roe deer, pudú and chital. Male deer of all species (except the Chinese water deer) and female reindeer grow and shed new antlers each year. In this they differ from permanently horned animals, such as antelope, which are in the same order as deer and may bear a superficial resemblance to them.

The musk deer of Asia and water chevrotain (or mouse deer) of tropical African and Asian forests are not usually regarded as true deer and form their own families: Moschidae and Tragulidae, respectively.

Terminology

The word deer was originally broader in meaning, but became more specific over time. In Middle English, der (Old English dēor) meant a wild animal of any kind. This was in contrast to cattle, which then meant any sort of domestic livestock that was easy to collect and remove from the land, from the idea of personal-property ownership (rather than real estate property) and related to modern chattel (property) and capital. Cognates of Old English dēor in other dead Germanic languages have the general sense of animal, such as Old High German tior, Old Norse djur or dȳr, Gothic dius, Old Saxon dier, and Old Frisian diar.

Stag (magazine)

Stag was the name of various American men's magazines published from the 1930s through at least the 1990s.

Publication history

First publication

The first Stag, published by Leeds Publishing Corp., beginning with vol. 1, #1 (June 1937), was a 25-cent, 96-page, digest subtitled "A Magazine for Men" and which included articles and stories by such writers as Carleton Beals, Elsa Maxwell, Bernard Sobel, and Hendrik Willem van Loon. It covered a range of topics, including literature, music, sports, and theater, along with stories on male-female relationships, sexual issues, and such topics as striptease.

Second publication

A second Stag, published by Official Com. Inc. and edited by Noah Sarlat, appeared circa 1951 as a 25-cent, 82-page, standard-sized men's adventure magazine. This version, containing ostensibly "true-life" fiction of men in wartime or in rugged adventure mode, continued through at least volume 22 in 1971. In 1958, Martin Goodman took over the magazine, using first his Atlas Magazines imprint, and then switching to his Magazine Management imprint circa 1970 with the cover price rising to 50 cents.

Castration

Castration (also known as gonadectomy) is any action, surgical, chemical, or otherwise, by which a biological male loses use of the testicles. Surgical castration is bilateral orchiectomy (excision of both testes), and chemical castration uses pharmaceutical drugs to inactivate the testes. Castration causes sterilization (i.e., prevents them from reproducing); it also greatly reduces the production of certain hormones, such as testosterone. Surgical castration in animals is often called neutering.

The term "castration" is sometimes also used to refer to the removal of the ovaries in the female, otherwise known as an oophorectomy or, in animals, spaying. Estrogen levels drop precipitously following oophorectomy, and long-term effects of the reduction of sex hormones are significant throughout the body.

Castration of non-human animals is intended for favouring a desired development of the animal or of its habits, or preventing overpopulation.

History

Castration was frequently used for religious or social reasons in certain cultures in Europe, South Asia, Africa, and East Asia. After battles in some cases, winners castrated their captives or the corpses of the defeated to symbolize their victory and seize their "power". Castrated men — eunuchs – were often admitted to special social classes and were used particularly to staff bureaucracies and palace households: in particular, the harem. Castration also figured in a number of religious castration cults. Other religions, such as Judaism, were strongly opposed to the practice. The Leviticus Holiness code, for example, specifically excludes eunuchs or any males with defective genitals from the priesthood, just as castrated animals are excluded from sacrifice.