On Death and Killing

People are so damn funny about death.
They treat death as if it were negative, a bad thing. They are fearful of it, for their own selves, and the idea of dying, the death of another, bothers them extremely. They have an almost violent reaction to it, like they put their hand into a fire, pulling back and staring in shock and horror when it even comes up.
So much fear, so much stupidity, so much ignorance.
I have never felt death was a bad thing. Life is death. Death is the only guarantee once you are born. Everything else is luck, fortune or possibly fate - but the only rock solid guarantee is death, and thats not a bad thing. It is an integral part of the whole package, it is normal. There is nothing wrong with death, and nothing to fear. Fearing it is like fearing life itself, or the oxygen around us - its stupid, and silly. Infact if you were fearful of the air you breathe or life itself, most would probably suggest you were in need of emotional/psychological counseling for a disorder. But fearing death is looked at as normal. How odd we are.
It wasnt until I fell in love for the first time that I was afraid of dying, and then it was the idea of leaving behind my love, alone and mourning me, that was very hard. I will say that it is easier to look death in the eye without attachment. Still, I am not afraid of death like everyone else. Death itself I do not fear, I am ready for it - when it comes, it will come, and its not a bad thing.
Killing, as an extension of the "Death" idea, seems to bother people even more.
I have an intense respect for life, all life, and I feel the need to preserve life to a great extent, but on the same token I feel that killing is, simply, one of those things that must be done.
Every animal kills to survive, it kills something - plant or fellow animal. Its the basic cycle of life. Whether you believe a great spiritual being engineered all this, or that it was a simple collision and explosion of deep-space gasses and general mish-mash that, through a process of evolution alone, came to create a stable life-system on this mud-ball, you have to look at it and ask yourself "If this isnt the way its supposed to be, why is this the way the system works?".
I dont worship killing, infact I dont particularly like it at all. I am not opposed to it however, because I believe, deeply, that it is one of those things that has to be done. Not always, not just anytime, and not on a whim or for enjoyment - but the need to kill exists, as a basic need, and I am not particularly emotional about that.
It is very intense to take a life - on a spiritual level - but I also can also kill if needed, go to sleep that night and get a very good nights sleep. I dont have nightmares, I am not psychologically tortured, I am at worst regretful that a life had to end brutally, and in many cases (such as killing to eat, or killing to relieve suffering) I feel glad it was as quick as possible, if not thankful for the sacrifice.
Killing to protect my own life, killing a man, is something I am thankful to say I have never had to do - but my feelings on having to do it are much the same. If you (generalized you) try to kill me, I will do my damndest to kill you first. If I succeed, then it was just something that had to be done, a regretful and violent thing to be sure, but none-the-less, it had to be done. I will go to sleep that night, I will dream of other things, I will wake up rested, eat my breakfast and go on my way, living, and hope I never have to do it again.
I dont like killing, I do not find or seek respect in killing (any damned fool can kill), but I do not hate it, or find myself sickened by it - as long as it is not needless or cruel.
Cruelty, needless brutality, bother me very much... but those are different issues. Another day.