I guess one has to ask himself, if he hunting for a challenge and for fun, or hunting to show pictures and say you kill one.
I don't like it when I see button bucks killed. I have accidentally done it myself. Kick myself when it happens.
One thing I can say, if you hold out and kill a mature 200lb deer, he will have more meat than 4 button bucks. So if you really are a meat hunter, it doesn't make sense shooting a fawn or button buck. Kinda like planting a garden and going out picking the corn when its not half grown.
I mean, you can kill two birds with one stone. Be a meat hunter, hunt for the challenge and still come out ahead.
I used to say I was a meat hunter. It was the days when numbers where down. I mean if you didn't take a scraggly 3 pt, you might not get a deer. But in MD/DE, thats not the case.
When I started passing on deer, i was amazed on what was right behind that doe. But a person can grow old and never see a mature deer if he shoots the first thing he sees.
And look at it this way, hunting a button buck is about as challenging as playing hide and seek with a 4-5 year old. But imagine outsmarting a 30 year old. Its an accomplishment.