Allow me to break this down for you, Atlasman-style.
ORIGINAL: Todd1700
I agree with muley69. This lame notion that if we huntersaren't unithinking mindclones of one anotherthat the anti's will win is pure nonsense. Take me down this slippery slope if you will. What am I going to do get so upset at some guy over a particular topic that I what.....join Greenpeace or Peta? Stop hunting? Vote to ban hunting? How exactly does this oft repeated but never explained process work? You guys chant this stuff so often that you got people on here scared to disagree about what brand of arrow to use for fear that a Goldtip vs Carbon Express rift will form in the hunting community and then.....wait for it......THE ANTIS WILL WIN?
The Goldtip vs CE arguement is extremely off base and a terrible example to use. I'm not talking about, and have never talked about, simply discussing or debating different selections in hunting gear. People have carried on with the Ford vs. Chevy debate for years and we haven't seen the destruction of the automobile industry, so saying that people talking about different arrow shafts or broadheads or brands of bows is going to cause the demise of our sport is ludicrous. I provided specific examples of what I was talking about in all of my posts. Apparently you missed those.
News flash. The antis don't outnumber us.Far from it in fact.If they did hunting would be gone now. There is however a large nonhunting public out there that outnumber both us and the antis combined. They aren't in Greenpeace or Peta. They don't hate hunting. They just don't hunt and are for the most part fairly neutral on the subject. These people do however vote on issues that affect your ability to hunt and elect people that make decisions about your ability to hunt. The only hope that the antis have is to sway the opinion of this large group against us. The best defence we have against them doingjust thatis to police our own.
Okay let's assume you're right and the number of anti-hunters don't outnumber us. Take a poll of all the non hunters of the world and see how familiar they are with Peta or the Humane Society versus how familiar they are with organizations like the NSSF. I think you'd be pretty suprised how familiar they are with the anit-hunting agenda while they are either mis-informed or completely uninformed about the benefits of hunting. That's if your claim is actually valid. I'd like to see some numbers put forward before I believe it.
I see things in the outdoor world that even though legal I will not support. Things like canned hunts. Ear tagged trophy bucks being auctioned off on E-bayfor the highest bidderto come shoot it. High fence ranches were the land enclosed is so small and the game packed into it so great that it becomes kind of like shooting fish in a barrel. I know a website that has a forum entitled "Long Range Hunting". These guys sit on hill or mountain sides shooting across canyons at deer often over 1000 yards away. Sometimes they shoot 7 or 8 times before they hit the animal.Well if the distance is so great that you can easily miss 7 times then it's safe to say that this isalso apractice that could easily lead to amaimedanimal with a leg or nose blown off. I think the aforementioned activities and others like them offend that very general public that we need to be aware of and I for one want them to know that these folks don't represent me.
This point was never argued anywhere in this thread. In fact, I explicitely said that slob hunters should be called just that and the public should be aware that people who practice these types of methods should not be included with the rest of the ethical hunters.
In this "Can't criticise it if it's legal" world that so many of you espouse let me ask the following. What about a guy who admits hehas beenattempting100 yards shots at deer with a bow? It's legal. There's no law that covers that. Should I offer my support to him as a fellow hunter? What about a guy with a 50 lb 26 inch draw untuned bow that announces his intention to use a 2 inch diameter expandable head for the coming season. Again, it's legal. He's not breaking a law. Should I tell him "Go for it Man" "3 inches ofpenetration is great for whitetail hunting, my brother hunter with whom I cannot disagree." What about a kid from a state where it's legal that speaks openly about his plans to use a 22 rifle to hunt deer? Should I say, "Awsome dude, I not only fully support you my hunting brother but for and added challenge waituntil he's facing away from you and go for a Texas heart shot"?
Or maybe, just maybe I should.....GASP! Dare to disagree and tell them that what they are doing is a bad idea. And the animals they are gonna end up wounding and losing are fuel for the anti's to burn us with.
I think the train has derailed.
In many of these situations it is our responsibility as informed hunters to help people out when they are put into situations like this. Instead of harping down on someone for making a bad decision, why don't we find out WHY they're making those decisions and see what we can do to help them make the right ones in the future? We were all beginners at some point and we all made mistakes. Without people to help us realize and correct those mistakes, how are we supposed to become better hunters? Turning your back on someone or degrading them for making poor choices is certainly not the proper way to go about helping the hunting community as a whole.
Also if someone here had first hand knowledge or some level of expertise that allowed them to know that some product I was planning to purchase was in fact a worthless scam and a waste of my money,gee, I think I'd want to know that. Isn't the very purpose of such forums to share information and learn from other peoples experiences. That's how I feel about it. But then I guess I'm just weird that way.
You're right, that is the purpose of any discussion forum. However, when a topic goes from "I don't believe this product works because...." to "You're a complete idiot!" I think we've gotten a little bit off track.
Which brings me back to my original point - discuss and debate all you want, that's great. But when we start this ridiculous namecalling and personal attacks on each other because of our individual beliefs, where is that getting us? The biggest advatage the anti-hunters have over us is that they are united in one single goal - to stop hunting. Hunters are split into all of these different state and local groups, which most of the time are at odds with one another over proper practices to preserve hunting. With funding being diverted into many different specialized interest groups instead of a single centralized organization that works to fight for hunting in all of it's forms we're really doing nothing but shooting ourselves in the foot. While we struggle to raise enough money to lobby local politicians, Peta is out raising BILLIONS of dollars to spend on advertising and recruiting more and more people to fight their cause.
While you may not believe they pose a real threat to hunting, take a look at the numbers. The number of hunters is decreasing year after year while the average age of hunters is increasing. With increased pressure put on people to only shoot big bucks and have absurd amounts of land to hunt on the numbers of deer are increasing every year. When is the point going to come when the public stops viewing hunting as a viable means of animal population control? Right now, we are the the very edge of watching our sport go into a downward spiral from which it may not recover. Preventing that from happening starts right here with hunters realizing how our own individual actions either benefit or harm our cause. Every action we take effects our sport, whether how small or large it is.
Okay - I'm done now. Agree or disagree, at this point if your opinions are already formed there isn't much anyone is going to say or do to concvince you to think otherwise. That's my 2 cents.