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Old 07-11-2006 | 05:24 PM
  #145  
bowsmacker
 
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Default RE: Professional Hunting "Tour" !?!?!?!

20% is all the support you need according to the much loved and well respected James A. Swan, PhD

http://www.jamesswan.com/Villians,%2...d%20Heroes.htm

Might want to read the entire article because its a good one but this is how it starts:

Villians, Fools and Heroes:
The Image of the Hunter in Television and Feature Films

by James A. Swan, Ph.D.

"Ideas are what bring us here. Ideas are like seeds scattered on the wind. Some take hold and grow into beliefs, attitudes, values, cultural systems, and religions that make war or peace and change the destiny of mankind. Others die and are never heard from again. What mass communication research tells us is that if 20% of the population embraces and accepts an idea, it is not likely to go away, at least not quickly. As we live in a mass society, where public opinion determines the future of hunting, and hunters are a minority group, hunters must be concerned about the image that others have of them, regardless whether it is deserved or not.

The United States Fish and Wildlife Service recently published results of a three-year survey of thousands of Americans about hunting. They found that forty percent strongly approved of hunting. Another 33% moderately approved of hunting. Only 22% either strongly or moderately disapproved. A whopping 81% of the respondents believed hunting should remain legal, while only 16% thought it should be outlawed.(1) In another survey, only 3% of those surveyed supported the tactics of animal rights extremist groups.

Despite these statistics, hunters are an endangered species. Unlike other forms of outdoor recreation, the number of hunters is not growing, and all across the US anti-hunting initiatives are appearing on ballots, hunting is being challenged in legislative proposals and in the courts. The Fish & Wildlife survey also asked about the image of the hunter. The response provides insight into the vulnerability of hunting. Sixty-two percent of those surveyed believed that "a lot" of hunters broke hunting laws or practiced unsafe behavior, such as drinking to excess and firing guns recklessly. These polls show that the non-hunting majority don't have much of a problem with HUNTING, but they do have a problem with HUNTERS. Statistics on safety, wildlife numbers and the good work that hunters do to save wild lands and support wildlife research clearly show they don't deserve the negative stereotype, but regardless whether it is deserved or not, a majority of the general public's image of the hunter is negative and suspicious. So long as the future of hunting is determined through general elections, legislative measures, and legal action rather than wildlife management biology, if hunting is going to survive this negative image has to be changed."

The image of the hunter truly does need to be the issue at hand. It wont get any better by having more "how to" videos on public tv.
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