I personally don't see the WHA as a "shot in the arm" recruitment tool. I read a very good article in the Wall Street Journal at work earlier this year talking about how while the number of hunters has been on a steady decline, the amount of money spent on hunting continues to skyrocket. And those that are still hunting, are doing their best to reinvent the sport of hunting by getting the whole family involved – including wives and daughters, etc. So don’t think hunting itself is about to go extinct overnight without the WHA.

The WHA and the short term entertainment value it will present is along the lines of today’s video games for the younger generation – not real. How many of those suburban kids playing Grand Theft Auto actually go out and start stealing cars. Not many. Its cool in their living room, but not in their everyday life. How many kids, sitting at home watching these WHA programs, are going to get in their car and speed over to the local archery pro shop and get into bowhunting. Not many. Instead they’ll watch the some guy shoot a deer with a tranquilizer dart, utter “Cool. Huh, huh, huh.” ala Beavis and Butthead and change the channel over to MTV to view the latest Real World.

The NBA is a perfect example of how altering a sport’s ethics, mantra, whatever you call it, can send that sport down the toilet bowl. The gangsta rapization of the NBA not only turned the sport into something along the lines of pro wrestling, where showmanship accounts for 90 percent of the game, but it severely cut ties with the sport’s former growing and thriving fan base. I used to love to watch Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls, etc. They played the game with style and class and plain beat the pants off their opponents. Now, I get to turn on the television and watch guys sucker punching one another and leaping into the stands to beat the crap out of fans (who by the way were acting just as idiotically as the players that went after them). Why, because the NBA needed a “shot in the arm.”

If you want to help hunting, there are better ways to go about it than the WHA. Introduce your family to hunting if they haven’t already been. I plan to take my wife along on some bowhunts this fall and she is actually interested in it now. Take a disabled person hunting or volunteer to help conduct a disabled hunt. Volunteer with a wildlife organization and help improve habitat. Give money to a wildlife organization. Give your aging but still very usable bow to a youngster or sell it to them for cheap, as many people have done here. There are better ways to ensure the sport continues to thrive. Shooting a pen deer with a tranquilizer dart and reviving it isn’t hunting.

This is America and if its legal, you’re entitled to do it. So by all means, go ahead with your WHA, but change the name to the WPRDSA (World Pen-Raised Deer Shooting Association) or something that accurately describes what it is.

Holy $%&#@!! Where’s the Tylenol?