Originally posted by McDave:
As far as the potential that someone would be hurt, there is no greater potential for hurting someone that automobiles. It's not just a potential, but a reality that drivers injure and kill many thousands of people every year. But we don't outlaw them, we just regulate them and try to keep the slaughter down to as low a level as we can and still keep the traffic moving. I wish the same reasoning was applied to other activities.
That's absolutely true, it can be shown with publicly available figures, and unfortunately for most people it is totally irrelevant.
I've spent quite a bit of time arguing the point with firearms by showing that there are more firearms than registered motor vehicles in the US (225 to 250 million vs. around 208 million), and they are involved in fewer fatalities (30,000 vs. 40,000).
You can't really argue logic against a visceral reaction to what are perceived as "weapons" of any kind.
I was lucky enough to grow up with a father who was interested in making all manner of primitive and modern weaponry. To me, they don't have any kind of totemistic evil attached to them. That is because I am familiar enough with them to know what they can and can not do. I also know that they can't influence the behavior of the person wielding them.
Unfortunately, that isn't true of a great many people. They have no experience with weapons as a class of objects, thus are ready to believe any kind of propaganda about the evils of one type or another, or inflated claims of criminality or dastardlyness.
These people tend to also be separated from the source of their food, thus are unlikely to make the connection between a living animal and the steak, hamburger, or chicken they buy at the supermarket. It does not occur to them that they are responsible for the deaths of animals because they don't *SEE* them until they are cut up and wrapped in nice, sanitary cellophane or handed to them through a drive-though window.
I make a point to explain this to anyone who generally asks about hunting, in either a positive or negative way. I don't expect to convert vegans into hunters*, or even non-hunters into hunters, but at least I try and get a pro-hunting perspective in there that is philosophically consistent.
One thing I do is point is out that while I have gone completely primitive/traditional (longbow/recurve for bow season, flintlock longrifle for gun), that is my path and I do not begrudge a person using a scoped .30'06 or a compound bow (although while hunting with people using them, I might engage in a bit of good-natured ribbing
), as I once used those implements myself. That doesn't prevent me from reporting behavior that is unethical or illegal, however. I consider doing that a positive DUTY. Those using illegal methods to hunt are stealing public resources.
I think if more hunters were cautious about the image that they portray, we would have very few problems. I know of several backyard bow ranges around within a block or two, and only the one I mentioned above is potentially unsafe**.
*Vegans are a special case. Man as a species evolved as an omnivore, and in fact there is no habitat on Earth where a person can live a healthy vegan diet on just what grows naturally. You can, however, live on a mostly carnivorous diet in some environments, as the Inuit have shown. At any rate, while an anti-hunting vegan may be misguided, they are philosophically consistent unlike a person who eats meat, but is opposed to hunting.
**By the way, I took another look. The guy has a wooden platform in one of his trees and is using that like a treestand, so it isn't as unsafe as I originally thought: Errant shafts will end up in the dirt at most a few yards away from his foam deer, provided they don't ricochet off a rock. I still wouldn't consider it "safe", but it is better than my original assessment.
Topic: Surprise, Az to pass an ordinance against archery (Read 2806 times)
