Most significant threat to hunting?

[tim roberts]

In Montana, it is loss of access, while there are many reasons, leases seem to be one of the worst, as they make it harder for game agencies to manage wildlife.

[Flying Dogg]

Loss of habitat and the many issues creating the cost of hunting to slowly become out of reach for the average hunter. We will choke ourselves out of hunting mainly due to greed.

[Konrad]

Hah!

There is no question in my mind, the most imminent threat to our hunting rights are the self righteous, highly “educated”, leftist, elitist, intelligencia who think they know better than we, how best to live our lives.

It has been the bitter history of mankind to see that once a ruling class dominates a political climate, rights of all types associated with the personal ownership of weapons first becomes restricted and then banned. Along the way, public use of wildlife recourses becomes a thing of the past. The current trend is restriction in the name of the ethical treatment of animals added to our society’s ability to provide physical sustenance via the supermarket.

 Of course, the intelligencia will always able to arm themselves and more importantly have personnel surrounding them with weaponry. Should they desire, ample opportunity is always provided for private hunts (in the name of conservation).

Those who would sacrifice the Second Amendment because they feel they are not directly affected need only look to history to see how when another’s ox is gored, the blood eventually runs to our own front door.

[Konrad]

I forgot to subscribe. These issues are near and dear to me so I want to see what the rest of the world has to say.
K

[Tsalagi]

Konrad, first, I'm in favor of ethical treatment of animals. That we eat them does not give us the excuse to treat them as less than fellow living beings.

Yeah, a lot of people trumpeting the Second Amendment also sat on their fat keesters while the Fourth and Fifth Amendments were trashed in the name of "national security", too.

Thing is, Konrad, I know you don't like the "Left", but the "Right" ain't so hot, either. People like Francisco Franco, Augusto Pinochet, and others were not paragons of liberty. The "Right" also thinks they know better than everyone how they should live their lives. As in who they can marry, for instance. Or where and how they worship and to what religion they ought to belong. Or where they can build their house of worship. Or whether they can at all.

And don't be so quick to smear being "educated". Knowledge is power. Being ignorant is not noble.

[Konrad]

The problem with folks on the far “Right” and “Left” is they both espouse their divine knowledge of how better to live my life than I.
You will find similar atrocities throughout history by both groups. In reality, their objective has always been the acquisition and maintenance of power

I have never derided real world knowledge. My issues arise with those who have never had to earn a living by the sweat of their brow and then attempt to legislate “proper” behavior based on their “standard”. Incidentally, that standard is rarely used by those same people in their own lives.

It seems to me those who so loudly decry the abuses of power and the rending of the Constitution only raise their voices when it suits their cause. Where is the ACLU when you need them? Why do they always side with those who would see the weakening of America?

In defense of true Conservatives, there has never been any debate of whether one should belong to this or that or even any religious group.

While the Second Amendment may be the “second”, all others exist because the Second does.

As far as respect for wildlife goes, I have never abused any of God’s creation be it insect, fish, plant or otherwise. I consider myself a steward of His gifts and as such will be held accountable for judgments made in this life.

Oh, sorry, I brought up that God thing didn’t I?

You see what I mean?
I wasn’t trying to be offensive. I was explaining my position. I wasn’t, by default, trying to proselytize, persuade or persecute.

[Tsalagi]

Konrad said:
"In defense of true Conservatives, there has never been any debate of whether one should belong to this or that or even any religious group."

Oh, really? Then who are those guys out there protesting because some Muslims want to build a mosque near where the World Trade Center was? And, I might add, there is a strip club just as close to the WTC site as the mosque will be. Seems to me there's a First Amendment that says they can. But to certain people, that only applies to people of their own religion.

 Konrad said:
"Oh, sorry, I brought up that God thing didn’t I?"

So, once again you assume something. You assume I must be an atheist. Well, no. I'm actually polytheistic. I believe in God plural---Gods. My point, Konrad, is you tend to go on preconceived notions---stereotypes---regardless of the way you lectured me about your debate skills some time back. To you, all liberals are college professors that never, as you said here, "...had to earn a living by the sweat of their brow." Once again, a stereotype. I could go on to make some stereotypes about the protest signs I see at Tea Parties being consistantly spelled woefully wrong. Would you like that? I bet not.  

And, no, the rest of the Bill of Rights exists not because of the Second Amendment, but because the Founders wrote it that way, we won the Revolutionary War (with a lot of aid from France, by the way), we had a Civil War, and a Supreme Court rules on the issues. There has not been an instance of an armed civilian populace beating back an invasion by some dictatorial horde bent on wiping mom, apple pie, and Chevrolets off the face of America. The government does not fear your personal firearms. Did you see them fear the better-armed (than American civilians) Afghan civilians enough to not invade Afghanistan? And Afghan civilians give out RPG-7s as party favors in Afghanistan. World War Two was won by mechanized armies being supplied by heavy industry, not grandad and his brothers armed with fowling pieces.

Just one final note. Your sig line, "The Constitution is not a Suicide Pact"? Guess who said that? A liberal in favor of gun control, referring to the Second Amendment and why it should be altered to disallow certain firearms.

[PJ]

Coputer games and television!

[insanedeerhunter]

animal activist

[Ray Hammond]

folks who believe government is the answer to every issue/problem.

And pseudo-intellectuals.

[Bowwild]

My aging knees.

[bad arrow]

Strip malls, housing developement, urban sprawl in general. Kinda sad, my wife and I moved to the "country " 17 yrs. ago and since then its being so built around us that its really not "country" anymore....Phil

[tim roberts]

Lazy people who believe that hunting is buy the stuff, go shoot it, score it, hang it and sell the story for endorsements.

[cjgregory]

The relentless and driving force to keep people in apathy and easily molded and controlled.

[bobman]

lack of access kids just cant go out the door and wander with a bow like I could as a kid..and I was a kid on the South side of Chicago and still could do it without being hasseled.

Now a swat team would probably show up

[Konrad]

Bobman,

When I was growing up in Houston, my mother would holler “You kids get your butts outside”. The house was about a quarter of a mile from Buffalo Bayou (a small river by any standards). That is where I spent a lot of my time. Cruising “The Woods”, trying to kill snakes and other vermin and generally terrorizing anything that got in my way. The Woods stretched far enough that I could not walk the length or breadth in one day. Dinner has always had a strong leash on my wanderings.

Of course, I went armed to the teeth with at least one knife, sometimes a machete and always my trusty Ben Person 20 pound recurve. It was a thing of beauty to behold. It was the sexiest thing an eleven-year-old could get his hands on. And of course, there were the obligatory cedar arrows. I only carried two while in the field. There never seemed to be enough money for a quiver. At the time I was getting 25 cents allowance every two weeks so I would wade through fire to retrieve one of those arrows.

I was never approached by a drug dealer, pervert or any other grown up while in The Woods over the course of nine years.

Some years later, a friend of mine and I went to visit my mother, still living in the same area. We went down to the edge of the woods and started shooting our compounds across a ditch and into the far bank (you know, those wheelie thingies) and within the hour we were visited by the Houston Police Dept…with weapons drawn.

“It is against the law to discharge a weapon that will shoot a projectile over 300 feet.”
Heck, even my 20 pound recurve from way-back would shoot well beyond 300 feet.

How will the kids ever know the joys of freedom and self reliance if they are only allowed to sit in front of a television?

[bobman]

yep thats been my experince as well kids can't be kids today and its a shame

I blame a lot of it on us because the horn fever stuff is what drives all the leasing and kids get shut out, if they never develop the hunting desire as youngsters they probably never will

[Emilio]

"We" are the main responsibles to maintain the hunting right, the hunting places, the hunting game, and the hunting soul... so, we are the main threat to hunting... Forget your obligation of doing these things the best way you can and hunting will be over, be sure.

Good Hunt.

[paperenginner]

I feel it is kid development but I feel it resides on the adults.  I understand that times have changed and the walk out the back opportunities are not there like they once were but, if anyone here is hunting/shooting then you can easily bring a child out with you.  That is why it relys on the adults.  As long as there are places to hunt/shoot we should be looking to bring as many kids out to them as possible.  It used to be that the door to the outdoors was always in front of kids.  Now we have to drive them to it.

[GreyGoose]

Lack of established communities ties.  A post above talked about the days when everyone hunted - and granted permission to hunt.  My grandfather did both, but he had known the people who asked to hunt on his property for years.  Even in the good old days, "cold calling" was not likely to get you access to hunting property.  We need to cultivate real relationships with landowners with as much enthusiasm as we practice shooting or scouting.