G'day all,
As a relative newcomer to trad I've found this forum an interesting place. I'm fairly young (almost 34 years old) and from another continent, so I enjoy sitting back and looking at a lot of the North American stuff from time to time with a different perspective.
Yes, I'm one of the many people who 'found' bowhunting through people like Cameron Hanes and Aron Snyder. I couldn't care less if a lot of the old guard don't like those blokes because at the end of the day, I'm enjoying my life much more as a result of having found fitness goals and traditional bowhunting so that's all that matters to me.
In a lot of the circles I 'go' in, there is talk about the 'trad police' and how they are reluctant to change and they hate a lot of the newer ways things get done. I see that a little bit here, but I see it everywhere - YouTube, Rokslide, Facebook groups, etc. Yes, most of these 'circles' are online because there aren't that many people I can interact with regularly about traditional archery where I live. Having said that, I've started to take my local archery club (compounds and trad bows) more seriously and went to a state shoot last year. It was a stack of fun meeting more like-minded people and my interactions were all positive. Lots of older blokes all interested in the way I do things as it's different to what they've seen - many of them are fascinated by the trad vanes on my arrows.
Having said all that, since picking up the ASL I've found a lot of social media to be polarising. I consider myself fairly young/fit/strong and when I was getting measured up by my bowyer for my first ASL, he said I'd have no problem handling something over 60#. This was based on him watching me shoot a handful of bows in his shop, as well as talking about the weightlifting programs that we both use. The reason I bring this up is because I had people all over the place telling me that a 65# bow was a waste of time. "You'll destroy your shoulders!" "That poundage is pointless!" "You can't handle that! I can see you shaking at full draw!"
This dialogue inspired me to make my video - "Are You Overbowed?" - in an effort to put it 'out there' to show people that they might benefit from being curious and asking questions a lot more, instead of jumping out of their computer chair to leave a comment based on exactly f*ck all. I've never understood why so many people are so quick to leave stupid comments? Lots of people want to appear as though they know everything so they can look down at others? I dunno.
ANYWAY...I was reluctant to post that video on this forum because I thought I'd get more of the same comments, but I have to say that when I did post it I was delighted to find the opposite. This forum took that video exactly as I intended it to be taken. All of the discussion in that thread and in private messages afterwards has been 100% positive. I don't mean to sound as though I wanted 100% praise for my efforts; I just wanted to promote some authentic discussion and thoughts around the whole idea. It seems that while this place cops criticism from a few places, it's the one place I've found on the internet or in real life (so far) that doesn't automatically have people wanting to tell me that shooting a bow over 55# is a complete waste of time and purely a macho exercise.
I guess that's a very long-winded way of me saying I appreciate a lot of the dialogue I've had as a result of being a member of this place and it's inspired me to share more of my videos and 'content' in the future, for anyone who may be interested in following along with a newbie from Australia who is enjoying feeling his way through the learning curves of traditional archery.
Topic: *** What Happened? II *** (Read 4703 times)
