Several weeks ago I was surfing through some sites on the web and came across this picture. I thought I had bookmarked the location of it’s home – unfortunately it is nowhere to be found. I downloaded it because (as much as I chuckled when I saw it) it mis-represents any kind of hunter I have ever known or seen.
I have a feeling this is the kind of image that hunters are becoming known for, or associated with. I realize this is just a ‘staged’ photo shoot, but the only thing legal in this picture is the hunter orange. In Ontario, you can’t even hunt this close to a main road. If the game warden came by, you can bet that sitting on a couple of cases of beer would not go overlooked.
Where does this stereo-type come from? I am starting to see it more and more in kids movies. Take Open Season for example. One blogger put it this way on her site,
“…there has never been an uglier animated character, and animated villains usually tend towards ugly. He’s a hunch-shouldered, beer-bellied, rotted-teeth, gun-clutching, pickup-driving caveman. He’s also a stereotypical (edited word) hunter: he’ll shoot anything that moves with no regard for the laws and regulations that govern hunting. Sure, there are hunters like that, but they’re surely outnumbered by the law-abiding citizens.”
I like the blogger’s final sentence from her quote. I know there are some idiots out there. We read about them in the news from time to time. Maybe, that is part of the problem.
To be honest, I have seen more people in non-hunting environments (like campgrounds) look and behave like drunken idiots from too much alcohol. Yet, when I think of the people who camp in campgrounds I don’t have a mental image (or stereotype) of them because of a few idiots.
My theory is that these “bad hunter” images are getting perpetuated by people and/or organizations who have never hunted/fished a day in their lives. If they did, they would know that anglers and hunters are part of their province’s/state’s wildlife management plan. Our license fees cover things like research, enforcement, and habitat protection. They would know that their is no difference in killing a cow or moose for food. Both involve blood, processing, and packaging. They may not know about the friendships, memories, or team-work that is all part of the package. The beer chair hunter above is not IT!
Thanks for allowing me to preach to the choir.
