Preaching To The Choir?
I don’t know why I was thinking about this over the weekend, but if you check-out my blogroll you will notice some great hunting and fishing blogs. The rewarding part about blogging is being able to follow these links (I am sure you all have your routine on which links you visit) and reading and commenting about our passions of hunting and/or fishing. As a blogger, I post knowing that my visitors probably love hunting and fishing as much as I do.
For those of you who write much better than I do, the question I have been trying to formalize in my mind this weekend is this,
As hunting and fishing bloggers are we not preaching to the choir?
Meaning, when I post about the antics of anti-hunting organization or an individual, I post knowing that a huge portion of my visitors will probably agree with me. My message is being read by people who already understand my position. How does this help educate a public about the benefits of wildlife management (through hunting and fishing) when the non-hunters and non-anglers are not reading the things I try to discuss and share?
I am not sure there is an answer.
I don’t have an interest in baseball. Therefore, I do not visit baseball blogs. So, assuming baseball is really an exciting sport and baseball blogs are trying to get their message out to the non-believer (like me) – I won’t hear their message. Reason? I don’t frequent their blogs. I could be missing out on so much (not holding my breath on that one…). I hope you get my point.
So where does that leave me? How do we as an outdoors blogging community get our message out to people who don’t frequent our blogs? I am not really sure. That is my question to you? I would love to hear your thoughts.
I was going to end with the above sentence, but I came up with some more thoughts.
I thought of some ways I could get our message out there – beyond the blogs. I could:
- not back away from and discussion about hunting and fishing in public – especially when in the presence of someone counter-minded.
- designate a portion of advertising revenue and donate that to community outdoor events and charities – get my logo or blog name in public
- ensure I find one young person a year and introduce them to hunting and fishing and get them to do the same
- put some anti-hunting/fishing sites on my blogroll and let them know they are on my radar
- post intelligent and respectful comments on the above sites when they mis-inform the public
- educate myself about the science and studies that impact hunting and fishing
The plane is still in the air for me on this one. Can anyone help me land it? Please leave your thoughts below.
Forget educating people and instead think about acquiring political power. Education depends on limp wristed grants and handouts and it alway ends up being a make work and highly compromised growth industry travelling on the highway to no where.
The antis are stake holders who make big money with their drive by crusades – which are always accompanied by the outstretched hand of the common street beggar. They are a business. “Not for profit” does not exclude huge salaries.
They have no interest in facts – only in money. They mostly live off the inheritances of mentally ill old women. They have vulture mentalities and will always be found hovering near the elderly (who have lost their marbles) and the sick (hoping to overturn their wills). The funeral of the late Leona Helsly was a frustrated animal rights vulturefest. They only made off with $1 million to save God know what and they were expecting her $ billions.
But somebody clever once said “when you have got them by the —-s, their hearts and minds will follow” and this is certainly true of politicians.
A rich Jewish billionaire showed Ontarians that democracy and their votes don’t count and by using the veiled fist of his $ billions he intimidated the Tories and unwittingly became THE symbol of political corruption in Canada.
When it came to closing the spring bear hunt his money meant more to the provincial Tories than votes because they knew hunters votes were not organized. They counted heads and found hunters lacking. Votes really are more important than money. That is why all democracies have them.
The idea is to break Ontario down into ridings, raise money and put that money into electing pro-hunting and pro-gun candidates (regardless of party affiliation) in swing ridings where the vote is close.
That is what the NRA does in the USA and that is why they are powerful. Surveys show the NRA has more credibility than Congress, the Democratic Party and the Republican party. They have more credibility than mainstream media which exists only to sell ads. Anything the NRA says is chiseled in stone.
Their Canadian counterparts are impotent losers because they don’t fight in the political arena but rather accept crumbs in the form of handouts and grants from their political masters. They are forelock tuggers who are bought and paid for like whores and people do not follow losers.
Ask Dan Thomey, the founding publisher of Ontario Out of Doors about this. He knows how to play hard ball. He knocked off Ross Milne in Orangeville when Milne was president of the federal Liberal Party of Canada. Thomey knows how to play the game. To do anything else is to spin your wheels.
Two more great perspectives!
Phillip – Appreciate your hymnal reference. Well said. Although I wrote it – I should have re-thought when I said that most readers would agree with what I would post.
Jon – I appreciate your comments about the importance of loyal readership. This should not be abused or forgotten.
The plane has landed people…
When I first started blogging, I was under the assumption that I was going to expose the joys of hunting and fishing to a whole new audience.
That is definitely not the case. I agree with Jeff. In addition to steering topics of discussion and carving out online “spaces” for others who enjoy the same things as us, I think building loyal readership also gives one the ability to issue a call to arms every now and then on an important issue. Just as long as one doesn’t abuse that ability, losing their readers in the process.
In some ways sure, we’re preaching mostly to the choir. But I don’t think everyone here is (or should be) reading from the same hymnal.
The interchange of ideas, debate, and discussion is where we see the value here. I doubt that any of us sees things exactly like everyone else, and there’s always something to learn from someone else’s perspective.
I also think some of us would be surprised at who is actually reading our blogs. The folks who comment, by and large, are the same small handful of the total audience. There are a bunch of folks who roll through, either following some sort of search (e.g. Google)or tracing back a link from someone else’s site.
This comes back, in large part, to the ideas we discussed a little while back about how we represent our sport in the blogs and articles we write. It’s important to be aware that everyone who reads our stuff is NOT on the same page with us…and is often not even using the same book.
Yes we are preaching to the choir.. but the choir still goes to church to learn what they need to become a better choir.
I hope that makes sense, and what I mean is that all of our readers hopefully learn something from us. Then when they are out in the real world and encounter someone biased against hunting/fishing, they are able to make a good argument against them as well as point out all of the great things sportsmen/women do to preserve our wildlife.
Also, hopefully we help the newcomers to our sport learn not just the right way, but the ethical way to participate. That right there makes tons of impressions on the people who do not hunt, many of whom you never knew you reached.
Keep preaching!
Dana – You are absolutely right!
Dayne – Great comment! I also agree I need to expect comments from anti-hunting sites as well – they WILL be approved.
Steve – we should keep blogging whenever we can to help keep our sites standing out in the search engines. Great thoughts!
I am with Dana. My site is for shed antler hunters, but I do pick up readers that have never shed hunted and I do hope to share with them how fun this outdoor activity is. We also need to remember that we have the younger generation coming up and I think they can gain a lot of information from some great outdoor bloggers. They may not know a lot about hunting or fishing but when they have a question and enter it in a search engine it will take them to your blog where they will learn.
I think if your goal is to educate people about issues in the hunting and fishing community the concern shouldn’t be that everyone reading already agrees with you.
Your readers may share the same passion for hunting and fishing, but they may disagree on issues within each hobby. I think it’s important to give people a place to read and learn about how other people feel about certain subjects.
With controversial subjects like abortion (I don’t want to start this conversation it’s just a very controversial subject) people need to be educated and aware of how others view the topic.
I think blogs that write about baiting for deer hunting or how to deal with CWD are great places for people to become educated on issues that need to be delt with.
I read blogs about things I’m interested in to gain knowledge about how people feel about subjects and also to keep up to date on the latest issues concerning those interests.
Knowledge about topics as a whole from each perspective is the only way we can understand issues fully.
You are definitely on the right track with your thoughts at the end of your post. Except that you’ll also have to allow anti-hunting sites to post on your site when they feel you are mis-informing the public. It’s only fair.
P.S. I love hunting and fishing!
I think it depends on what your message is. When you said, “My message is being read by people who already understand my position.” – did you mean that the purpose of your blog (your message) is to convince people that hunting/fishing is a good thing? Then yes, you’re preaching to the choir. But if you are rather creating a space where hunters/fishermen can gather for relevant news, reliable information, and interesting links – then it’s not preaching and you are accomplishing that! Same with my blog. I’m assuming the women reading it are already somewhat or totally interested in outdoor activities, and I don’t think I need to convince them of anything. I just want them to have a place to gather…and gather useful information hopefully.
I was not suggesting an end to blogging. Your points are well taken. You may have just landed the plan for me…
I’ve written about this subject too. My theory is the more people who are writing about hunting, fishing and conservation, the wider the potential audience will be.
There is also this to consider. Sometimes people read blogs just because they are written well. I don’t want children, and don’t have children, but I read a couple of blogs written by women who are pregnant or have children just because they are written so well. So there may be more than one reason why someone reads a blog.
I also like your thoughts for alternative ways to get the message out there. I think they are great ideas.