"Hunting is a Sport For Men With Insecurity Issues" Says One Person

In an opinion piece this morning from the Boulder Dirt – which sounds like a good name from whence this crap cometh – the writer, Clay Evans, refers to hunters as “a sport for men with insecurity issues”.

I have said many times in previous writings that when anybody decides to write an “opinion piece” they should know when an opinion is in fact an opinion, when facts are facts and when lies are lies. I am to assume that the writer has the opinion the hunters have insecurity issues. You will further discover that Evans has quite an array of descriptions for the hunter. It is my opinion that Evans may be projecting his own feelings.

Let’s set the tone of the article right off the bat. This of course is the number one lamest statement made by anyone who argues against hunting as a civilized, necessary part of wildlife management. This is what he writes.

I’m not anti-hunting. I used to hunt – deer, pheasant, ducks. I understand that hunting overabundant game species, whether elk or Canada geese, helps balance the ecosystem (since our Western forebears drove most predator species into near oblivion).

The tone quickly becomes negative with little or no facts to back up his opinion, yet he presents his writings as facts when in fact much of it is lies and half truths. He states that he understands hunting overabundant species and then gets his digs in by condemning ancient practices of previous generations and refuses to see that he and I and everyone else who lives and breaths in this country are encroaching on our wildlife and we are having a greater effect on wildlife through development and urban sprawl – not by savagely milling about randomly killing animals. Hunting is an intergral part of wildlife management whether we like it or not and the only alternative proposals by those who reject hunting as legitimate, is to simply leave the animals alone and let Mother Nature do her thing. I’ll go along with that as soon as everyone moves back to the city and parks their cars and ceases further development.

Evan’s issue comes from the prospects that if the grizzly bear in and around the Yellowstone area is delisted, hunters are going to eradicate the United States from the bear by killing them all off. I am to assume that that he has no confidence in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife or any of the state’s wildlife management institutions to look after the best interest of the bear and all other species. He does indicate how he feels about who he thinks has control over these agencies.

But trophy hunting is a “sport” only for men (mostly) with insecurity issues, if you know what I mean. And for much too long, we’ve allowed such “sportsmen” to dictate American wildlife policy, including trophy and predator hunting.

So, the truth begins to surface. His anger perhaps comes from believing that money from “insecure” hunters dictates wildlife policy. I wasn’t aware that to be able to afford hunting, one has to be insecure. Such nonsense!

Money does play an integral part in our society and much of that comes from money from hunters, both secure and insecure. I am willing to bet that much of what Mr. Evans does is funded directly or indirectly from hunter’s dollars. But to surmise that rich hunters tell the wildlife agencies how to operate their game management programs is ridiculous and an insult to every wildlife biologist, game warden and employee of the wildlife industry.

Evans refers to the aerial wolf hunt in Alaska and either hasn’t done his homework or deliberately omits the entire story about that event. Here is what he says.

Take Alaska, where a judge halted the state’s “wolf control program” Jan. 17. This program has been on-again, off-again since at least the early 1990s, justified by the mathematically ridiculous assertion that the state’s 7,000 to 11,000 wolves eat too many of its millions of caribou, moose and other game species.

In reality, the wolves pose no threat to Alaskan ungulate populations. “Wolf control” is about giving a few twisted macho men a chance to blow away a wolf … from an airplane. Real fair fight, but then, most predator hunting is equally cowardly.

The judge halted the program because Alaska didn’t provide the scientific justification for slaughtering wolves. Gee, what a shock.

Evans is correct, initially Judge Sharon Gleason did halt the aerial hunt but not for the reasons stated by him. She stopped the hunt because the Board of Game had not shown the court all of what it had done up til that time to increase the population of the dwindling moose and caribou herds. Once that was completed and the courts were satisfied, the hunt was allowed to resume.

Evans states as fact that wolves have no affect on moose and caribou populations. Either he gets his facts from perhaps a Disney movie, has no facts at all to back up any of his statements or is lying in an attempt to sway his readers into believing that he is right. The wolve and the brown and black bear are the three largest natural predators of new-born moose and caribou. This is a fact that has been proven time and time again to the courts through documented evidence. If Evans cared, he would discover that the last thing the Board of Game in Alaska wants to do is have aerial hunting of wolves. As a last resort, this effort and that of finding new ways to encourage hunters to hunt the bear to help control populations, may save the moose and caribou in those designated areas.

We, meaning all of us, Evans included, demand that we manage our wildlife for everyone – wildlife viewers as well as hunters. Leaving it to Mother Nature is no longer an option. If Alaska officials sit back and allow the wolf to eradicate the moose and caribou in the regions affected, would simply be negligence and bad wildlife management.

But then, once again, Evans begins to let his true colors come shining through when he describes predator hunters as “a few twisted macho men” and “cowardly”. Perhaps Mr. Evans needs a few anger management classes.

Wildlife management practices all across America are not perfect and our wildlife biologists continue to learn the best ways to management them. There are certain realities that we must deal with whether we like them or not. The biggest reality is that man and beast must live together. Man continues its quest for bigger houses, more shopping opportunities, everything that continues to encroach into the habitat of our wildlife and they demand “on demand wildlife viewing”. With this ever increasing reality, scientists have to find more creative ways in maintaining a healthy population of animals while battling the selfish desires of humans.
Until someone can come up with a better way of controlling the populations of certain species, we are all relegated to utilizing hunting as an integral part of wildlife management and we must never forget that hunting and fishing are both part of American heritage. Anti-hunters are on a quest to rid America of that heritage. It can’t be allowed.
Tom Remington