Like the KKK, the NRA will eventually Fade Away

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Comparatively speaking, the body of hunters in America is withered and shrunken, only a wee fraction of its former self. Today there are six times as many photographers, bird watchers and others who enjoy seeing animals alive as those compelled to make them lie down and die. Like the KKK and the SLA, the NRA has seen its day and will rightfully fade away. Literally, figuratively and statistically, hunting is a dying sport.

But non-hunters should not be lulled into a false sense of security for wildlife. Sportsmen, though a skeletal minority, are a shrill and voluble 5 (or 6) percent when it comes to forcibly interjecting themselves into animal issues; they‘re reluctant, to say the least, to kiss their blood-sport goodbye and join the civilized world.

The NRA and other heavily-funded hunting groups are pushing to pass laws such as the odious “Hunting Heritage Protection“ acts (already shoved on several states), aiming to enshrine their perceived “birthright“ to shoot and kill nonhumans recreationally.

Worse yet are the unconstitutional Hunter Harassment laws, which essentially punish residents and land-owners for trying to protect animals and keep hunters off their properties. In direct answer to the drop in sportsmen’s numbers, meddlesome state game departments are encouraging young kids to get a taste for killing (perverting their natural affinity for animals).

Alabama opens deer season two days early for children under the age of 16 (so they’ll have a better crack at “bagging“ one), and Maine holds a “Youth Deer Day,” allowing pre-season bow hunting for children ages 10 to 16. States like Illinois and Colorado are preying on women by offering hunting lessons for single mothers, while the private pro-hunting programs “Becoming an Outdoors-woman“ and the NRA’s “Women on Target” are seeking to enlist the future Sarah Palins of America.

Fouler still are the ongoing schemes to open more and more public lands to hunting…

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The preceding was excerpted from the book, Exposing the Big Game: Living Targets of a Dying Sport

40 thoughts on “Like the KKK, the NRA will eventually Fade Away”

  1. I’m not so sanquine, Jim, about the NRA and like organizations just fading away. They seem to currently have (and have had for as long as I can remember) a strangle-hold on the legislative and executive institutions of our purported democracy. So much so that they are able to push through directives and laws that benefit only themselves, that are often clearly detrimental to society at large (to say nothing of the wild animals who suffer the brunt of the assault) and often, nowadays especially, arguably violate the very Constituion that gun rights advocates so vociferously claim to revere.

    As far as the KKK is concerned, let me, who actually grew-up during the days of the civil rights struggle, offer an alternative opinion for its eclipse. Klansman stopped kidnapping and assaulting blacks in the south when blacks started talking about self defense and arming themselves. It is one thing to pick on a minority person who cannot defend themselves, quite another with someone who may be armed and prepared to fight back. The Klan lost its strength because it was essentially made-up of cowardly bullies; and bullies always back down when confronted by an opponent on equal footing. It wasn’t all about “marching with Dr. King”; Stokely Carmichael, Malcolm X and the Black Panthers had more than a little to do with changing white behavior and “by any means necessary” doesn’t refer just to how to cook an egg..

    Although I would happily clean-out my savings account to arm every bear in the woods with an AK-47 if that would help, unfortunately it would not. So, how does a committed, moral person go about protecting those who cannot defend themselves from the entirely legal depradations of a relatively small (5%, give or take) but persistent cadre of blood-thirsty killers? One answer I believe lies in the concept of “extensional self-defense” as articulated by the animal rights philosopher Steven Best. Maybe if hunters in the field were being routinely subject to some real “harassment” it might sufficiently dampen their enthusiasm for blood sports that some wild animals might catch a break.

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    • Pete, have you, by any chance, see the footage or photos from Australia, where wildlife rehabilitators and protesters head out into the wetlands and confront and rescue waterfowl? I don’t believe they face the same hunter harassment laws as we do here, but I’ve often thought about how the fact that they engage bloodsport largely out of sight and out of mind, dictates not only their own behavior but public perceptions of hunting at large.

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    • If only! After all, hunters are bullies too, like the KKK, picking on the defenseless and those weaker than themselves. And bullies are cowards. And cowards can be controlled by fear. I agree, they must be given something to fear!

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      • I would LOVE to share this with All who Have a Special Bond. I am not a huge fan of Equine Dressage. When I saw the Bond between Laura and Mistral (Dutch Warm Blood) 2012 Olympics, I was reminded of my Daffodil “Daffy.” She was such a Wonder 🙂

        She Praised Him by saying “Good Boy.”

        Laura has an instinct to be GENTLE. You can see Her on You Tube. Notice how she keeps her Spurs away from Mistral 🙂

        He is now the Love of my life.

        When They came forth I caught my breath.

  4. Too bad the NRA happily let itself be hijacked by animal serial killers and is not a champion of people’s basic human right to self-defense. I’m a strong believer in the right to self-defense and therefore believe in sane, responsible adults’ rights to own firearms. The NRA and these “hunters” also like to place deadly force in the hands of children and warp them emotionally by teaching them to enjoy taking helpless lives. Nothing could be more adverse to humanity.

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    • Right Laura, I have no problem with guns for self-defense and own a few myself. But when they are turned on unarmed animals for sport shooting,,,then the NRA starts to step on the rights of others and earns the comparisson to the KKK

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  7. The NRA has a knack for confusing the issue: Gun “ownership” and hunter’s “rights” are not one and the same. I have guns. I do not hunt. Would be interesting if there were statistics on the number of non-hunting gun owners vs gun owners who are hunters.

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    • I own guns to Gail, about a dozen surplus military firearms which I collect (and know how to use). I see nothing inherently wrong with the private ownership of firearms just like I see nothing inherently wrong with the private ownership of automobiles. It’s just if cars were routinely used to run over pedestrians as a recreational pursuit that I would see a problem; and if large, well-funded “charities” like the American Automobuile Association defended the practice as everyone’s god-given, constitutional right!

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  10. Hunters like to claim that they firearms and ammo they buy fund conservation as if they were the only ones whose money does that. I have read, but haven’t checked, that non-hunter purchase of these items actually provides more than half of that funding.

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    • MK Ray, I believe a study is to be completed soon in this regard. As I recall…it was Fish & Wildlife who was doing it, but not positive. If the reults are as we all here are hoping, that will sure be a kick in the pants to that tired old argument that some hunters love to spout about. Keeping fingers crossed!

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  12. I was just asking my husband this morning if hunting is becoming more popular, or is it just that so many are being “outed” on Facebook and I’m seeing them. It’s the latter.

    We had a gunsmithing shop for 20 years. When technology came into play, when video games and computers became common, we noticed the shooting sports and hunting start to fall as far as the younger generation was concerned. Technology is much more skilled, more creative, more immediate and just plain more fun.

    Even though we still shoot (and Canada has good gun control and home storage laws), it’s definitely our generation and older on the average that are at the range. I suspect that must be true (on the whole, of course) with hunting as well.

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  13. Hunters paid for less than 3% of the National Wildlife Refuge System. 14-18% of gun owners are hunters. All guns are still taxed to benefit hunting. It’s a very evil and fixed game, like welfare ranching.

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    • Really? What’s the name of the tax on guns that benefit hunting in the States? I’ve never heard of that– certainly not right for those who do not hunt, or further who are, like we, vegans.

      There is no such tax in Canada. We pay the same sales tax for guns as for any other commodity.

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      • Is it possible that the supposed “study” by the Fish and Wildlife people will contain this information? It is my impression that results were to be completed sometime in November of this year. I think “they” have us right where they want us: In a state of great amd perpetual confusion regarding where the money comes from and how it is spent. Do we really expect them to WANT us to be informed?!? I hardly think so. That a study was even initiated is a big surprise. Let’s all be vigilant regarding any study publications.

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