Hunters vs. Shooters and some comments from the Michael Bane Blog. (Borrowed from the Parma list).
(Edited to better highlight the comments and fix some typos)
Hunters vs. Shooters
I posted this rant on a DRTV thread on "Hunters vs. Shooters," and upon reflection thought it needed to be a blog post as well:
You guys know this is a subject that has been on my front burner for years, right?
I stopped hunting a long time ago, largely because I have the attention span of an 8 year-old...made me a good IPSC shooter and a miserable person in a tree stand. Hunting and shooting are, in fact, two sides of the same coin. My gripe was that hunting was the giganto senior partner, to the virtual exclusion of the shooting sports side of the coin.
Several things have happened to change that perception:
• Eventually, people in the industry started listening to me and other voices, like Paul Erhardt, Jim Shepherd, Tom Taylor at S&W, Steve Sanetti and Ken Jorgensen at Ruger, Paul Januzzo (formerly) at Glock, etc. When I keynoted the last huge hunting enclave several years ago — the guy who was there to tell people what they didn't want to hear — my comments were met with stony silence. I said the truth — deal with us, work with us, because we're half the market and we pay 75% of the excise taxes that state fish and game run on...I said taxation without representation is STILL tyranny...one of the reps from a huge hunting accessories company pigeonholed me after the talk..."Good work, jerk," he said, although he used a stronger word than "jerk." "You're single-handedly going to tear this industry to pieces."
However, at the upcoming NSSF Shooting Sports Summit in a couple of weeks, the list of speakers has totally changed...me, Erhardt, Shepherd, Sanetti (now head of NSSF), etc.
Even more importantly, for the first time we have a definitive study that totally backs up everything we've been saying...the (as yet unreleased) omnibus NSSF study on hunting and shooting trends in the United States. It's scary negative, but here's the key stat...of the overall market:
• 43% define themselves as primarily hunting
• 43% define themselves as primarily shooters
• 14% do both
EQUAL MARKETS, as we've been saying for the better part of a decade!
• The Zumbo Effect...no other single event had the profound effect on the industry as the slagging of Jim Zumbo. Jim made his ill-thought-out remarks on a Friday afternoon; by Sunday evening the entire firearms industry understood who was now driving the machine. I've told Jim to his face that I was sorry for the role I had to play, but that it had to be done! We could not continue, much less go into another election cycle, with everyone, including Congress, acting like "hunting" and "shooting" were synonymous, so all anybody needed to do to suck up to us was conserve some wetlands and talk about ducks!
• The ascendency of the AR-15 platform as the most popular rifle on earth...when I first started talking about the size and depth of the black rifle market 3 or 4 years ago, I was flatly told by "industry experts" that I was crazy. This numbers are now accepted as the baseline (and 2008 sales, driven by Obama, are at levels that are already breath-taking even to me). OUTDOOR LIFE magazine considers my 6-page article on ARs in the field a year or so ago to be one of the most important articles they've ever published, and it laid to rest the naysayers.
• The rise of industry "heroes," like the inestimable Ronnie Barrett, who showed everyone what "standing up" looked like, and people like the aforementioned Sanetti, Taylor, Jorgensen, Bob Morrison at Taurus, former NSSF head Doug Painter and NSSF legal expert Larry Keene, former NRA Prez Sandy Froman and new Prez John Siglar and many others, who understood and understand that the world is changing and were willing to put the gun culture first.
I've said this before, we go into the most important elections of our lives more united than we've ever been before. We on the shooting side need to reach out to the hunting side...there is still some awkwardness, but nothing we can't overcome.
Make no mistake about it...the gun culture is going to war. The Democrats have given in to their basest instincts and given us a candidate who, all hyperbole aside, will if he gets the power take our guns — all our guns! — and gut the Second Amendment, a man who holds what we believe in to the core of our beings in utter contempt.
I watched Bob Barr on Glenn Beck last night. Bob is a man I've met, a man I hugely respect, a warrior, a man who has a spot-on analysis of America at this juncture...and a man I will not vote for this November! If the Dems had run one of their "political whore" candidates, maybe even the lovely and talented Hillary Clinton, I might have opted to vote Libertarian, where my heart is, rather than for a man I particularly dislike who champions a morally and ethically bankrupt political party of weasels and morons.
But that's not what the Dems have done...they've played the scary card.
And as is typical, we as a voting block are invisible. Ever wonder why the MSM never seems to mention guns as a major battleground? Because they totally understand, as do the Dems, that the more invisible we are, the easier we are to step on after the election. Is there anybody here who doesn't believe that an Obama as President with a huge majority Democratic House and Senate won't do exactly what he says he will do and ram through a new — and permanent — AWB? Ammo controls like microstamping? "Smart gun" initiatives and restrictions on "unsafe" guns? Closing public lands to shooting? Lots and lots of "reasonable" gun laws...
Okay, rant mode off...remember, my job is to be strident, because so many in our culture aren't.
Posted by Michael Bane at 11:43 AM
9 comments:
Fiftycal said... Amen brother. You said it. Since you are the one with the political connections, I would like to hear McCain swear a blood oath that he will not back more anti-gun legislation. Including the fictional "gun show loophole". And the main thing that is needed is work on the local level for seats in Congress. Hopefully the Supreme Court will give us something to hang our hats on in a couple of weeks. And the best we can hope for is redemption in 2010.
1:02 PM
clayflingythingy said... Unfortunately, there still remain a sizable number of Fudds who will sell us out. Frankly, I never believed Dumbo's apology. I read his blog and I am convinced he meant every word of it and the apology was a lame attempt to save his career. I have shared a duck blind with a gentleman who couldn't understand "why anyone needs to carry a gun". Fudds believe lying sack of turd polls who tell them their duck guns and deer rifles are safe. Although a large number of hunters are strong 2A supporters the majority, I believe, are not. The NSSF should commission a poll to see just how strongly the average Fudd supports the 2A. I predict the industry would be shocked at the results.
Frankly, I agree with fiftycal that we had better hope for a favorable ruling from the Supremes and better gird ourselves to fight the upcoming battles in court. You see, I am convinced Obama has a damn good chance at becoming prez. If he makes it it will be with the help of Fudds and those imbeciles who say "McCain is no better than Obama" and who will cast a 3rd party vote.
And if Obama wins there will be a Republican bloodletting across the country with pro-gun Repubs going down in flames to anti-gun Dems. And those who count on 2010 to set things right are betting on a longshot. Obama could well make the liberal orthodoxy the dominant political voice in this nation for a generation.
2:02 PM
Kevin said... Amen, Brother.
I will say in Jim Zumbo's defense that by about apology #6 or #8, he really had figured out what he'd done wrong, and was actually sorry for what he'd said. And said. And said.
4:17 PM
Anonymous said... I'm voting for Barr.
Obama is the most ineffective democrat in the race. McCain knows how to get things done, that is why he is more dangerous. Heck, McCain doesn't even want my clingy, bitter conservative vote. He thinks I'm a racist because I don't want our nation flooded with immigrants.
Face it. McCain will sign any anti-gun legislation that passes. He is NOT a friend of the second amendment and not of the first and not of the rest of the bill of rights.
Obama and McCain, the only difference is effectiveness.
Now, the biggie question is ... who will the NRA endorse? McAmnesty? or Barr who is a true pro-gun guy and a Board Member. Remember, no Republican has won the white house without the NRA endorsement since they started.
Mike Johnson
6:46 PM
Anonymous said... McCain voted against the AWB and he voted against limiting magazine capacity - the two biggest anti-gun bills to pass. Not sure what part of his record indicates that he'd "sign any anti-gun legislation that passes." He even signed on to Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson's amicus brief on the Heller case.
4:45 AM
nj_larry said... Invisible like the elderly in the nursing home. Take a look around at your gun club. What is the average age? How many 12 to 24 year old folks belong and attend regularly? At the NRA meeting in Louisville it was refreshing to see kids and young folks but the vast majority were over forty. The national statistics show this also.
Sadly you buy political and/or commercial respect with growing demographics or with economic power. Per the above, ours is a graying demographic.
The entire industry, despite what you might want to believe, is tiny. It is a niche market. Check out what kids spend on itunes and ipods.
Now that is not to say that massive political activism could help counteract the above. But the reality is that a very small percentage of any shooters OR hunters are willing to get off the couch and REALLY participate.
We rattle the swords and say that this is a civil rights movement. Can you imagine if MLK had the same kind of apathy? Where was our march on Selma and Montgomery? On Washington DC? Where are the visible celebrity faces? Gunny R. Lee Ermy? Denis Ming? Which celebrities attended and had press conferences at the NRA meeting? NONE. Tom Selleck shows up at SCI and talks to Cam Edwards. Woopie. Other than Heston (god bless him) who else stands up for us? Who do we have in front of the camera? Glenn Beck only recently has given us continuous blessed attention (does Rush? no). Wayne does great but he is one man. The second tier are a bunch of no names. John Sigler? No one knows who the heck he is? Nice guy but no presence. No celebrity types, no one with charisma. No one to break thru to the MSM.
Final thought is we have no sugar daddies. Soros and the left wing loons pump enormous sums into their activism. Where are the Texas millionaires? Name one who is putting 100 million $$$ into 2A rights activism?
It is amazing that we are doing what we are with all the above. I just am not optimistic for the future. I wish it were different.
5:55 AM
the pistolero said... Amen, brother. I hope that includes calling out the Fudds for who they are...no matter who might find that term "divisive," it's really the only one that fits.
8:02 AM
rastus said... nj_larry hit it on the head.
It is time for the Fudds to wise up. I think I'm beginning to realize I don't care if I piss Fudds off anymore (like I really ever cared). They will probably vote their pocketbook (i.e. my money to theirs) before the 2nd Ammendment.
I SAID FUDDS NOT HUNTERS!!! Fudds are a particularly un-pleasant set of control freaks that primarily inhabit the hunting genre'. Control kind of sums it up...sort of like the dirty words l-i-b-e-r-a-l and Marxist-socialist... someone wanting to tell someone what to do to exercise power and gain prestige.
