A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE Michael Sabbeth is a lawyer, author & consultant in Denver, Colorado. See his book The Good, The Bad & The Difference: How to Talk with Children About Values. Available at Amazon.com http://tinyurl.com/c5flmmu Now available as a Kindle EBook.
Saving Private Hunting The Big Picture Can Enhance the 3 Rs I begin with an anecdote. On the first day of class for most of the twenty or so years I taught my ethics program to young children, I handed out a questionnaire. The first question was, “Who are your heroes?” The second was, “Why are those persons your heroes?” To question one, almost all children named their parents. For question two, they described the traits that created their heroes: they made them stronger; they made them a better person; and, they taught them right from wrong. Turns out, their greatest heroes inspired them to reach beyond themselves. I see this as an analogy to ensuring hunting’s future. Demography is destiny. Today, hunting’s demographic future is troublesome. We all know hunters are decreasing, as are Pittman-Robertson hunting dollars. If it is accurate that hunting
Every hunter education instructor and student surely know about the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation, the foundational principles of public hunting in the United States. I suggest understanding the model is merely a jumping off point for understanding our modern hunting culture. That the model’s principles exist in the first place — wildlife being a public resource, science should guide wildlife management, etc. — is not divinely ordained but is the consequence of specific laws, institutions, policies, and cultural norms. What we had yesterday and today are not guaranteed for tomorrow. Hunting as we know it exists because of specific facts. Hunting will survive only if specific actions occur. In his valuable volume, Inherit the Hunt, Jim Posewitz writes:
is approaching a metaphoric iceberg (and I think it is) then
“Having the abundance and diversity of wildlife we live
it must rapidly change course and develop agile and effective
with today is neither luck nor accident. It is the result of
strategies as the best hope of avoiding disaster.
hard, purposeful work. It was done by people of ordinary
Causation and the Big Picture
means and by people blessed with special talents and
I assert that a successful future for hunting can best be
chose to be hunters and there was room in our culture for
achieved by instilling in young hunters (frankly, all hunters)
opportunity. What they had in common was that they anyone who made that choice.”
the same characteristics my young students identified in
Interactions with young hunters should include teaching that
their heroes. The magnificent “3-R” programs—recruitment,
the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation and our
retention, and reactivation of hunters—should be enhanced
hunting culture exist because of our unique political economy
by teaching what I call “The Big Picture.” The Big Picture
where, among other fundamental traits, our legal system allows
incorporates demography, the foundation of our hunting
individuals to possess and use firearms (at the moment), that
culture; an awareness of causation and recognizing the hunter’s
our tax system leaves sufficient discretionary income for
ethical duty of stewardship of wildlife; and, their duty to defend
hunters to buy hunting equipment and licenses (at the moment),
and advance hunting.
and which has a transportation system that enables hunters
I argue preserving hunting requires a paradigm shift from focusing on the fun, the physical challenges, and tasty meals
to freely travel this nation and beyond. The United States is unique among nations.
inherent in hunting to enriching the wisdom cultivated in,
Students should be taught that these systems, rights, and
and the strengthening of character of, young hunters. Young
privileges are fragile. They can be lost quickly, perhaps forever.
hunters should become aware that hunting imposes demands
They can only survive if every hunter commits to exercising
on them.
his and her opportunity to be informed, engaged, and to act
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MOUNTAIN HUNTER - FALL 2020
