The Hunting Mystique

    This story came my way the other day via the E-mail grapevine. It set me thinking:

A professor was giving a lecture on Involuntary Muscular Contractions to a class of medical students.
Realizing this was not the most riveting subject, the professor decided to lighten the mood. He pointed to a young woman in the front row and asked, "Do you know what your asshole is doing while you're having an orgasm?"
She thought for a moment before replying, "Probably deer hunting with his buddies."

    In his weekly column, "Woods, Water & Wildlife" in the Manchester Union Leader, John Harrigan occasionally defends the hunting subset of humanity by pointing out the hypocrisy of critics who castigate people that indulge in blood-sports, but themselves dine on steaks, pork chops, and roast turkey; relax on davenports upholstered in fine Italian leather; hold their pants up with cow-hide belts, and stow their credit cards, cosmetics, emergency tampons, and spare change in handbags crafted out of calf-skin.
    In a recent column about tender-hearted folk who are outraged by north country residents hanging their kills in the backyard prior to butchering them, Mr. Harrigan writes:

I cannot understand why people have a problem with deer carcasses hanging in the yard. Sure, it’s a dead animal. But it came from here, lived its life here, died here and will be used here.
Contrast that life with feedlot beef. Or pigs. Or lambs.
What is it with the public’s seeing dead animals?
Most people eat dead animals but never see them.
With vegetarians, I’m ready to give some slack.
Still, I want to look at their belts, their pocketbooks and their shoes.

    On the face of it, John is absolutely right. It’s absurd for passers-by to weep over the slaughter of noble stags or pretty little pheasants when they'll be scarfing down veal roulades or Rock Cornish game hen in the evening.
    So what’s wrong with his argument, if anything?
    Just this: The issue is not what hunters do. It is why they do it.
    Consider the deer hunter.
    Granted...venison steak is a tasty dish that I, on occasion, have ordered in restaurants.
    Granted...there may be a few intrepid gentlemen in Maine and Vermont and New Hampshire who hop on their skimobiles or ATV’s and freeze their balls off in the northern woods each autumn for the sole purpose of stocking their freezers with moose or deer.
    But for a majority of hunters, the activity is a sport. Despite claims to the contrary, it is not, as with primitive peoples, an activity motivated by the harsh realities of survival.
    Moreover, it is hard to believe that coughing up your lottery winnings to the state fish and game authority for a hunting permit; donating a few thousand to Cabela's for rifle, ammo, boots, and camouflage outfit; and paying some local yokel to butcher, process and package the carcass is a cost-effective way to provide nourishment for yourself and your more-or-less loved ones.
    In short, the incentive for nailing prey with a rifle or shotgun or bow and arrow is not necessity or economy, but because it gives pleasure to the hunter analogous to the feeling Albert Pujols gets when he connects for a home run or someone engaged in the act of fucking achieves when he has an orgasm.
    Wolves do not hunt for fun, they hunt to eat. Lions do not hunt for fun, they hunt to eat. Grizzly bears do not hunt for fun, they hunt to eat.
    Men hunt because it’s a kick.
    People employed in the meat and leather goods industries do not get a charge out of slaughtering livestock (and if they do, they’d best be locked up in the loony bin lest they expand their repertory to other species such as puppies, kitty cats, and young ladies). There is no passion or pleasure or challenge involved when stockyard employees slaughter an animal. It’s a bloody, dirty. stinking business, an unpleasant occupation born of mankind’s yen for meat, trouser supports, and snappy shoes.
    I’m aware that there is a large community of jerks who fantasize that a primeval instinct for slaughtering wildlife beats deep within the breasts of true men.
    A famous spokesman for this school of thought, that obnoxious, self-promoting bully Ernest Hemingway, held that the measure of a man was mystically dependant on his ability to blow out the brains of a charging water buffalo or run a sword through the jugular of a tortured, bleeding, exhausted bull.
    Old Papa Ernie wrote lots and lots of macho crap over the years, picking up a Nobel Prize along the way, before employing his shooting skills on a different sort of target ─ himself.
    In similar fashion the hunting clan likes to pretend that freezing one’s nuts off on a tree-platform while waiting for a moose to wander by so that he can blast it to kingdom come with his thousand dollar .308 Win Ruger M77 Hawkeye Sporter is proof of his masculinity and affirmation of some sort of antediluvian Y-chromosome hunting instinct.
    Bullshit.
    All those overweight farts who think that lurking in the brush and plonking some dull-witted herbivore from 100 yards away is an act of machismo don’t have a clue as to what risk, danger, fear, and courage is all about. These assholes belong to the same club as the idiots who inhale Camel cigarettes, eschew seat belts, and then tank up on beer and flaunt their alcohol bravery by philosophizing to nodding fellow morons, "Hey, man, you can get killed crossing the street," or "Listen, man, if the bullet's got your number on it..."
    Yeah. Right.
    Well hey, man, and listen up, man ─ all you Heineken heroes with compound bows and high-powered rifles and pump-action shotguns ─ here’s a challenge. Go to some nearby rock face ─ Rumney, say, or even the little cliff at Pawtuckaway ─ and try one of the sissy climbs ─ Three Pines at the Gunks, for example. One thing, though, do it free ─ no rope, no ‘biners, no pro. I guarantee it’ll give you a real rush, even if you forget to bring an AK47. You might even discover what genuine sport and genuine kick are all about..

Norm Mack, Peterborough, dog@myfairpoint.net

Posted by dome of glass at 12/29/2011 8:00 AM
Categories: Hunting
Tags: hunters Hemingway
 

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  • 12/29/2011 10:58 AM Loren wrote:
    Wonderfully written. Couldn't agree more with all of it. It has always boggled my mind when I see the joy and excitement in a man's eyes as he's planning or reliving his hunting escapades. Never went out with the hunter-type either – I doubt I could stomach it. Venison is tasty though.
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  • 1/2/2012 10:07 AM Nun wrote:
    My house in GA was infested. After haveaheart trapping some 2 dozen squirrels and driving a 10 mile round trip to release each one, I tired and bought a 22 caliber pump air pellet gun rifle. The first squirrel I shot dead made me feel awful, just awful. Then, the next wasn't quite as bad. In the end I was gleefully running for my toy gun whenever I saw a squirrel out the window. Disturbing behavior, I still feel guilty. Point is that, as disgusting as it is, there is something there. Imagine being raised as boy, being taught that it was a great thing to bag a deer. Still, I never hung any squirrel heads in my den.
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