Not long ago, before the principal deer season of the year opened, I posted a video to tease about discomfort some people have with hunting. In fact, that’s not common in Wisconsin – most people are comfortable with hunting.
One can go to a Packers game, for example, and find that many of one’s fellow fans are wearing warm, blaze orange coats otherwise used during hunting season.
Good for them – one should be comfortable in one’s own skin, and in the long tradition of game hunting. Stigmatizing gun ownership and hunting is a departure from our heritage on this continent.
We are so comfortable, really, that even a liberal town like Madison has a newspaper website that features photos of impressive success during the Thanksgiving hunt.
The Wisconsin State Journal showcases some impressive deer – see for yourself at the Wisconsin State Journal’s Deer Trophy Room.
It’s even more remarkable because the liberal, online Capital Times is part of the same publishing group.
Yet, perhaps not remarkable at all – Wisconsin has a better respect for hunters than many other states, and Wisconsinites enjoy gun rights closer to the intent of the Second Amendment than residents of many other places.
Hunting and gun ownership have been swept away, in other places, into a false conflict between left and right. Scholarship supporting a clear right of individuals to bear arms has been ignored during this political battle.
It’s not all that it should be, but we are fortunate to live in a place where a fundamental constitutional right is so distorted through politics that one cannot exercise – or even recognize it.
I’m not sure how successful the overall season was, but congratulations to those who had good luck in hunting this year.