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Author
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Topic: What a Bunk!
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The Outdoor Tripp
Knows what it's all about
Member # 619
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posted September 04, 2006 09:44 AM
What a Bunk!
Enjoy mindless entertainment? Crave molasses thick-southern accents, mangled grammar, dramatic music and a camo-clad cast befitting a Deliverance sequel? Then sit back, relax and check your brain at the door. TV deer hunting – it’s the real deal.
Each year, as deer season approaches and outdoor networks trade rod and reel for barrel and bullet, I attempt a jump for the bandwagon. But each year I find little but the same disrespectful, non-realistic, drive-another-nail-in-hunting’s-coffin trash, and don’t quite make it.
You’d think camouflage, oops, I mean sponsor, companies with more money than God would want to protect the pastime and their future income by depicting hunting and hunters in a positive light. You know, a useful tip here and there that may help us become better, safer or more ethical hunters, or action and commentary that demonstrate respect for the animal to help foster understanding from non-hunters.
But then again, why waste time educating, making points, and breeding respect? Thirty minutes isn’t much and they’ve got to squeeze in as many kill shots as they can. After all, TV is entertainment and hunting is killing.
Unfamiliar with the scenario? It goes something like this…
Cameras roll. Our usual tired suspects are up a tree waiting for “big-un” to wander into range. Pointless, mangled verb-tense riddled whispering ensues. Briefly I fear I’ve accidentally changed channels to the Hee-Haw Golf Classic. Then, right on queue, as he does three times weekly, “monster boy” appears. Ominous, suspense-building, opera-of-the-doomed music is heard. More whispering. Buck is ogled despite lack of obvious maturity. Buck turns broadside. Kablam. Buck stumbles, takes dirt nap.
"Stunned" hunter can’t believe his luck or the deer he just shot – just like last week. “What a buck!” pours from hunter’s yap multiple times as fist pumps half-heartedly (it’s tough to remain hyper during re-takes). All immediately exit blind to high-five, back-slap, and jump and pee on each other like excited puppies. Group begins tracking. Despite shot placement, deer always located within thirty seconds.
Camera immediately zooms in on antlers. Hunter strokes rack, counts points while praising amazing trophy. "What a buck!" blurted several more times. Deer could be seven months or seven years old, weigh four or four-hundred pounds. – we’ll never know. No mention of why this particular buck was harvested, what worked, how things could have been done better, or anything about venison, is ever made.
Final score: Entertaining show segment – one. Piles of money in sponsor’s pocket –one. Number of people with more respect for hunting than before watching show – unknown. Number of disgusted non-hunting voters – unknown. Anything else of value – zero.
I hope I live to see the day one of our accomplished TV hunters will on camera: actually track a wounded buck, put a tag on a kill, gut an animal, clean a rifle, cook or eat venison, display the understanding that young deer are best left to mature no matter the rack on their head today, show concern over how they’re perceived by millions, or teach someone at least something.
Meanwhile, the majority of concerned, ethical deer hunters are stereotyped as wasteful, trophy obsessed, trigger-happy, whack 'em and stack 'em, redneck yokels who don’t give a damn about anything but tying something bloody to the truck rack.
What a buck!
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The Outdoor Tripp
www.theoutdoortripp.com
"All great truths begin as blasphemies."
Posts: 805 | From: Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
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TOM64
Knows what it's all about
Member # 561
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posted September 04, 2006 10:07 AM
Hey, I did learn that camera men are the best trackers out of the whole crew. I mean you see the high dollar guide and hunting host with years of experience tracking the shot buck, finding clues here and there then just as all hope is about lost, THERE HE IS!!!
But the camera man is already there filming the 2 bozo's coming down the trail.
Posts: 2283 | From: okieland | Registered: Feb 2005
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Rich Higgins
unknown comic
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posted September 04, 2006 11:08 AM
Tom, Tyler and I sometimes watch those shows together and when the shooter says something like "Let's track down that buck." We blurt out together,"Ask the cameraman, he knows where it is."
Sure enough, soon you see the hunter approaching the buck, with the camera framing him through the deers antlers. Best part of the shows. ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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JD
HONORARY OKIE .... and Tim's at fault!
Member # 768
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posted September 04, 2006 05:28 PM
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif) I thought I was the only one who can`t stand these shows.
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Jason
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What do Obama & TA17Rem have in common........both are clueless asshats!!!
Posts: 1456 | From: NE. | Registered: Dec 2005
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Andy L
HI, I'M THE NEW MODERATOR OF THE CENTRAL MISSOURI FORUM, PULL MY FINGER!
Member # 642
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posted September 04, 2006 05:43 PM
Alot of coyote videos are just as bad. I guess they film later our hero blowing a call, saying "there he is", clicking the gun off safety and lining up the shot, ect.... Then back to the coyote.
All the while, the whole calling stand was filmed by a camera man not even close to being in position to get that kind of shot.
Running the risk of pissing off someone I look up to, the first video I got of Cals had that. The Bass Pro dude, Jerry whatever, was the shooter, and they took great pains to make sure he got his whispering shots in, clicking of the safety and lining up of the shot. I noticed that Cal didnt have that in his video with Murphy and Cenny.
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Andy
Posts: 2645 | From: Central Missouri | Registered: Apr 2005
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Az-Hunter
Hi, I'm Vic WELCOME TO THE U.S. Free baloney sandwiches here
Member # 17
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posted September 04, 2006 06:03 PM
It's all happy nonsense,and Im glad to see Im not alone in my loathing of these gawd awful shows. Ive never quite understood how it can even be called "hunting", more like "waiting" to my mind?
The question I have is; why do they keep whispering, AFTER the monster buck has been shot????????
One more thing, I had to come back and edit for; of all the usual hunter jargon babbled on those shows, for some reason, every time I hear the word "awesome" uttered, I could throw something thu the tv screen!
[ September 04, 2006, 06:10 PM: Message edited by: Az-Hunter ]
Posts: 1640 | From: 5 miles west of Tim | Registered: Jan 2003
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The Outdoor Tripp
Knows what it's all about
Member # 619
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posted September 04, 2006 07:27 PM
You've got to control those urges Az.
Trust me, replacing those TV's can get expensive.
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The Outdoor Tripp
www.theoutdoortripp.com
"All great truths begin as blasphemies."
Posts: 805 | From: Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
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