Letter to a Lout...*

To the alleged duck hunter(s) who visited the east side of my local duck-hunting spot this past weekend: I'm sure you don't care, but I picked up all the empty shell boxes, used wet wipes, plastic bags, candy wrappers, pop cans and other assorted garbage you left strewn across the parking area. You're welcome, jerks. That was right classy of you.

I kind of expect that kind of behavior from the methheads who sometimes use these isolated areas of the lake to toss out the toxic leavings of their mobile meth labs. I expect it from the littering, drunken slobs who throw their beer cans and fast-food containers out the window as they drive around the lake looking for road signs and assorted wildlife to shoot up. I even expect it from the don't-know-any-better high school kids who sometimes throw parties out here, far away from the prying eyes of their elders.

But what I don't expect is this kind of behavior from my people, fellow hunters, people who ostensibly should have the greatest respect for the land from which we derive our greatest pleasure, our sustenance, and indeed, our very meaning. Most of us have been taught to venerate our public lands, treat them like they're our own, because, well hell, they are. Maybe you're one of the "new breed" I've been running into more and more lately, and who knows, maybe you and your "crew" didn't have time to pick up after yourselves following that epic skybusting clinic you were putting on this morning (yeah, I was watching from across the lake...) 

This little piece of public ground (one I'm very fond of, by the way) offered up its treasures to you, and you responded by treating it like a dump. I don't know how you were raised, don't know what kind of role models you may or may not have had, don't know if you're congenital jackasses or if your behavior is a product of your upbringing or environment, but since it's a new year and therefore the perfect time to turn over a new leaf, here's a suggestion for a belated resolution: Try really, really hard to stop being dicks. Instead, make a concerted effort to cultivate a minimum level of class, dignity and ethics. Try mightily to refrain from being an obvious disgrace to your sport and your culture.

And if that's just too much effort for you, too much work, sacrifice or consideration, then please, just go the hell away and be an embarrassment to some other demographic. Take up some other sport, parachute-less skydiving, maybe, or perhaps nude shark-chumming. I hear golf's a fun game, and I know it's popular with many, many assclowns like yourselves. Anything, really, but hunting or any other activities requiring a small modicum of respect for wild places. Because you obviously have none to give.

* Believe it or not, I actually wrote (angrily and quickly) this blog post during last year's waterfowl season, saved it as a draft, and then promptly forgot it for over a year. So it's not actually current anger, it's past anger. I only noticed it today while I was trying to clean out some old stuff from the folder, but decided "what the hell, I dealt with the same shit this year, maybe even worse, so why not?"