According to Mumbrella, the RSPCA has got duck shooting in its crosshairs, aiming to make a big deal about kids being taught to hunt. No doubt this will get a big thumbs-up from the two or three remaining readers of The Age, the paper in which the RSPCA’s ad ran this weekend, but the Prick wonders if this has really been thought through.
After all, aren’t we all supposed to teach kids where their food comes from? To say nothing of feeding them, where possible, free-range food? Taking one’s children out for a hunt would seem to tick both these boxes, giving the next generation an appreciation not just of nature but the fact that something died to give you dinner so you’d better damn well respect your produce. A duck shot on the wing has probably had a hell of a nicer life than some poor industrially-raised chicken, even one raised in an RSPCA-approved facility. The campaign’s tagline, which asks, “What’s wrong with this picture?” as a towheaded youth stands in a marsh with a shotgun, is hard to answer with anything but, “Nothing at all, so long as the young man is properly trained and supervised.”
It should also be noted that hunters, in the Prick’s limited experience, are among the most responsible gun owners around and they tend to be pretty serious conservationists as well. Only they never get any credit for this because radical green-left politics have pushed this sort of, for lack of a better term, muscular Teddy Roosevelt-style environmentalism beyond the pale, right out there with molesting collies or building nuclear power plants in the Tarkine Rainforest.
UPDATE: What’s wrong with this picture? Tons, according to readers.
“For one, those dickheads at the RSPCA have told the kid to put his finger on the trigger – a terrible safety breach. The finger should always be outside the trigger guard until you are ready to take the shot. Shows how little they know about firearms safety”, writes one commenter.
Adds Kelley Merkel, “Where do I start… The pump-action shotgun should be pointing towards the sky, never horizontally. Ummm, the ducks are behind him! Pump-action shotguns have been banned in Australia for 17 years. He’s holding the gun completely wrong. Finger is on the trigger. Gun is too small for him. He is not shouldering it correctly. His head should be down on the stock and he has no ear or eye protection.”
Great points.
Prick With A Fork 
When I was a kid in the 50’s and 60’s all my mates had either an air rifle or a 22. We didn’t kill or injure anyone. Just learned how to handle a weapon and enjoy it.
So every duck that is shot is eaten by the shooter? How many ducks are killed for sport and not eaten by the kids or hunters? I think the other point is the kids can go out and shoot with out testing and get a licensing for free. It’s easier than getting your drivers license and we all know how many accidents happen on the roads with P platers…so who is responsible for them taking a clean shot and not over hunting our native ducks? Growing up on a farm and killing 1 chicken for dinner is very different to hunting and killing 30 ducks a day for sport for no reason but “fun”. You can’t tell me this is teaching our kids how to survive when dinner is probably macca’s on the way home…
When I was a kid we had >22s and shotguns. In the 60’s. And we shat a load of bunnies and ducks. Then a .303/270 for pigs , goats, deer etc. Learned how to handle weapons and butcher game.
And with one ill thought out ad campaign approved by the radical green arm of this organisation there goes their monthly donation from this household.
well obviously I meant shot. Should have prof read.
And Anon above? You are a fool.
For one, those dickheads at the RSPCA have told the kid to put his finger on the trigger – a terrible safety breach. The finger should always be outside the trigger guard until you are ready to take the shot. Shows how little they know about firearms safety.
I’m with Anon @7.38pm.
Anon @4.26pm, do you really want a thorough fisking? Or will you just settle for being a dickhead?
The RSPCA went the “full PETA” when they recently few a kite about banning of saleyards.
Where elese are sheep/cattle growers going to sell their stock, on ebay?
For mine, the RSPCA/PETA can go and take a running screw at itself.
What is wrong with this picture they ask? http://www.rspcavic.org/images/Campaigns/duck-shooting/Duck-shooting-homepage-Mar2-2013.gif
Where do I start… The pump-action shotgun should be pointing towards the sky, never horizontally. Ummm, the ducks are behind him! Pump-action shotguns have been banned in Australia for 17 years. He’s holding the gun completely wrong. Finger is on the trigger. Gun is too small for him. He is not shouldering it correctly. His head should be down on the stock and he has no ear or eye protection.
Kelly – I reckon that kid is holding a single of double barrel shotgun – the opening lever is just visible against the background. But every other point is certainly correct – I go nuts at such obvious safety breaches.
Yeah you are right. It’s not a pump.
Who uses a single barrel to shoot ducks though!
Neither photo, not the one at the top of this post, nor the one at Kelly Merkel’s link, is a photo of a pump action shotgun.
Yes, they’ve been banned (is it really 17 years since I last voted for the coalition?) and in all that time, there has not been one coherent reason given for why pump actions were banned.
Maybe he’s just about to fire the gun, posing on the way through!
Here’s a kid demonstrating proper weapons handling.
http://www.colddeadhands.us/Home/tabid/56/ctl/ArticleView/mid/515/articleId/33228/Interview-with-a-meme-icon–Morrigan-Sanders.aspx