Some of the blogosphere commentary about the right/wrong way to hold a certain firearm, makes me smile. Especially when the opiner is trying to dun Obama for what is for the Prez a newbie hobbyist pursuit.
Many comments across the blogosphere seem to be from rankle-ankles unhappy-with-Obama … and wanting to critizise his whatever, whenever they can. Good enough. But/and…
I’ve a different view of shooting– that there are a thousand ways, a million ways, effective ways [plural] and people whose hand-eye coordination to spacial relationships are ace accurate, or way off or only mediocre. From witness over a lifetime, I wouldnt be on ‘the one way only’ soapbox.
Coming from farmers and hunters and fisher people– not only long ago in grandpappy’s days: but right now: We werent tourist hunters, not seasonal hunters, not weekend hunters, not target practicers, not shooting range goers.
I have seen rifles with various gerryrigging and old fine stocks, handmade, homemade, and revolvers with loose grips…
and stances in shooting varying from blooming sideways on uneven terrain, in wind and storm, shoulder in/out/ up/down, and upside-down off the side of a horse,
and my brothers and uncles and some hard-riding aunts would agree utterly that the idea of ‘stance’ being this or that, is cud for ‘gentleman shooters’ only.
When the prize is an full rack elk, or a bleeding bear, or stripping out the mountain lions who kill the deer thereby depleting food stock… and one is bloody and bruised from days of tracking and all the common assaults of weather and loss that goes with… the family doesnt give a rat’s rear end about ‘how to stand.’ Just to take the best shot given wind, weather, movement sideways, up or down or traverse.
THE RUTH HUNTER
The land and its creatures
move.
We move with them,
not against them…
We have no ‘formal’
‘this and this only’ way,
made up by whomever
under ‘pret-nice’
controlled conditions.
The forest,
the high country desert,
the mountains, move.
Even the breath
of a creature
laying in rest
moves the guard hairs
of its pelt
softly right and left.
We too, move our legs/ arms/
shoulders/center of gravity/
this way and that,
to find
best shot.
We live
in the living Heart
of the land
and her animals,
not in the lard
of the head.
The land and
the animals
move ever up
and down and diagonal…
we too,
as we move across
the terrain
filled with life
underground
and overland,
my life
being only one
of many here.
Some wanting to codify stances, argue this or that is ‘the right way’– Fine. But Prez or no Prez, shooting around on a Sunday isnt the same as hunting– which is not the same as ground combat with firearms.
I’d be with hunters of ruth heart. And those shooters who practice who also hunt for food sustenance they are dependent on. And in the blessing prayer for safety of all, who regardless of how they have to twist or turn to take the shot’ are in danger –for they are in the midst of a war, or public safety crisis, or facing off a creature with five long sharp razors in each heavy paw.
For the rest about critiquing whomever politician who is neither a shootist, and not an artillery soldier, nor hunter, the criticizers can have at it. But those who come from daily hunting cultures are laughing at the trivial assertions by those wanting to criticize a politician on frivolous matters… as arguing about, as we say in the backwoods of those who like hobby shooting and weekend crawling about in the thickets: ‘bullets spent for naught now and forever.’
Some bawling over ‘how to hold a rifle’ seems a mite of an issue that attempts to make a mole hill into an ant hill. Yet, the overarching issue that catches my interest seems moreso to have become, like the ‘birther’ismo still trailing about, the entertaining assertions ‘about Obama’s way of handling a firearm’ that come from armchair opiners who think there is ‘only one way’ to carry/unwrap/load/hold/shoot.
The same stance about ‘one way’ to fight/ ‘one way’ to shoot, is what took the lobster-backs, that is ‘the redcoats’ of the late 1700s to their utter doom, along with the foolish king who trained them to such: putting their ‘rose-red-royal’ noses tilted upward in formality and form –high above backwoods utility and common sense.
Just my .02, from a witness to hunters who if need be, could shoot a hunting rifle with one arm extended, no shoulder support, and hit their target straight on.