If I understood, someone asserted that hunting prevents delinquency. I don't
think so. Maybe if urban boys were the study group -then participation in
hunting might just show that their fathers' were involved in their lives,
since its hard to take your rifle and get on the bus, ride to the edge of
town, blast a deer and then drag the bloody carcass home.

But I grew up in the country, and started hunting when I was 6. So did most
of my friends. And while I think we were more or less average for the time
and place, nobody could make us poster boys for the way to live. Hunting
sure didn't make us nice. Nothing like a gun to make a male of any age feel
macho. Of course, there was the countervailing need to be seen to be "grown
up" and responsible, which definitely helped.

As an adult, I've hunted and fished, and I prefer to be around fishermen,
overall. It takes a certain amount of aggressiveness to shoot a deer with a
rifle, it makes a nasty hole in a beautiful animal. If you need meat, its an
honest way to get it. Otherwise, take up rugby or lacrosse.

And hunters get frustrated when they can't find anything to shoot. Anyone in
the woods in the fall knows that there are a lot of songbirds, trees, what
have you, gunned down by bagless hunters.

I pretty much quit hunting when I was about 35. Now my kids are almost
grown, and they would like for us to start. I might, but I also kind of hold
back. There is somethng about killing, especially a large mammal that
doesn't die easily, that I find distasteful. Pretty much the same on farm
animals, it isn't easy.

None of this proves anything, just thought I would share.

Micheal