President’s Letter – Fall 2019
How to Talk to non-Hunters
The Colorado Wildlife Council, which recently ran a successful pro-hunting campaign, has published a study on how to effectively communicate to non-hunters. Talking to anti-hunters may be a waste of time and energy, but about 70% of the country has no strong opinion about hunting either way.
The group worked with about 1,000 non-hunters and tried several different approaches to see what got our message across the best. The biggest negative for many non-hunters is “trophy hunting.”
Here is one example of how to talk about hunting (from the report referenced below):
“One of the things that makes Colorado great is that people of all different walks of life can live together. Not everyone hunts, but we respect the right of our fellow Coloradans to do so. Hunting and fishing license fees help protect and provide access to the land that Coloradans use for hiking and other outdoor activities and help keep animal populations healthy. Trophy hunting (without harvesting the meat [my addition]) is illegal and violators are subject to heavy fines and criminal charges. Hunting contributes $3 billion to the Colorado economy each year and supports 27,000 jobs. Further restrictions would have dire consequences for small-business owners, the tourism industry, and regular taxpayers. Even if you don’t hunt, hunting is important to our public lands, our wildlife, and our Colorado way of life.”
We can easily modify this for California. As part of the fact that hunters support wildlife, I also tell people that I am a member of Ducks Unlimited (DU) because I like seeing ducks and geese, even though I am not a duck hunter. I know that over 90% of the DU funds go towards wildlife habitat preservation. That is a great bargain.