Matt Rinella for president

[Newtosavage]

I’m not here to debate the issue of what’s more important, just watching the thread to keep it on track. Access and mentoring are great topics, but lumping them into this thread is going to get all three topics lost, they should probably have their own threads.

So to make my point and keep it on topic... I think this is much ado about nothing. I think social media "influencers" live in a bubble and think they are much more influential than they really are. Just my take. I could be completely wrong.

 

[fngTony]

So to make my point and keep it on topic... I think this is much ado about nothing. I think social media "influencers" live in a bubble and think they are much more influential than they really are. Just my take. I could be completely wrong.

Fair enough. My spin on that is while they are a minority and live in a bubble, they are the most seen and heard to the non hunting crowd.

 

[Newtosavage]

Fair enough. My spin on that is while they are a minority and live in a bubble, they are the most seen and heard to the non hunting crowd.

Really? I think the strangely dressed neighbor who hunts is the most often seen and heard hunter as far as the non-hunting crowd goes. How would a non-hunter even know about these "influencers?" It's not like they hang out here or tune in to hunting shows.

I would wager my next paycheck that I could survey my neighborhood and not a soul would have ever heard of Rinella or Bowmar, and this is a very conservative pro-hunting county.

 

[fngTony]

Really? I think the strangely dressed neighbor who hunts is the most often seen and heard hunter as far as the non-hunting crowd goes. How would a non-hunter even know about these "influencers?" It's not like they hang out here or tune in to hunting shows.

I would wager my next paycheck that I could survey my neighborhood and not a soul would have ever heard of Rinella or Bowmar, and this is a very conservative pro-hunting county.

If they were to search or an algorithm gave them a YouTube video for example or something in the news.

 

[Newtosavage]

I would wager two paychecks that none of my neighbors could explain what an algorithm is, much less spell it.

 

[fngTony]

I would wager two paychecks that none of my neighbors could explain what an algorithm is, much less spell it.

If you really want to blow their minds try to explain to them what NFTs are

 

[robby denning]

If you really want to blow their minds try to explain to them what NFTs are

Or FNGs (ryan and I can't even agree on that one)

 

[fngTony]

Or FNGs (ryan and I can't even agree on that one)

Ya, I don’t know what Fort Nite Gamer has to do with Rokslide

 

[tgus59]

The only people who find hunting influencers, are people looking for hunting influencers.

I'm relatively active on Instagram, occasional grip and grin, but mostly recipes/food posts, but I hadn't heard of Bowmar until seeing the threads here. The dozen or so guys that I hunt with (ages 30-60ish) don't use social outside of some pictures of their kids and the occasional meme.

My point is that this is an echo chamber, and is much much smaller than most would think. Hunters are a tiny minority in this country, and the hunters that engage heavily in social, engage with influencers and message boards are a tiny minority of hunters.

 

[Scooter90254]

I work in a non-hunting dominated industry. I'm literally the only one who units and sometimes I'm looked at like I'm some kind of weird alien.

Point being not a single 1 of them have any idea what you guys are talking about and have never heard of any of these influencers.

 

[CRJR45]

I'm 63 , been hunting 48 years , and I never heard of Bowmar or Rinella until I started reading about them here , just saying .

 

[3forks]

I work in a non-hunting dominated industry. I'm literally the only one who units and sometimes I'm looked at like I'm some kind of weird alien.

Point being not a single 1 of them have any idea what you guys are talking about and have never heard of any of these influencers.

I bet a few of them heard about that gal who killed a husky after mistaking it for a wolf pup, or that dentist who killed Cecil the lion, though.

 

[woods89]

An interesting thought experiment that I've been thinking about is this.....

If you could neither tell anyone or show anyone pictures of your hunting activities, would you still hunt? And if so, how would it change?

I think almost all of us would be lying if we said it wouldn't change anything. I think for some it would change very little, and I bet there would be a decent chunk of people who would just quit.

I'm not advocating for this, as I love telling stories and listening to others as well. But it does make me ponder my motivations.

 

[roymunson]

I bet a few of them heard about that gal who killed a husky after mistaking it for a wolf pup, or that dentist who killed Cecil the lion, though.

Cecil the lion had it coming.

 

[CRJR45]

An interesting thought experiment that I've been thinking about is this.....

If you could neither tell anyone or show anyone pictures of your hunting activities, would you still hunt? And if so, how would it change?

I think almost all of us would be lying if we said it wouldn't change anything. I think for some it would change very little, and I bet there would be a decent chunk of people who would just quit.

I'm not advocating for this, as I love telling stories and listening to others as well. But it does make me ponder my motivations.

Yes , I would , I don't relive my hunting , it's something I do for me . But , I'm the coolest guy on the planet , so , there's that , LOL

 

[North Idaho Stickbow]

An interesting thought experiment that I've been thinking about is this.....

If you could neither tell anyone or show anyone pictures of your hunting activities, would you still hunt? And if so, how would it change?

I think almost all of us would be lying if we said it wouldn't change anything. I think for some it would change very little, and I bet there would be a decent chunk of people who would just quit.

I'm not advocating for this, as I love telling stories and listening to others as well. But it does make me ponder my motivations.

In all honesty, the pictures would change zero things for me. I have no social media, and I’ll send a picture to my wife, hunting buddies and father and that’s it really.

The only time I talk about hunting is either when people ask me about what I love to do, eat something I killed, or they come to my house and see mounts and want a story. The room with all the mounts in my basement is more for me than anything. I can go sit down there and be happy thinking about some of the best memories that I have.

EDIT: I forgot to add that eating the animal is the greatest reward for me. Every time I cook something up I killed I feel like it’s a 5-star meal because I did it. All the way from start to finish like it’s supposed to be.

 

[Teets]

I think the real issue is new hunters think this is the way to act and be.

 

[tommygoodtimes]

I'd vote for Matt. The man knows his shit. I took advise to heart and my hemorrhoids haven't bothered me since.

But in all seriousness, stop listening to all the opinions of others on social media and keep doing what you love. There's nothing more satisfying than feeding your family healthy organic wild game meat that you harvested yourself.

Sent from my SM-A536U using Tapatalk

 

[Will_m]

I see a lot of “don’t worry about what influencers say…or I’ve never even heard of such and such.”

I think you’re missing the point. It’s the fact that they are essentially advertising hunting, and advertising in such a way that really embellishes it. This obviously recruits people-as is the point of advertising-into something that didn’t need it. Now you have more people using a finite resource and a lot of them foregoing a good chunk of the learning curve. It’s everywhere. Even in the southeast for whitetails on public land, which was once somewhat unused comparatively. You can stroll through the woods now and anything that even looks fair will have multiple cell cameras and stands in the vicinity.

The only way this thing is going to end is more limited and restricted entry opportunities. Sure, it was probably always headed that way but what purpose did any of this serve by accelerating it? Some misplaced notion of social mores that encouraging others to be involved which makes one feel like a good person?

 

[Idaho_Potato]

Taking the risk here that mods won't like this one . Feel free to delete if this is going to take us off the rails. I like that the dudes at T and K have a sense of humor about all this.