@Hogpatrol, I completely agree that we need to do more than preach to the choir. How to accomplish a viable SCI PR campaign is a real challenge though. We are in the middle of working on that. Running ads is extremely expensive and has to be done repetitively over a significant length of time to have any hope of being effective. No hunting organization that I know of comes close to having the bucks to do this.
There are other ways that we are working on, such as using social media. One of the issues with that is that social media can and will be controlled. Right now there is a big fuss over the use of data-mining through Facebook. I wouldn't be surprised to see regulators, or that industry itself, clamp down.
A method we've been using with some success recently is to be willing to speak with major media on hot topic hunting issues. The media becomes a virtually free avenue for us to get our pro-hunting points out to the audiences for each media outlet. Of course when you do that you offer yourself up to get flayed alive at the hands of a skilled interviewer with an attitude. But if you can take the heat and have some skills yourself, your points get across to some of the audience.
We are also working diligently to find the messages that will resonate with non-hunters, because they are the largest group of people. Ultimately it will be legislators and regulators listening to the loudest voices that decide whether we get to hunt or not. There are simply not enough hunters to win by sheer force of numbers. So the idea is to give the unaligned part of the public something to consider about hunting that makes them less likely to join a lynch mob spurred on by antis. Every hunter I have ever known thinks they have just the right thing to say that will convince non-hunters to leave us in peace, even in the face of the antis trying to whip everyone into an emotional frenzy. I think we need to get outside of own little world and consider what folks who are not frothing-at-the-mouth against hunting might find convincing enough to leave us be. We are certainly open to any brilliant ideas about how to do this. And if you've got a spare $50 Million for a big PR campaign we'll be glad to put that to good use too. But since I don't expect to see a line of big donors at my door in DC anytime soon, we will continue to work on figuring out what the right word is and cost-effective ways to get that word out.
And that's my real point -- what SCI and the other hunter advocacy groups do is that we keep trying, for YOU. That's why we exist. Our mission is to protect YOUR freedom to hunt, whether you're an SCI member or not. It's what we do. We'd like your support as members, but as long as we exist we will keep doing what we are here for.
Rick Parsons, CEO, SCI
