"... patriots and socialist.. " attitudes is the primary reason for the decline of the site. The basic assumption of participation has always included a far right conspiracist outlook and ostracizing those who disagreed. When assertions about "stolen election" are accepted as usual chat (Mannlicher recently) or any number of dead children is acceptable re AR type weapon discussions (Moe recently) or the idea "White men with guns have spoken" (Wolfy?) post election in 2016 was acceptable and lauded or the discredited fin de sicle eugenics claims became abundant around then or the vitriol directed at "Socialists" (ironically by members with careers in actual functioning socialist based agencies such as Police and military) or the many outright denials of human contributions to Climate problems such as it is not happening or glaciers are enlarging (Moe recently but reflecting the general attitude) the history tends to reflect the general pattern of hostility and exclusion members seem to desire. The attitude has been often openly displayed when members preferring fact based views are invited to leave by the coterie of far right conspiracists remaining including snide remarks by moderator (Crash) which included to either name names as is done here or "Shut Up" in the interweb equivalent of shouting. This was the Moderators instruction that was followed as required.
The site is moribund because of what it has become. At one time it was lively and growing with burgeoning international membership. The irony is that it could have been again. There were a number of ways the site could have maintained the growth of earlier years but instead allowed itself to be drawn into the current death spiral.
Citizens and guests on public forums may have differing opinions on just about anything from knives to tarps to politics. On a site dedicated to open discussions, which I fully support, toleration of all ideas and view points is the sine qua non of success. The curmudgeonly diatribes of a few superannuated "leaders" proved too bitter a vinegar for those seeking a taste of honey and comradeship in a shared interest of the outdoors.
Other bushcraft and outdoors sites continue to be successful simply because they remain inclusive to a degree never achieved here. That is a shame and waste of talent, knowledge and opportunity. It might be worth considering how many potential members of the bushcraft and outdoors community have been dissuaded from participation by the rampaging nonsense of a few more intent on pushing a political diatribe at the expense of everything else. They made the site they wanted and now we reap the returns.
, Sounds like you've been holding on to those feelings for a long time Boomer, I'm happy for you that you were finally able to get them out into the open air, I'll bet you feel lighter in many ways and feel much better overall, letting loose with a good diatribe occasionally is healthy. medicine for the mind so to speak.
There's allot of truth in what you said above, this forum is mostly made up of Conservatives who have a deep seated love for their God, Constitution, and their guns, for the most part they are extremely self reliant and expect others to be the same, individualism wins out with them every time over collectivism, they recognize the need for a social safety net, there are many reasons why people need help and helping people get back on their feet is a moral thing to do, but that doesn't mean welfare for life.
Most conservatives these days tend to be short on patients when it come to the lefts constant whining about social injustices, after all, life is not fair or just, some people are born smarter than others, more physically fit than others, some born to wealthy parents, in supportive home, have available higher education, and still others get opportunities that other never do, some folks seem to get all the breaks while others get none.
You bandy about the word Facts allot, here are a few facts that you and yours seem to ignore allot, most crimes are committed by people of color, they make up about 16% of this country's population yet they make up 75% of our prison population, not because of bias or racism, but because they committed a crime.
While the left refuses to recognize all the rioting, looting, burning, violent assaults on American citizens and their property by minority groups like Antifa, BLM, and occupy Wall St. (or what ever the new target of choice is today) our cities are still occupied and under attack by criminal looters, thugs, rioters, and paid by the left professional trouble makers, and in those states, cities, and local jurisdictions where the leadership is socialist and the majority of citizens vote Blue it's a hell hole, murders, rapes, assaults, muggings, car jackings, and robberies are the norm.
Ever wonder why we don't see that kind of news coming out of the Red States, funny, you never include those facts in your presentations.
You champion gun control (actually against original intent Constitutionally), especially the AR type rifles, why, oh yes, they are killing children by the scores, you cite hundreds of mass shooting each year in the USA, actually those are fuzzy facts, AR type guns don't kill anyone especially children, crazy people kill using those weapons, rival gangs of criminals and drug dealers kill using those weapons, hardened criminals use those kinds of weapons while committing their crimes, in all according to the FBI's uniform crime reports those weapons are used in crimes maybe a hundred times a year, and are not a major factor in our society.
You may or may not be aware of this but, there are millions of those AR's, AK's, and other black military looking semi auto rifles in the hands of millions of law abiding American Citizens that use them to hunt, target shoot, and compete in shooting events, and they also keep them to defend their families and homes, and also to fulfill their obligation to defend this country against all threats foreign and domestic, look it up, it's in the US Constitution, you know, the one you guys on the left say is obsolete and irrelevant in todays "modern world".
You say we must ban them, make criminals out of their owners, looks good on paper, but who's going to cooperate, who's going to obey those unconstitutional laws, probably the law abiding citizens who own them, maybe, but I can guarantee you who definitely will not obey any gun control laws and not turn in their AR's, AK's, and other black evil guns, the very people who are using them to commit crimes and kill people, and I can also guarantee you that many people will be left defenseless against those criminals, not to mention that our country will be at the mercy of any tyrant who cares to take it over, I know you don't agree, but as you say, I have a right to voice my opinion.
To your question, "how many children have to die before we ban those weapons", let me ask you a question, just how many men, women, and children have to die in automobile accidents before we ban automobiles (more people die in automobiles every year than are killed by gun violence or suicide), the numbers are endless, why, because cars are important to people in this country for countless reasons, those deaths by automobile are simply the cost of doing business automobile wise, the Constitutionally protected Second Amendment Right to keep and bear arms is what makes mass shooting the cost of keeping that freedom, and make no mistake, the Second amendment is the one that protects all the others, that's why in the eyes of the left, it has to go.
Climate change, we hear all manner of horror stories about the end of our world because of Global Warming, scratch that, it didn't work, so we adopted Climate Change as the new Boggy man that we have to dump billions of dollars into on order to save the planet, how many hundreds of millions of years has the earth been repairing itself from natural disasters like floods, earthquakes, forest fires, twisters and hurricanes, meteor strikes, global warming, global cooling (remember the days when the entire globe was covered in ice, BURR), all of a sudden (what a couple of thousand years of cooking and heating fires and a couple of hundred years of the industrial revolution and those stinky horseless carriages and we are doomed, give me a break.
OK, OK, lets say the sky is falling Global Warming/Climate Change crowd is right, AOC and the squad in Washington say we have 12 years (well 10-1/2 now) before total meltdown, I haven't heard for Al Gore in awhile but I believe he's on board with AOC, I think the big three (WHO, NATO, and the world something or other (the name escapes me at the moment), lets not forget the New Green Deal, and last but not least John Kerry.
That's a pretty impressive bunch of celebs right there tell us how much trouble we're truly in, scary stuff really, but "They" say all we have to do is throw billions and billions and billions of dollars (there ain't that many dollars in the world but I guess the Fed can keep printing as much as the paper and ink supplys last) at the Global Warming/Climate Change problem and we can reverse it and all be saved.
Well, that's good news, right up until you ask that big impressive bunch of celebs how they are going to do it, now a more reasonable prediction is that we have until 2050 before it all goes to hell, that gives us 28 years, that's better, but, we are still going to loose the nice caps, seals and polar bears and a few other species are going to go extinct, we're still going to have to deal with famine, heat, all sorts of new illnesses, our diet will change, most of the foods we are used to won't grow in the new environment that Climate Change is predicted to deliver in the meantime between now and day 0, so laboratory created food substitutes and Bugs will make up most of our diet along with some Rice (they say Rice will grow just about anywhere under almost any conditions as long as it has water, which shouldn't be a problem with all that melting ice around us.
But the unanswered question still remains, what are those Billions upon Billions of dollars of Climate Change fighting monies going to be spent on that's going to stop and reverse what "they" say is total destruction of the world as we know it, inquiring minds want to know, but so far it seems like no one in charge has a plan.
I don't know why the thought popped into my head, but how many of you folks reading this remember Y2K (the Millennium), for a year or more that's all that was being talked about, it was to be devastating, when the world clock
hit 12:00 midnight on the eve of the year 2000, computers would stop, the world would go dark, no more power, no more records, all would be loss, millions upon millions of dollars were being spent of modifying computers by government and industry across the globe, people were stocking food and water, they were converting their money into silver and gold, topping off their gas tanks, the predictions were terrible, almost as bad as those accompanying the Global Warming/Climate Change predictions.
And on the morning of the first day of the new millennium people woke up to another day just like the day before, the world hadn't ended, computers still functioned fine, the clocks all worked and were on time, and it was business as usual, well, except for millions of people who bought allot of food that they were probably not going to eat and would eventually end up throwing in the trash when it went bad.
That's my problem with all this GW/CC stuff, we have a tons of predictions, all bad, and not a hint of a plan except that we have to get solar panels installed on our homes, buy expensive battery powered cars, adopt a vegan diet, and give up all carbon based fuels, give up outdoor cooking, BBQ's, and fire pits, in general give up all those things that are comforting in our lives.
So, I'll concede that maybe I'm wrong and that maybe GW/CC really exists to the degree they say and that their predictions of gloom and doom are accurate, but what if they aren't, is it like Y2K all over again except with a huge price tag, or could it be worse than that, could it be a plot to create a new world order, create a totally controlled society of slaves and masters, OK, I know, now we're entering Rod Serling territory, but could it be ?
You all decide for yourselves, but don't do it over a pitcher of Cool Aid, Tang is better, or Gator Aid.
Personally, I'm not buying any of it until someone shows me a compelling reason and a convincing plan.
