In light of the 2010 Fall Shooter’s Bash having become a four-day competition I’ve been thinking about the rapid growth of practical long range rifle shooting.
A recent Thread discussed the NRA creating a ‘tactical rifle shooting’ coordinator. My post on that Thread can be found here: http://www.snipershide.com/forum/ubbthre...032#Post2124032
Sitting here tonight I have a few more observations, this time regarding recent growth in popularity of the sport:
Shooting organizations like the NRA may seek to define the sport of practical long range rifle shooting. If that happens, as it did twenty years ago with practical pistol shooting, the crucial aspects of the sport will become regulated by manufacturers, politicians, and media - in short, by outsiders. I call them ‘outsiders’ because their intent is to sell things, like shooting instruction, gear and gadgets, and to do this they will need to bend the sport to suit their own agendas and interests.
The problem for us is that each step we take down this path diminishes the integrity of the discipline we have created. The reality is that there is no other way but publicity if the goal is to make what we do more accessible to more people. Enter the purists: I think that what concerns them most is that some appreciate the value of a circle kept small. Why? Because to give-up the freedom and autonomy we have now is also to undermine the foundations of what we are doing.
The freedom to design courses of fire and a lack of match rules are what make what we do different from the other shooting sports. This freedom invites not only those who disagree with the structure and rules of other shooting competitions, but also those who refuse to conform to the ready-to-go formulas for weekend competition on square ranges. I respect the achievements of Benchresters but I, for one, would not drive across the country to shoot the exact same course of fire that I shot last weekend at home.
Do you want to be required to earn the right to compete against the best in the country by taking part in a laborious, points-oriented structured classification and elimination process? Right now, if you want to try your hand against the best practical rifle shooters in the country you are free to do so: Buy a rifle, register for a big match, jump into your car and come down. You may finish last, but there are no artificial restrictions in your way that prevent you from trying. To me, that kind of freedom is part of what is unique about living in the United States (as compared to, for example, what passes for free-living in Europe).
In three years I have seen Sniper’s Hide grow from barely twenty-five thousand members to almost fifty-thousand today. In some ways that’s good, and it’s especially good for those who make their living from the disposable income of the community. This increase in popularity is probably due in large part to shows on Discovery and The History Channel which made ‘sniper’ matches and ‘sniping’ part of the pop-culture in a wartime decade. The media now links what we do with the so-called ‘sniper’ rifles that we reportedly use, probably because it makes for better television appeal. I even have it on good authority that these ‘sniper’ shows are some of the top-rated shows on those networks. And more public appeal means more advertising revenue. But the truth is that ‘sniping’, whatever that is, has very little to do with the shooting we do at the matches and nothing to do with the reasons why we compete.
In the United States it is probably heresy to argue against the intrinsic value of more people making more money faster and easier, but in my mind the fundamental question still won’t go away: Do we not have a responsibility to the future integrity of the sport? I think we do. I have seen dedicated shooters and friends climb inside the media machine only to lose both the spirit of competition and the love of shooting that they once had. Of course they paid-off their house, but in return they don’t seem as happy as they once were, just more popular and more distracted, with more to lose.
The older I get the more difficult it is for me to be satisfied competing for the judgment of others. I participated stridently in the growth of IPSC. But I am now at a point in my own development that I no longer care whether or not I win a shooting match. After all, it’s just a shooting match. Today, if you met me at a public range you would see someone who keeps mostly to himself. I help those who ask me for it, but when I give a friend shooting advice I don’t send him a bill for my time. Because what is really for sale has nothing to do with shooting: it’s the gadgets, the gear, the clothing, the bullshit and the bragging rights - all of which I couldn’t care less about.
Sniping will exist whether or not there are ‘sniper’ competitions. And snipers will exist regardless of whether someone in authority gives them a certificate, a ‘hog’s tooth’, and a pay-grade which requires them to sit around with nothing to do most of the time. For me, shooting is something I do for myself. I do it when I want to do it and how I want to do it. I’ve been reasonably successful at it. But I’ve also made an ass of myself pretending that I was better at it than someone else.
In my opinion we don’t need an organization to determine who is ‘Top Shot’. We don’t need to spend our spare time indulging in that ever-so-human desire to measure, compare, qualify and quantify and classify and control other people that we see in our daily lives. And we don’t need to organize into otherwise irrelevant groups for the sake of dictating terms to others in the group. After all, no one really cares what someone else wants to stop him from doing anyway. Because whether or not you agree with me, that’s not what this sport is about.
Call me an elitist if you wish, but I am in favor of there being real effort required to become involved in the sport of long-range tactical rifle shooting. I go to Shreveport to shoot Terry’s match because it’s Terry and Jim’s match. I go to Texas to shoot Jacob’s match because it’s Jacob’s match. I travel far because that’s the only way I can get there. I don’t care where I place in the official standings because I learn from the people I meet there, most of which are also there to do the same. If I go to the match, and Jacob says to put the barrel on a wire, then I put the barrel on a wire. I don’t care if it’s ‘against the rules’ of organized competition: I either learn something from doing it or I don’t. That’s the standard. It’s the only true standard. And, either way, what I take from it is not up to someone else, it’s up to me. What matters is what the experience of the match means to the shooter, not whether what we do is grist for someone else’s mill.
See you all at Rifles Only in December.
A recent Thread discussed the NRA creating a ‘tactical rifle shooting’ coordinator. My post on that Thread can be found here: http://www.snipershide.com/forum/ubbthre...032#Post2124032
Sitting here tonight I have a few more observations, this time regarding recent growth in popularity of the sport:
Shooting organizations like the NRA may seek to define the sport of practical long range rifle shooting. If that happens, as it did twenty years ago with practical pistol shooting, the crucial aspects of the sport will become regulated by manufacturers, politicians, and media - in short, by outsiders. I call them ‘outsiders’ because their intent is to sell things, like shooting instruction, gear and gadgets, and to do this they will need to bend the sport to suit their own agendas and interests.
The problem for us is that each step we take down this path diminishes the integrity of the discipline we have created. The reality is that there is no other way but publicity if the goal is to make what we do more accessible to more people. Enter the purists: I think that what concerns them most is that some appreciate the value of a circle kept small. Why? Because to give-up the freedom and autonomy we have now is also to undermine the foundations of what we are doing.
The freedom to design courses of fire and a lack of match rules are what make what we do different from the other shooting sports. This freedom invites not only those who disagree with the structure and rules of other shooting competitions, but also those who refuse to conform to the ready-to-go formulas for weekend competition on square ranges. I respect the achievements of Benchresters but I, for one, would not drive across the country to shoot the exact same course of fire that I shot last weekend at home.
Do you want to be required to earn the right to compete against the best in the country by taking part in a laborious, points-oriented structured classification and elimination process? Right now, if you want to try your hand against the best practical rifle shooters in the country you are free to do so: Buy a rifle, register for a big match, jump into your car and come down. You may finish last, but there are no artificial restrictions in your way that prevent you from trying. To me, that kind of freedom is part of what is unique about living in the United States (as compared to, for example, what passes for free-living in Europe).
In three years I have seen Sniper’s Hide grow from barely twenty-five thousand members to almost fifty-thousand today. In some ways that’s good, and it’s especially good for those who make their living from the disposable income of the community. This increase in popularity is probably due in large part to shows on Discovery and The History Channel which made ‘sniper’ matches and ‘sniping’ part of the pop-culture in a wartime decade. The media now links what we do with the so-called ‘sniper’ rifles that we reportedly use, probably because it makes for better television appeal. I even have it on good authority that these ‘sniper’ shows are some of the top-rated shows on those networks. And more public appeal means more advertising revenue. But the truth is that ‘sniping’, whatever that is, has very little to do with the shooting we do at the matches and nothing to do with the reasons why we compete.
In the United States it is probably heresy to argue against the intrinsic value of more people making more money faster and easier, but in my mind the fundamental question still won’t go away: Do we not have a responsibility to the future integrity of the sport? I think we do. I have seen dedicated shooters and friends climb inside the media machine only to lose both the spirit of competition and the love of shooting that they once had. Of course they paid-off their house, but in return they don’t seem as happy as they once were, just more popular and more distracted, with more to lose.
The older I get the more difficult it is for me to be satisfied competing for the judgment of others. I participated stridently in the growth of IPSC. But I am now at a point in my own development that I no longer care whether or not I win a shooting match. After all, it’s just a shooting match. Today, if you met me at a public range you would see someone who keeps mostly to himself. I help those who ask me for it, but when I give a friend shooting advice I don’t send him a bill for my time. Because what is really for sale has nothing to do with shooting: it’s the gadgets, the gear, the clothing, the bullshit and the bragging rights - all of which I couldn’t care less about.
Sniping will exist whether or not there are ‘sniper’ competitions. And snipers will exist regardless of whether someone in authority gives them a certificate, a ‘hog’s tooth’, and a pay-grade which requires them to sit around with nothing to do most of the time. For me, shooting is something I do for myself. I do it when I want to do it and how I want to do it. I’ve been reasonably successful at it. But I’ve also made an ass of myself pretending that I was better at it than someone else.
In my opinion we don’t need an organization to determine who is ‘Top Shot’. We don’t need to spend our spare time indulging in that ever-so-human desire to measure, compare, qualify and quantify and classify and control other people that we see in our daily lives. And we don’t need to organize into otherwise irrelevant groups for the sake of dictating terms to others in the group. After all, no one really cares what someone else wants to stop him from doing anyway. Because whether or not you agree with me, that’s not what this sport is about.
Call me an elitist if you wish, but I am in favor of there being real effort required to become involved in the sport of long-range tactical rifle shooting. I go to Shreveport to shoot Terry’s match because it’s Terry and Jim’s match. I go to Texas to shoot Jacob’s match because it’s Jacob’s match. I travel far because that’s the only way I can get there. I don’t care where I place in the official standings because I learn from the people I meet there, most of which are also there to do the same. If I go to the match, and Jacob says to put the barrel on a wire, then I put the barrel on a wire. I don’t care if it’s ‘against the rules’ of organized competition: I either learn something from doing it or I don’t. That’s the standard. It’s the only true standard. And, either way, what I take from it is not up to someone else, it’s up to me. What matters is what the experience of the match means to the shooter, not whether what we do is grist for someone else’s mill.
See you all at Rifles Only in December.
