I am not a gun person, by which I mean I’ve never owned or fired a gun, nor do I want to. However, I am an active participant in what many call the “gun culture” debate. Which means I am at odds with others, even if some of those others are sitting across from me at the dinner table, sharing a wonderful winter stew on a snowy Sunday evening. Even now our own beloved daughter.
“I have a semi-automatic,” she announced, just as some of us were expressing opposition to assault-style rifles. The context for this revelation was discussion about the recent Parkland, Fla., school shooting where 17 children were killed. My daughter’s pronouncement stopped the conversation in its tracks. It was hard to swallow. Our daughter armed with a lethal weapon, like the one used in that horrific shooting?
And yes, our strong, progressive-minded, union-organizer daughter is a hunter. She married into a multi-generational family of hunters. She’s part of a wider community that hunts. On crisp fall mornings, she’s up at dawn, dressed in her layers joining up with family and neighbors to hunt ducks, or track deer in season. She loves it. The skill, the silence and patience, the challenge of eye and hand, the camaraderie and particularly the pride of gathering ones own food. And then to offer up wonderful meals. I recall a feast of wild duck wrapped in bacon strips, venison steaks cooked on the grill and an appetizer of goose sausage. It’s been an education.
But initially it was conflict. We (me) argued fiercely about guns, about the ethics of hunting and the influence of the NRA. We painted each other into corners and cast each other as stereotypes, only healing the rift through our mutual love of family. Then forging pathways toward understanding the “culture wars.” Allow a short digression to a related incident here.
One early winter day, our daughter was driving across a causeway, abutted by two ponds that had just iced over, when she spotted four deer on the run. She witnessed the ice shatter under their weight and saw the deer fall through into the water. Two of the deer scrabbled back onto the ice and made it to shore. Two others did not. Instead they panicked, exhausting themselves swimming in circles. Horribly distressed, our girl called her husband, her father-in-law and buddy Steve for help. In no time, they, along with other neighbors, appeared, with ropes, with a boat, with rescue know-how. Some leaving their deer stands in order to help save the deer. And thanks to some combination of muscle and competence, they succeeded in getting the deer to shore to rejoin their waiting companions and lope off into the woods. Only thanks to these hunters.
I have come to admire these good hunters, to value their skills, their devotion to conservation, their knowledge and love of nature. I also understand that many of their hunting buddies (not all) favor some gun control measures: mandatory training and stronger background checks with three-day wait periods. And yes, we still disagree on critical issues. For example, I do not believe that the second amendment gives people the right to own military-style weapons with high-capacity magazines. Still, we are also discovering areas of common ground where before there were none.
A few days after our discussion about guns, my daughter sent me a cartoon by the political cartoonist, Mike Luckovich. The cartoon depicted a man cowering inside his home, while a suited-up elephant (think Republican) makes a getaway holding two bags, one marked “Medicare” and the other “Social Security.” The elephant head’s bubble reads: “Keep your eyes peeled for Democrats comin’ to take your guns.” I believe that she sent the cartoon for two reasons. One, because it depicts the distrust and manipulation that so informs and dilutes our political will. And second, because the cartoon underscores the need to reach beyond single-issue polarization.
I will never be a hunter. But my issue is not that others are. My issue is that we must find ways to combat this epidemic of mass shootings and the proliferation of military-grade weapons as well as handguns. Which means we must all come out from our corners to make our way over that metaphoric thin-ice pond together or, like those deer, we will keep falling through and swimming in circles.
Perhaps, some of us non-hunters and some of us good hunters might yet gain purchase and stand with the high school students to demand the reforms that will ultimately protect our children and our communities. And in this way, as my daughter said, “we may not win arguments. But we will build community.”
Ruth Charney lives in Greenfield.