A Time To Vent

A fisherman in Newport Beach, California stabs a sea lion to death with a steak knife for stealing his bait...and on the top NW fishing forum he is applauded! One neanderthal even likened this guys killing of the sea lion to the civil disobedience of Rosa Parks!!!! On a fly fishing forum a thread about native Americans netters on the Columbia runs for several days with the majority of posters railing against the tribal harvest with some posts bordering on racism. My God!!! what is wrong with these people? Are we so self absorbed that the ends justify the means no matter what?
I could fill this blog with examples of "me first" posts by sports anglers. We, and I include myself in this group because I sports fish, whine, gripe, threaten and generally ridicule those that don't agree that we sports anglers are entitled to harvest fish above and beyond every other fish resource user group out there.
"We" go into spring chinook salmon allocation hearings with this gigantic feeling of entitlement. The government owes us fish after all and no one should be able to take any without us getting our lion's share first and just screw everyone else!
Pacific northwest native American tribes ancient heritage and culture revolves around the returning Columbia river salmon. We brought disease, introduced alcohol, took their fish and dammed their river and some wonder why they are suspicious of the white man!
I have no problem with the fish the tribes get and since it's federally mandated for them to get 50% of the fish those who continue to complain about it are wasting their breath.
Another example of our screwed up priorities is the reaction to the removal of Marmot dam on the Sandy river. On the same hugely popular northwest fishing forum there are those who are afraid that the potential return of more wild fish will cause them to not be able to kill fish and thus satisfy their greed.The same people who complain that they aren't getting their share of fish are those same ones who sit on their collective asses and do nothing when it comes to conservation issues. Oh sure there are those who put up a big show about how concerned they are about wild fish but when it comes right down to it they are just as lazy and just as complacent as those who do nothing. The fact that they are clueless is just an example of how lazy they really are.
So to wrap this bitch session up let me just say that we are obligated as so called sportsmen to respect the resource we all enjoy and do all we can to preserve it and protect it. Remember the earth is not ours to plunder and waste! We need to do better before it's too late.