Equal Opportunity?

Here's a news item that sent shivers down my spine...and it is not even Halloween.

According to ABC news, the Texas Wildlife Association has been sponsoring hunting outings for young girls in Texas and elsewhere with the intention of attracting more young women to the sport. These father and daughter outings in Texas are courtesy of the Texas Wildlife Association and on a recent one at Wildcat Mountain Ranch in Robert Lee, Texas, 9 year old Carolyn White shot her first deer.

"It's wonderful," says young Carolyn. "You feel like you can do anything and it is really cool."

Now I have NEVER been a proponent of guns in any one's hands other than law enforcement officers but I do understand that A) Texas is, in many ways, another country and B) hunting is a regulated sport and C) women can do anything men can do. What I do not understand, however, is letting 9 year old CHILDREN shoot living things ANYWHERE.

What is interesting about the premise behind these outings is the fact that according to the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service there has been a decline in the number of hunters nationwide from 1991 to 2006. To which I can only say, hooray. But why then target young girls as the next generation of Annie Oakleys?

And here's how they're doing it: with pink camouflage clothing and pink rifles and fashion lines with names like Foxy Huntress. Puhleese...By making hunting a fashion statement, do you think you are eliminating the fact that the object is to KILL something, regardless of what you are wearing? Besides which, I thought that the idea behind camouflage gear was to actually camouflage you. How can that happen if you are wearing PINK??

I'm all for equal opportunity but not when it masquerades as a shopping opportunity. "We want to see children respect animals," notes Heidi Prescott of the Human Society. "We want to see them love animals and not go out in the woods and kill animals."

Need I say anything more?