Bundaberg talkback about The Junior Shooter

ABC Wide Bay (Bundaberg), Mornings, 11/06/2008 9:21am

David Dowsett: Fred of Gunalda. Good morning, Fred. Got a problem with a shooting magazine for youngsters?

Caller Fred: Well, Dave, I’ve got a few points to my argument. Any type of publication can be aimed at imbeciles. And if somebody publishes a magazine as graphic and as revolting as what Roland’s described, yeah, I wish it to hell. But getting back to the real argument about sporting shooting. I’m an older bloke. I got my first rifle when I was about 12. It was a rite of passage, the same as smoking. I’ve given up smoking many years ago. Sporting shooting, I got to be very good at it. I was one of the very few people I know that would go and shoot feral pigs with a 22. Most people use big-bore rifles. When it comes to killing animals, before I got a proper job, I worked as a casual kid in a meatworks and when you see what happens to animals in a meatworks, I’d rather be shot than slaughtered the way animals are processed in a meatworks. Believe me, it is not pretty. And I honestly believe that the only people that have the right to, you know, really scream about animal rights in this regard are probably vegans. And the last point of my argument is simply this, that the Port Arthur massacre, the gun laws in Tasmania didn’t fail. What failed was a gun dealer selling weapons to Martin Bryant, totally in contravention of the law. The bloke had no right to buy the weapons and they were sold for about 10 times their market price, which means the marketer, the seller, knew what he was doing. So, no matter what you do, you can produce laws for everything you want, but the smarties, like, the crims will always have guns. So you disarm the rest of the population, we’ll all go round in pink tutus wearing ballet shoes.

David Dowsett: [Laughs] They’ve probably got magazines for that as well. Fred, thanks for your call.

Caller Fred: Thanks, mate.

David Dowsett: Thanks. Fred of Gunalda there. Pat of Maryborough, good morning.

Caller Pat: Good morning. That gentleman’s just taken a bit of my...

David Dowsett: He’s stolen your thunder, has he?

Caller Pat: Yes. You know, my husband was a returned man and he’s had rifles in our home. We lived out west for quite a few years. All of my children were taught the dos and the don’ts and as far as I’m concerned, there are more horrible, degrading magazines on the market for teenagers today. And if we can develop into some sort of a sporting association for the kids where they can see the benefits of a gun, they can see the things that you don’t do and I think that’s what’s been lacking in Australia.

David Dowsett: So the anti-gun lobby saying teaching a child to shoot is really teaching a child to kill, is...

Caller Pat: Nobody can teach you to kill. There is an instinct in humans, isn’t there, like everybody knows? If you’re going to kill, you’ll kill and you don’t need a gun or anything else. You will do it.

David Dowsett: Pat, thanks for your call.

Caller Pat: Thank you.

David Dowsett: Dan of Brisbane, good morning.

Caller Dan: Hi, how are you?

David Dowsett: Good, thanks, Dan. How do you see this one?

Caller Dan: Personally, look, my parents were involved in sport shooting for a lot of years, so they competed at high Australian level. I think there’s a positive in teaching children the safety aspects of gun handling. On the magazine front, at the end of the day, people that have an interest in the sport are going to be the people that buy the magazine, so I don’t really think there’s an issue or an argument from the anti-gun lobby in that respect. Personally, I don’t shoot. I have been around gun clubs. It’s a personal choice, but I tend to agree with the previous two callers.

David Dowsett: Do you think it’s a sign that interest in shooting is waning, that they’ve aimed a magazine at the youngsters in this way?

Caller Dan: Well, every sport does it. You know, if you don’t encourage new people to become active in a sport, the sport eventually dies.

David Dowsett: Yes. All right, Dan, thanks for your call.

Caller Dan: Pleasure.

David Dowsett: Thanks for calling in. John of Biggenden, good morning.

Caller John: Good morning, David. Yes, I’m surprised, all that support. I was expecting to hear a big bunch of city slickers talking.

David Dowsett: That’s the great thing with talkback; it’s a roll of the dice. You never know what you’re going to get, do you?

Caller John: Yes, that’s right. David, John Howard was brought up in the city and I’m sure he never, he would probably say, why would you need a gun in the country? I’ve never had any dingoes in my front paddock. Look, I was brought up, same as all the other people, like the previous callers and that, taught how to use a gun at a very young age and all the kids I went to school with knew how to use a gun. We never ever shot each other and dingoes are a problem in the country. Now, since I’ve moved here, I could have shot five or six dingoes. Unfortunately, I haven’t got a big enough property to own a gun. I also could have shot two foxes and also I observed a crow, which we’re not allowed to shoot, taking my neighbour’s ducklings one day, sneaking up behind as the duck’s trying to get ‘em away. So I just had to watch. They were out and it was a fair distance away and there’s a big netting fence between us. In all those cases - I don’t like shooting things. I hate the thought of even having to shoot a dingo. I’m a bit of a softie, David, but I would have shot the dingoes because I’ve seen the mess a dingo makes of a calf and the mess that it makes of a sheep and it doesn’t kill it often, it just, you know, rips it to pieces. And I’ve also, in the instance where the crow is taking livestock, it should be shot and I think that I never voted for the Liberal Party again. I don’t vote for them.

David Dowsett: So for you, John, more guns the merrier.

Caller John: No. No, David. I’m not saying that. I’m saying a gun is a valuable tool in the bush and that’s where it should be, but everybody who lives in the bush, outside the town limits, should be allowed to have a rifle and, of course, unless they have some criminal thingo, you know. You know, because of the dingoes and the wild dogs. You see a lot of them out here, David, and they make a terrible mess of livestock.

David Dowsett: Certainly. Thanks for your call, John of Biggenden. 1300 221 001 is our talkback number. We’re following on from a decision by the Sporting Shooters’ Association of Australia to add a junior shooter magazine to their parent magazine and it’s resulted in a whole amount of anger from those representing the anti-gun lobby. How do you feel about it? You’ve got a problem with a shooting magazine aimed directly at youngsters? Is shooting just a health little adventure for children or is teaching a child to shoot really teaching a child to kill?