By now many of you have seen what Jim Zumbo wrote on his OutDoor Life blog (which apparently has now been removed). For those that have not, here is the pertinent text:
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Assault Rifles For Hunters?
As I write this, I'm hunting coyotes in southeastern Wyoming with Eddie Stevenson, PR Manager for Remington Arms, Greg Dennison, who is senior research engineer for Remington, and several writers. We're testing Remington's brand new .17 cal Spitfire bullet on coyotes.
I must be living in a vacuum. The guides on our hunt tell me that the use of AR and AK rifles have a rapidly growing following among hunters, especially prairie dog hunters. I had no clue. Only once in my life have I ever seen anyone using one of these firearms.
I call them "assault" rifles, which may upset some people. Excuse me, maybe I'm a traditionalist, but I see no place for these weapons among our hunting fraternity. I'll go so far as to call them "terrorist" rifles. They tell me that some companies are producing assault rifles that are "tackdrivers."
Sorry, folks, in my humble opinion, these things have no place in hunting. We don't need to be lumped into the group of people who terrorize the world with them, which is an obvious concern. I've always been comfortable with the statement that hunters don't use assault rifles. We've always been proud of our "sporting firearms."
This really has me concerned. As hunters, we don't need the image of walking around the woods carrying one of these weapons. To most of the public, an assault rifle is a terrifying thing. Let's divorce ourselves from them. I say game departments should ban them from the praries and woods.
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As a result of this article, Remington has withdrawn their sponsorship from Jim Zumbo. You can read about it here:
http://www.remington.com/library/press/2007/2007-1.aspIf you suppport Remington's action to dump Zumbo, please contact Remington and let them know.
It is difficult to send Remington a letter via their web page as I couldn't find a "Contact us" link, but I did find a place to ask questions and sent a letter there. You can get there by following these clicks:
www.remington.comClick 'Support'
Click 'Help Center'
Click the 'Ask a Question' tab
Below is a copy of the letter I submitted to Remington.
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Dear Remington,
Thank you for your prompt action regarding Mr. Zumbo.
While I do not own any of the rifles of which he wrote, many of the members of my shooting club do, and I support not only their right to do so but their right to hunt with them if they so choose. One of my early elk hunting partners used a battle rifle from another era, an M1 Garand, and another used an even earlier battle rifle, an '03-A3 Springfield. The rifle does not determine how it is used. If that was the case, my Remington M700 BDL in .308 Win, with it's Leupold Vari-X III 3.5-10x scope would be considered a "sniper rifle".
Mr. Zumbo may not care for their looks, but that does not make them any more inappropriate for hunting than a Remington 7600 and a pocket full of magazines. Nor does their typically black color make them "terrorist weapons" any more than the matte black finish and black synthetic stock and an unblocked magazine filled with 00 buckshot makes my Model 870 Express Super Magnum a "terrorist weapon".
It was only a few years ago that Colorado outlawed modern inline muzzleloaders during 'primitive season'. A large part of the reason they did so was the advice from the traditionalistic CSMA (Colorado State Muzzleloaders Association) which did not care for the "look and feel" of the inlines. Colorado also justified their decision based on the argument made by the CSMA that the inlines provided the hunter with a significant advantage in power over side-hammer designs. That year I had to set my Remington M700ML aside and purchase a Thompson side-hammer rifle. Many people wrote the Colorado Division of Wildlife to protest this action. I did so as well, noting that I could dress up my Thompson side-hammer rifle with fiber optic sights; a match grade stainless barrel; a professionally tuned trigger; a custom titanium hammer for faster lock times; a red, white and blue paint job with yellow lightning bolts emblazoned on the stock and that I could load it with the exact same loads I would have used in my Remington M700ML. I also correctly pointed out that while such a rifle would happily fail to meet the 'look and feel' standards of the CSMA, it would be perfectly legal under the then-current regulations. Such a rifle, of course, would not provide any significant advantage over an unaltered rifle, in spite of its "look and feel". I was also happy to refute Colorado's argument about inlines providing more power than traditional side-hammer rifles by comparing the published maximum loads from Remington and other manufacturers of the time to load data published by an outdoor writer in the 1880s. Thankfully, in response to the many hundreds of people who wrote in to object to the new policy, inline rifles once again legalized. Today thousands of rank and file hunters and shooters, people just like those who wrote to protest Colorado's disingenuous ban on inlines, have lit up the Internet with their posts in angry protest to Mr. Zumbo's ill-informed and ill-conceived remarks.
While Zumbo may not like the black guns, he is sadly mistaken if he thinks the Second Amendment is about hunting or that responsible hunters should not use such weapons because others object to their look and feel. Limiting hunting firearms by their look and feel is an example of ignorance in action and is a very steep and slippery slope.
Thank you again for your prompt action.
Sincerely,
[name]
[email address]
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