Posted on 11/25/2004 3:08:08 PM PST by marktwain
That is an excellent background article. It is much the same here in Pennsylvania. Schools will be closed on Monday, the first day of deer season. Families are already traveling up to their cabins for several days of comradeship and enjoyment of Penn's Woods.
Our hunters are well-trained from youth and are generally very careful and considerate.
It is the "visitors" from other states who sometimes create problems.
The last murder I can recall during deer season was when a man trespassed on a judge's property. When the judge asked him to leave, the "hunter" shot him dead in cold blood. That was about 25 years ago.
The mainstream media trying to spin this Wisconsin massacre as some sort of racial incident is spurious, to say the least.
I first started hearing about the Hmong about 1979. The sparse number of conversations were mainly about their lack of cultural understanding of game laws and conservation. I believe that there are very few living in the North Woods. However, as hunters, my guess is that there would be a certain sympathy toward them from many. I note that the shooter was from St. Paul, which most definitely is *not* a part of the North Woods.
As for my silence, I simply have not had any known personal experience with the Hmong, and very little secondhand knowledge.
This story was a real media letdown!
If all the participants were white, it would have been small anti-gun story.
If the shooter was black and the victims was white, it wouldn't have been a story.
If the shooter was white and the victims were black, this would have pre-empted the Macy's Thanksgiving day parade, and so on for the next 2 weeks.
But the shooter was asian( an immigrant?) and the vics were white so the media has a problem...it can't condemn third world immigrants, and we can't express sympathy for white male hunters, murdered though they surely were...thus the story must fade.
IMHO, the morals of the story are (1) Stop Immigration (2)the media is full of BS
thank you MT for taking the time to write this. Good job.
Thank you for your personnel background of the traditions of this part of our country and educating me about this unfortunate tragedy.
I am not surprised that no one shot back at this assailant. The event is so rare as to be far outside normal experience. No one shoots another person deliberately in deer season!
I suspect that even those who were shot did not realize that they had been shot deliberately for some time.
I never understood why no one fired back. Thanks to you, I know how kind and good those who were shot must have been.
As a kid growing up (10 - 14 years old) my brother and I used to go fishing on the peer jutting out into Lake Michigan. We'de each bring 5 or 6 fishing polls with us, pick a spot on the peer, and wait.
We'de stick the polls in holes in the concrete and pull the fishing line down and set an empty soda can on the fishing line, this way, whenever a a fish struck we'de hear the can and know which poll to get to and set the hook.
You had to set the hook fast as most of the fish (King, Coho, Rainbow) (2 feet long, 10 to 20 pounds) would spit the bait and run, but mostly in involved waiting, hours and hours, sometimes over night.
One day we saw a Hmong family new to the area and the father and his kid were out on the peer picking up the little dead fish (6 inches- less than a pound) (ail white sp? mostly) off the peer and putting them in a bucket.
After saying hello, we got to talking and they told us that, where they came from those little dried fish sold for a lot in the local market, and we just laughed. "stick around, we'll show you some fish"
Sure enough, 5 mins later the guy next to my brother hears the "tinkk-tink-tink" of his soda can, yells "fish on!", grabs the rod and sets the hook hard and he's got em.
After fighting him all the way to the end of the peer, his friend gets out the net and they pull in this huuuuge king.
The Hmong kids eyes light up like a Christmas tree, his jaw dropped to the ground, and they became a constant presence on the peer ever since.
I never knew their names, or even what country they were from (now I know they helped our side during Vietnam and got sweetheart deals to immigrate) but we made good fisherman out of them and a great time fishing on the peer.
Well said, marktwain, a good backgrounder, and thank you. I live a bit more than 20 miles from the murder scene. Just about everyone around here knew or knew of the victims and their families. Long after this tragedy fades from the headlines, the grief and disbelief here will remain.
To others there is a large population of; Hmongs in the Wausaw, Eau Claire areas. Many chruchs sponsered them in the 70s and 80's. Lots of gang activily there among them. Many travel between these to cities and Mn cities
Either they don't want to learn are game laws or chose not to obey them claiming the differants in culture for not obeying them. I have heard many reports on their lack of respect for others property and game laws. Over bagging ect.
I am sorry but when I travel to another country to hunt I have to know the laws I can not claim we did it differant back home. Let alone live in a country and still claim I did not know better. That is just a easy excuse for violating the law.
My memories align with yours. In years gone by (before hunters were required to wear orange), there were invariably a number of deaths due to hunting accidents. But I cannot remember even one homicide.
There's not a whole lot else to do in Hiles :-)
You can always pet the bear ;)
Great post.
I heard on Fox that he might have started to hunt humans. Very sad to say the least .
I don't consider it a 'vanity' at all. Your knowledge is first-hand and highly relevant (as well as being very well written). Thanks.
Much of what you've written reminds my of my own corner of Pennsylvania.
"My memories align with yours. In years gone by (before hunters were required to wear orange), there were invariably a number of deaths due to hunting accidents. But I cannot remember even one homicide."
===
Me three.
(As an aside--I recall my dear old Dad cleaning his gun in the house. Unloaded, of course. Boom! Shot through the ceiling, the upstairs bedroom, and out the roof - holes got bigger on exit.) LOL - no one hurt luckily.
Thank you and an excellent post. It should see wide reproduction for the insight it provides into the area and culture. Thanks again.
I just heard tonight that the police say that the guy that they are looking for in the UP shooting drives the same kind of truck that the shooter in the Wisconsin shooting drives.
In the Pacific Northwest, the Hmong pick mushrooms in the national forests. They have an exagerated sense of their "hunting" territory, imported from the old country in the mountains of Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos. When the uninitiated unintentionally impinge on their presumed "territory," the interloper is likely to be shot. Every year I remember, there were shootings in the mountains among the Hmong, and random hikers who wandered into the mushroom patch which was their livelihood.
Therefore, it is no surprise to me to see a Hmong fellow involved in a shooting in Wisconsin. He, like others, has probably imported his aboriginal sense of territoriality for the hunt. Private property is not recognized among these folks, to my knowledge. The guy who gets there first and defends his turf is the hunter of that patch. Private property be damned.
Sadly, this fellow seems to have adopted the private property and tree stand of this hunting party. When confronted and asked to move, he did what Hmong have done for years in the Pacific Northwest: He shot them.
Just my personal theory on the shooting....
Thanks. Excellent article.
Great post!!
Your post certainly fits the country people I know from the North Central.
Thanks for the local information. It's carefully filed away in my old foggy brain.
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