Monday, and I’ve got nothing to write about? 

Honestly, after this weekend I’m wondering if I shouldn’t change the name of this blog to the Recliner Blog.  Seems like all I do anymore when I’m not at work or flying off to Spokane is sit in my recliner and wish I were hunting.  Hmm… I think I’m starting to see the problem here.

OK, so anyway, a blog is a personal journal, right?  So I hope it’s OK to just cut loose from time to time.  If you’re afraid of unabridged, personal opinion, you might want to step back and check in on the next post.  I don’t do this often, but I’m over the top here.

What brings this on? A Friday night, an empty house, a bottle of wine, and nothing worth going out of my way for on TV. 

I’m a masochist.  I’ve said it before, and nights like this remind me of the truth of it.  With nothing better to do, sometimes, I do things that I know are going to suck.  I just can’t help myself.  Like shooting a pig in the bottom of a miserable canyon while hunting solo.

Or.

Like watching Hogs Gone Wild on the Discovery Channel. (No link provided.  You can look it up yourself.)

First things first here.  I know that at least a couple of folks involved with the program have dropped in on the Hog Blog to comment or just to read what we’re saying.  For what it’s worth, I have no doubt in the ability and skill of the contractors who are portrayed on this program.  Nothing personal.

I’ve ragged on this show before, and I can promise that if what I saw Friday night is any indication, I won’t stop ragging on it any time soon.  Not to put too fine a point on it… but I hate this show!

You know… if I were creating a comic book, about these superheroes who battled an invasion of man-killing hogs, I would style it much like the producers of Hogs Gone Wild have done.  The swine would be these bloodthirsty, intelligent monsters.  I’m thinking the velociraptors from Jurassic Park here. 

Not only would they be mankillers (but for goodness’ sake, don’t forget they’re mankillers), but their feet are rototillers and they piss Roundup ™.    In their path they’d leave steaming heaps of e. Coli, brucellosis, and glow-in-the-dark radiation.  They’d become, in my comic, one of those things you really don’t want to show up in your neighborhood on a pretty weekend.

But real life ain’t a comic book, now is it?

Sure, wild hogs are potentially dangerous.  With their tusks, their strength, and their speed, they can be bad news in a tight spot.  I’ve seen it, first hand.  But you know what else can be a deadly adversary in a corner?  A terrified whitetail deer.  Even a doe, with its razor-sharp hooves, can ruin your day if you get between her and safety. 

I’ve faced off with a pissed off ‘possum, which is never something you want to do if you don’t have room to run.  And I don’t need to tell you about the rage of a cornered coon.  Honestly, I’ve seen a semi-tame mallard duck chase a grown man across the driveway and send him diving for his truck… and this is a guy I wouldn’t pick a fight with on my best night.

The thing about wild animals is that they’re Wild.  They have a very strong survival instinct and none of the moral constraints humans tend to exhibit.  They will kick you when you’re down, and they’ll sure kick you when they’re down.  They’ll bite and scratch and anything else they think will get them away from you… the predator. 

But in the real world, wild hogs are not super demons.  We can kill them, quickly, thousands of times beyond the reach of their tusks.  The the simple pull of a trigger and in an instant, we can reduce the biggest, meanest boar to a pile of meat, skin, and bone. 

Too dramatic?  OK.  How’s this… with a few rocks, or maybe a broomstick, we can send them scurrying and squalling back into the shadows.  Even the big ones will quail under a flurry of blows from a broom.  And if they get snappy, all you have to do is offer them a way out… an escape.  Hell, even Sun Tzu warns against cornering an enemy without an avenue of escape.

So there’s the Hogs Gone Wild program… and there’s reality.   I doubt the twain shall ever meet. 

But why does the show gall me so bad?  I mean, I can pretty well ignore most of the other “reality” shows the same way I pretty much ignored professional wrestling.  For that matter, I ignore them for the same reasons… they’re both fake. 

The difference is, I’m a little concerned about the blind vilification of the feral hog.  I’m a little concerned about sending the message that these things are the modern velociraptor, and you better hide the children and put an armed guard over the azaleas at the same time.  People shouldn’t fear the wild hogs.  They should understand them.  They should be aware that these are non-native species, like ourselves, and they’re pretty damned good at getting along under adverse conditions… again, not unlike us.  They should know the facts about wild hogs, just as with any wild animal, and base their opinions on those facts.

Where am I going here?  Well, to be sure I’m not going all, “let’s protect the wild hogs!”  No sir.  I am looking forward to my next opportunity to put the crosshairs on one. 

But I think the Discovery Channel should take responsibility and give us, the viewers, better.  They should have respect for the viewers, and our intelligence, or at least enough respect to present “reality” in a real package, and not the foolish hyperbole of programs like Hogs Gone Wild. 

I can’t help it that I remember when Discovery was like the National Geographic of television.  They showed us stuff that we couldn’t help but learn from.  And it was, mostly, real.  And then the “reality” craze.  Now, the Discovery Channel is a parody of itself… a joke, and this program is exactly that… a joke.  Problem is, it’s a bad one.

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