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I am fascinated by women who choose to live lives outside of culturally sanctioned norms so when I came across an article about women who hunt, I was immediately intrigued. As a city gal, I've been sufficiently immersed in the cultural image of hunting as strictly a man's domain. The veil was lifted a bit when I lived in Michigan and noticed entire families, moms and daughters included, shopping for camouflage at the local Meijer. Still, I found myself really scratching my head when I read The Huntress Club: Duck Hunting Sorority in the Swamp by Michael Brick in The New York Times.
Though I find it difficult to relate to the "swamp witches" I was curious to learn more and to try and understand their feeling of empowerment vs. my judgmental view that they've been co-opted into a perverted form of patriarchy.
Susan Williams, 52, an importer from Clinton, spoke of a pride so deep that she had felt inspired to show off her first slain duck, in frozen form, at a New Year’s Eve party.
“That’s a validation for the women,” Williams said. “A lot of people say, ‘Oh, sure, women hunt, but there are men putting out the decoys for them.’ We have our own dogs, we put out our own decoys, we do it all without power, we canoe in.”
The group had been subjected to some curious questions over the years — “Do y’all have to have a license, like males do?” one man was said to have asked — but Crews, reserved and proper, struck a more diplomatic tone.
“We’re not out to prove anything,” she said. “We just like it.”
Not everyone is willing to believe that women are in it simply for their own pleasure. The blogger FSHuntress ("Advancing the tradition of the American Outdooswoman at Field and Stream Magazine) shares a piece by "St. Louis-based freelance writer Christopher Orlet titled, The Hunt for Gray February." She shares this excerpt from the article:
"Sadly few women understand the importance of this male [hunting] ritual. Unlike the fair sex, men cannot sit on a cell phone for hours talking about what drives them crazy about other men..."
"It has been my experience that most females will demand to go hunting exactly once. Women naively see the hunt as a chance to bond with their boyfriends or husbands. Of course, their presence defeats its whole purpose which is to isolate oneself from female society for a few days, while regaining one's masculine bearings. Thus the smart men are likely to make the trip as unpleasant as possible. They may find the buggiest place in the swamp to make camp. They may choose the weekend of an expected ice storm. They will constantly remind their love-interest there is no talking allowed as it scares the game ..."
Thus my confusion - why on earth would any woman seek to participate in a culture whose main practitioners view them so shallow and dismally? However, in a way, my question answers my question. They should precisely because of that view of women. If there is something to be enjoyed in the act of hunting (I don't have to understand what it is to recognize that it is there for others), even though it is an activity that I personally would hope that nobody would enjoy nor do I see any sport in humans shooting animals, if it is a legal activity open to men, I see no reason why women would not find equal pleasure nor why they should be deprived of equal access.
With that, enough of what I think about women who hunt, let's hear from those women themselves:
Holly at NorCal Cazadora is a duck hunter and she was excited about a recent event:
But it would've been amazing to me even if I hadn't been involved as an organizer, because this duck dinner was about women - it was the Valentine's Daddy Daughter Dinner, celebrating women in waterfowling. The only thing that was cooler than all the women hunters in the room was all the little girls - dressed to the nines - who have already begun to join us in the duck blinds.
The Hunters Wife imagines what it would be like to go hunting with Holly:
If you read Holly’s blog, you can feel the passion she has for hunting. It makes a non-hunter consider hunting. And if I ever went ducking hunting with Holly,
