Rational Solo Fear

You should have let them look at the pack and offered to hold their rifles for them. Actually that would be a pretty good hint as to how sober/safe they were. If they'd checked the weapon or asked if you know firearms handling you'd at least have known they were safe.

Its important to to have actual connections through real people rather than through stereotypes. I remember seeing a TV show about a group of women hunting deer for the first time. One of them killed a deer and the women were gather around it and were oohing and awing on how beautiful it was, and it was easy to see they loved both the outdoors and in fact the animals in their way. Taken out of context without an open heart not so much. I would in fact trust the protection of the environment they loved and experienced to them far more that I would to someone in it merely as an issue of personal purity. Anyone actually seeing these old gals as people and not ideological stereotypes, even if they had a personal problem with the killing or even the gun part, would have to admit they were actually potential allies in preserving the environment. Anything that gets in between that contact is the real problem – or as politicians call it – a tool.

/toggle off off-topic ramble

Marko & Luke – appreciate your responses & agree. (Didn't have the guts to ask for a gun, though – I'll remember that.) Cool site to be on.

Where is Doug, I see so much material here for one of his jokes…

"It would have been funny said in a certain tone of voice."

Hmm… well golly gee whiz, it wouldn't be ALL that difficult for Jennifer to clarify the intent of her "2nd Amendment fetish" phrase. Was she just talkin' 'bout drunk yahoos with guns (who scare all of us!) or was she lumping in all competent, law-abiding firearms owners and users? Simple question, no?

Help us out here, Jennifer!

Libertarian and Conservative Guys and Gals, it's okay to stop twisting yourself into a pretzel apologizing for your objections to liberal stereotyping (whether or not that was Jennifer's intent – will we ever find out?). Let them try it for a change.

Yes, Libertarians and Conservatives should not stereotype. But neither should Liberals.

It is about time they are taken to task for doing so, as they have been doing with impunity for so many years.

Time for Jennifer to clear the air.

"It is about time they are taken to task for doing so, as they have been doing with impunity for so many years. "

Christ on a bicycle, let it go! Take it to chaff or better to a more appropriate website.

"Take it to chaff"

I would suggest that, but didn't somebody do that already??

"Just keeping it real."

Thanks for posting. About as spot on a comment on the subject as I've ever heard on BPL. Really not much left to say, is there?

Removes palm from face, and gives thanks that Chaff no longer shows up in recent posts. I do almost all my trips solo and river crossings are my main concern.

Also a big + 1 to Tom's recent comment on the keeping it real post.

On topic, I too agree with the folks for whom solo for river crossings are a rational fear. I had a friend die under analogous circumstances, and on a trip I backed out of at the last moment. So solo, slips on bank, hits head on rock and knocked out, ended up face down in shallow water, drowns. With a partner maybe a good chance to avoid the last part by getting pulled out/flipped over. I agree it sounds like a bit of a stretch, but apparently this scenario happens all the time according to the ranger I dealt with when my friend went missing. The hypothermia is an another, since if you reach the point where you loose good control of your limbs, and/or your thinking, having a someone else there to be you surrogate brain and hands for a time can save you life.

On the other hand it doesn't stop me, and like others have said, I enjoy the added level of attention I pay to things when solo. Like a lot of things, the level of mental pressure is if not pleasurable, then fulfilling, but as it is ramped up there is a point where it become too much. For example, at least at my level of skill and lack of grace at times, if I tired to do parts of the High Sierra Route solo it would simply become mentally debilitating, and I think for me that also would be a useful and wise fear. Not saying it wouldn't be very useful exercise in self knowledge, just probably too much for me mentally to consciously seek it out. I'm no Aron Ralston.

I realize a lot of high level climbing, for example, is about rationally approaching this edge and pushing a bit past each time, and that some people feel this process is the most meaningful thing they have ever experienced in their life. I can believe it. I just feel like playing with that edge is not for me. I'm happy to look over the rational fear cliff from a safe distance rather than to intentionally dangle my legs over the edge.

Yeesh! Ironically, I hesitating in posting about my experience with fear it may get somehow taken the wrong way, but I'm amazed at how this conversation has taken a turn.

As for Jenifers comment – I appreciated it and found it funny, and I think that's likely how she intended it to be….it's a shame it ruffled so many feathers.

Jokes and touchy subjects aside though, it IS a legitimate issue for a solo hiker. As a man on this thread experienced – you don't have to be a woman to to be caught off-guard by threatening people you may encounter on the trail.

I'm going to hope these encounters are as rare as mountain lion attacks and I never experience one again.

OOO that got out of hand. SORRY! it was not meant to be chaffy (but i guess I'm not surprised it turned out that way….a post is not a great way to try for humorous sarcasm….)

I meant any drunken group of – yes, sorry – men – in the woods scare me. Yes, I was trying to be stereotypically funny…and for that I apologize. I did put the "fetish" in there as a qualifier, and I had hoped that the empty beer can bit would suggest drunkenness. And as a single woman in the woods, alone, I'm sorry if that's you, but you're unpredictable and frankly, make me nervous.

I was approached in northern Michigan by two drunk guys – yes, they had a pickup – and it was terribly unpleasant. Thankfully I was by my car, and thankfully my dog was with me, but I almost didn't go on my day hike that day. They freaked me out – the fact that they were in a group (group think…very dangerous), and smelled very strongly of alcohol, at the end of a fire road with no one else around…I'm sorry if I offend people, but that is a scary situation. If they had guns, even more so.

And I'm totally fine with people carrying guns – just not drunk people who approach single women in the middle of nowhere.

And for the last time – I may be a raging left wing commie liberal from Chicago – but I'M FINE WITH GUNS!!!!!!

Now who's stereotyping??!!!!

I just don't want to run into an inebriated man with a gun – or a knife, or a bat, or a hatchet – on a trail when I'm by myself. We were discussing fears of solo backpacking, and as I mentioned, all the places I get to go (for the most part) are VERY accessible by fire road. So YAHOOS (no, not the law abiding person who happens to be carrying a well-cared-for firearm) who are not acting responsible, shooting at things along those fire roads (which many of the trails in the midwest happen to cross frequently) happen to scare me. If I get nervous in camp at night, in the dark – even when I'm in a group, cause I haven't been able to backpack solo yet….), THAT'S what I'm afraid is poking around my camp, not a deer or a bear or whatever…it's the creepy guy who's there to attack a woman on her own.

Because most camp sites in Northern Michigan are rather accessible by road.

I find swinging my ice axe around me using the "windmill attack" seems to keep unwanted attention to a minimum.

.

Is that an UL backpacking tutu Ian?

Acting crazier that the other guy and or cross dressing may be a good defense in the wilderness – I learned this and many other importation lesson from Bugs Bunny.

Useful for confusing Republicans with guns:

And escaping from (potentially man-molesting) hillbillies:

"Technically" it's a high adventure tutu but I have a cuben fiber one in the works.

Edit to add: while not a Republican, I AM a right-leaning cross dressing gun toting (but not when whiskey drinking or backpacking because I'm a gram weanie) backpacker. The way some men approach women is unbelievably creepy if not psychopathic so I can understand the concern.

"The way some men approach women is unbelievably creepy if not psychopathic so I can understand the concern."

Agreed!

In some cultures it seem like the lack public of mixing of the sexes seem to lead to creepy behavior towards women. In the case of a 50 year old Greek man from a tiny village, the easiest way to get him to immediately stop is (I jest not) to threaten to tell his Mother about his bad behavior. Italy seems very similar in this regard. There is a lot of ogling and verbal stuff, but it is far less likely to lead to any actual danger. On the other hand when men start acting like this in the nominally sexually "mature" cultures it actually seems much scarier.

Thanks for several of you understanding that there is a bit of a difference in these situations when you have lady parts. I so didn't mean for this to devolve to a gun thread – but I guess that just goes to show you can't even discuss things without people getting all bent out of shape.

But know that I do appreciate those of you who get it. I'm assuming the ladies here get what I'm talking about…but I really don't want to assume anything. I'm getting too old to be surprised by stuff anymore.

I've seen multiple threads comment on and even criticize various religions that were tame when compared to just about every thread I've ever seen here on guns. I'm not going to even try to speculate as to what that is other than to say that firearms is a topic I have quite a bit of knowledge of and can discuss from multiple angles but I won't here as it never ever seems to end well and seems to be the only true taboo topic here at BPL.

"…as it never ever seems to end well and seems to be the only true taboo topic here at BPL.

… guns, god, and government.

Step Away from the Keyboard!…..Step Away NOW!

"Step Away from the Keyboard!…..Step Away NOW!"

AND KEEP YOUR HANDS WHERE I CAN SEE THEM!!!

Tom stop stealing my lines:)

"Tom stop stealing my lines:)"

;0))

"I just don't want to run into an inebriated man with a gun – or a knife, or a bat, or a hatchet – on a trail when I'm by myself."

Me neither! Or a woman like that either.

My wife has a pistol. Kat has a chainsaw. I behave myself.

"My wife has a pistol. Kat has a chainsaw. I behave myself."

It would be well for all those inclined to abuse the so called weaker gender to ponder the following anecdote: Once upon a time, a female friend of a friend, who stood 4'10", found herself in a very tight situation when her hubby came home drunk one night and started roughing her up. She retreated to the kitchen and picked up a butcher knife, whereupon hubby, a former state wrestling champion, grinned and said, That ain't gonna do you no good". She fixed him with an icy glare and responded, "You've got to go to sleep sometime". That apparently cut thru his drunken fog, because he turned around and left the room in a hurry. Needless to say, their ill fated union was not destined to last much longer. ;0)