It seems that the world is filled with things that are necessary but that are anything but fun. Some people find a career that they really enjoy, but for many people what they do for a living is just a job and it?s anything but fun. We take up hobbies; pleasant diversions that take our minds off the difficulties of life. Unfortunately, our hobbies often become more stressful than our everyday life, or so it seems by some of things that I read or some of the things I have witnessed.
Neil where should I start? From the three guys in a boat that waded the boat through my run in the Box Canyon of the Henry’s Fork - while I was standing there fishing it - to the four-letter expletives that erupt as seemingly “normal” speach from many, if not most, who wade all up and down through the water I’m either fishing or working towards fishing - to those guides who block off almost the entire river as you try to float by in order to get to less crowded water downstream, and then curse you for “molesting” their run…
I love this sport and go out of my way to advocate for it and to help others enjoy it as much as I do, yet, there seems to be an increasingly growing group who feel themselves “entitled” to exhibit whatever behavior they want to as they pursue their day’s activities.
Just look at many of the other flyfishing forum sites out there to see the vulgarity and crudeness of those who advocate to love the sport we all share. I have joined to and then left many of those sites in favor of FAOL. The problem you see on those other sites appears to be spilling out to on-stream experiences, and then many of us must be subjected to a crude diatribe that would make any of their mothers blush and frankly ruins my on-stream experience. Many whom I have approached and asked kindly to desist, have basically launched into a lecture about how if I didn’t like it then I could (take your best guess here), and why don’t I just leave?!?
The sad part is that many of these are professionals and/or have some professional grade skills and many of them would be great mentors to those just embracing the sport, but I wouldn’t want to leave the care of one of my sons, my wife or a friend in their care.
When is enough, enough? Whose job is it to remind these fellow anglers that there are others on the stream who may not share their so-called “passion” for doing things the way they do it? I have a lot of fun on the water most of the time. Sure, I try not to let the actions of others dictate my experience on the water, but sometimes its impossible because they are so “in-your-face” about how they feel, what they say and what they do. Yet, I cna have a great day, catch a lot of fish or not, lose some real beasts, or not, and I don’t have to utter one curse from my lips in order to do it. I don’t have to offer a colorful commentary on how to do this or that or whatever it is the other guy may be doing wrong. I don’t feel the need to do it and I don’t do it. Self-control, restraint, and just plain, common courtesy go a long way towards allowing all of us to enjoy our days on the water as well as each others company, even if we are strangers.
A bit more than my $.02 cents worth, but something I’m very passionate about.
Neil, thanks again for raising this subject. I hope to hear others passionate responses.
Kelly
Both of you hit the nail on the head and I REALLY appreciate it. I don’t think I’m a prude, but I sure don’t like the language either and I think it lessens the joy of fishing for all. Thanks for saying it.
My wife and I teach our kids that using profanity makes your I.Q. level drop considerably…maybe not in truth, but in others’ perceptions of you.
When I was rather young, I caught a nice fish I was proud to show off. I said, “Wow, look at the size of this Bass-Turd (spelling changed, of course)!” I knew Bass were a fish, and I’d heard my Dad call these fish by the name I had just said. I thought that is what the name of the fish was. There was absolutely no ill-will on my part, and I was quite confused to suddenly be in so much trouble…but my Mother immediately fixed my erroneous knowledge!
Fast forward to early teenage years…during summers, I worked in bean fields and cornfields with a group of slightly older teenagers. I slowly picked up on the language they were using. One day, my older brother made certain “suggestions” that I should desist all use of profanity, and gave some good reasons. I desisted.
Even now I work with a good mix of folks. A few are a bit rough around the edges and seem to have anger management issues with the sudden curses they throw loudly at their computer monitors in our office space of cubicles. People are who they are…what would I say to change them, and why should I have to say anything? If life hasn’t taught them enough creative words to use in lieu of profanity, then anything I would say would doubtless have little affect.
I know we can be influence by the speech patterns of those around us, but in the end, we each CHOOSE the words we use. Even good people can use bad words, but all should reconsider.
Fly Fishing is best as a "Solitary Pastime, just you, your fly rod & fly line, casting the fly pattern onto the water’s surface.
I am retired, so I can go fly fishing, any where there is open water during the week days, when a majority of the population is at work. Even in the cities there are rivers, streams, creeks, lakes and ponds that are deserted of humans.
I use to play golf, and I was good at playing the golf course, most golfer’s do not play the golf course, they play each other, and there lays the “rub” that cause the “expletive adjectives” being uttered!
I played baseball, football, and hockey; when I was a boy and then as a young man, and back then if you uttered a “expletive adjective” and the news reached your parents, your backside would be glowing in the dark (you could not sit down for a few days), your mouth would have the taste of the bar of soap that you washed your mouth with!
Fly Fishing is to relax in the outdoors and to “Carpe Diem” (Seize the Day)…
Grandfather Henry Washington Albert (my mother’s father) use to say, “If you have nothing nice to say, don’t say it!” My grandfather left school in 1900 having just finished the 3rd grade and was put to work as a apprentice mason. Working on building St. Paul Central High School, that later in life his two daughters attended. He carried hods of mortar or bricks up the rickety ladders to the bricklayers on the outside of the four story tall high school. Later in life he had his own construction company, and was a 32nd degree Mason (Scottish Rites). The man never used vulgar language!
I have had my weak moments in life where I have used expletive adjectives, of which I am not proud of… ~Parnelli
Speaking as an old ex navy hand.
One that still unfortunately swears like a sailor…
It’s not so much the profanity that bothers me as it is the attitude and rudeness.
I’d much rather be around someone with a mouth in need of soap, than a clean spoken person that is just plain rude and inconsiderate.
Which would you prefer?
A fisherman upstream saying “Holy #@$@ did you see the size of that…”
OR
A fisherman upstream that says nothing but crowds you out, and scares the fish in your area away when he comes to fish your area, because YOU seem to have found where all the fish are.
Give me a dirty mouth and a polite person over the opposite any day.
I met a fellow once at a dinner party -( a mountain of a man and a little rough around the edges- first impressions aren’t always right)) during the evenings conversation he came out with an expression I will never forget. " Profanity - the attempt of a weak mind trying to express itself forcibly "
Another former sailor here, I must admit that my speech can be coarse when I get excited or emphatic about things. But I do not raise my voice when fishing within ear-shot of others.
I don’t care what someone is saying when I’m fishing. Unless they’re fishing with me or there is some sort of emergency they are warning me about, I don’t want to hear what they are saying from across the water. I think this is the real issue. Let me explain.
It’s about space and the invasion of it. It’s about the lack of respect of another’s right to use the same space you are and enjoy themselves too. It’s about courtesy. It’s about manners. It’s about good sportsmanship.
All of these things I mentioned above are rapidly becoming extinct in our culture. We live in a neo-barbaric age brought about by the popularity of vulgar music, films and TV that mostly seem to celebrate and explore excess and mayhem, a video gaming culture that does the same and simultaneously isolates the players from social interaction, and a whole generation of parents and teachers and coaches and religious leaders who have abdicated their moral responsibility to lead…both my example and through proper training and discipline. You can sum up contemporary American culture with two words: Self-obsession and Excess.
My father taught all six of us (and repetition is the mother of learning!) that our rights stopped where another’s began. And he would amplify that with a follow-up question: where do other people’s rights actually begin? We’d think about it as youngsters when he first began this lesson with us and eventually admit that we didn’t really know. He’d put his finger on our noses and say, “Right there. Your rights end at the tip of your nose and the tips of your fingers, because someone else’s rights are going to start pretty close to there.” And then he would give some examples. Your example of the stream incident is very similar to the ones he would use: inconsiderate behavior robbing others of their peaceful enjoyment, cutting in line in front of others, cheating on a test others had studied hard for, running a red light in a car and perhaps causing an accident, etc.
Most parents stopped engaging in this sort of aggressive program of individualized moral instruction of their children a long time ago. My parents had a system and followed it through the rearing of six kids over a period of 40 years. They also had an academic set of priorities for each of their kids and supplemented anything lacking in the public schools. And they had a set of goals and objectives for the athletic and arts and cultural rearing of their kids, too. They dedicated their lives to this.
My dad passed on an offer to become an NFL referee…a dream job for him…because it would have kept him away from us much of the year for 4 days/week, including the weekends when we were out of school. It would have paid much better and been a lot of fun for him. It would have gotten him away from a career he didn’t enjoy. But it would have violated his priorities and values. He was a man of principles, ethics, and self-discipline. I suspect that most men like him died on the battlefields of WW2, but he survived. Otherwise, I cannot explain how such a big chunk of the Baby Boom generation turned out to be such a bunch of self-absorbed, over-indulged pansies with a raging sense of entitlement. And the generation that they (failed to) raise are a bunch of young folks with good hearts and amazing talents, but have almost zero social skills.
When I was a kid well educated, professional men rarely and ladies never used profanity in public. A pre-teen kid would be straighten out immediately by the near adult. Profanity was never heard at the movies or on the radio, the radio isn’t too bad but the movies will burn the hair out of your ears. Bill Cosby never uses profanity in his act, Chris Rock can’t say hello without using the F word. Which one is funnier, it’s no contest IMHO, which one is well educated, guess. Profanity has simply become socially acceptable and eliminates the need to develop a vocabulary. The total lack of manners starts when the kid is in diapers and the inability of the parents to say “NO” and mean it.
I remember well walking with Mom and Dad in Downtown Denver at the age of 5. If I was not on the street side of Mom, I was put there. If I went through a door before Mom did, I was yanked back by the collar. If I didn’t open a door for Mom, or any other of the fairer sex, I was “reminded” of my transgression. Foul language was not tolerated. I never heard foul language fro my parents or grandmother. I taught my kids the same.
Not all of us boomers are lacking with the training of our kids. I took on 6 step kids after their father committed suicide. We had our times. It wasn’t an easy road for any of us, but they are fine men and women now. They treat others with respect and work hard. Their kids do, too. My girls thought I was horrid for not letting them run to the car when a date pulled up and honked. They were horribly embarrassed when I would go out and let their date know that he would, if he ever wanted to go out with my daughter again, come to the door when they were going out. The girls got to where they expected this from a date as well and I got to meet some nice young men. Kids that came to the house were held to the same standard as my kids were. They all liked being treated with respect and see the value in treating others with respect as well.
I still teach young men to treat others with respect through Scouts.
As for the adults I deal with every day, I lead by example. Someone might start out with a foul mouth, but after getting “The Look” and not hearing anything foul from me, they get the idea very quickly. You can make a difference by simply not using foul language yourself. Manners are contagious. Be a carrier.
Good job, Kevin!
Of course you’re right: not ALL. But it seems that these things are becoming so rare that in day-to-day living it often seems as though we are the last of the dinosaurs.
I like that. The quote I picked up years ago is similar; “Profanity is a crutch for the inarticulate.”
I wish I could say that I never let profanity leave my mouth, but I can’t. I can work on it, though, and I do.
Those of us who have seen five or six decades pass have certainly seen some changes. When we were kids we cursed when we got extremely angry, or when we wanted to impress somebody with how we perceived ourselves as macho, risque, or cool, or some such nonsense. Always, in the back of our minds, was the fear that our behavior would get back to parents, teachers, clergy etc, and our world would come crashing down. I watched the next generation come up with lots less inhibiton about displaying bad language, and improper behavior. Now I’m watching their kids swagger around with their pants hanging around their knees, talking trash that would make a pirate blush, and blatantly excoriating every socially accepted behavior. Try to correct them, and you might wind up with a molotov coctail in your lap. Example: It was a bluebird day on the lake. Bright sun. No wind. No fish biting stripped flies etc. so we anchored the boat 30-40 yards away from a family group fishing from shore, and a respectful distance from several other boats who were doing the same. Good time to chuck a worm and wait for it to drown, while munching and dozing, and waiting for evening. Two young guys and a young gal in one of the nearby boats. Poles in the water. Guys in cut-offs and no shirts. Gal in short shorts and a tube top. You’re all familiar with how well sounds carry over water on a quiet day. We were all privy to the discussion they were having about their amorous exploits. This being liberally laced with words and descriptions that made you sorry you belonged to the same species. I fervently wished for a bow gun and an open season. The family on-shore gathered up their kids and gear and left. Several more of us in the boats pulled anchor and did the same. Those three didn’t have a clue, and wouldn’t have cared if they had. Where does this end? What will their unfortunate kids be like?
Best thing that I always try to do, is be courteous to all on the water. Granted, last year, I had two encounters with other fishermen. In one case, I was probably the rude one. (Walking back to my truck and didn’t realize somebody was just around the bend from me, and was thrashing through the water to get to the other side). I probably spooked the hole he was fishing pretty good. The other case was a standard tackle guy who was fishing about 25 yards behind me. No issues from me on that. Although it was upsetting to watch him catch 2 fish out of holes that I had just finished dropping flies too 15 minutes earlier! Heh.