Guns aren’t just a hobby for conservatives; they’re an identity. Profile pictures with rifles. Truck decals. Hunting photos on social media. Second Amendment memes. The gun is who they are. The outdoor lifestyle is who they are. The camo and the blaze orange and the trophy photos are who they are.
Take away the land to use the gun, and you take away their identity.
And now they’re voting to take it away from themselves.
The US Forest Service manages 193 million acres of national forests and grasslands. Public land. Land where anyone can hunt, fish, hike, or shoot. The Forest Service maintains the trails. Manages wildlife habitats. Issues permits. Maintains access roads. Fights wildfires. Keeps campgrounds open. Ensures streams are clean and game is plentiful.
Without it, the land is just empty acres with no management, no access, and no future.
Republicans control the presidency, the Senate, the House, and the Supreme Court. Total power. They could protect public lands. Instead, they’re dismantling the agency that manages them.
And the people who use that land voted for every bit of it.
Staffing at historic lows. Hiring freezes. Regional offices closing. Trail maintenance abandoned. Fire crews crippled. The agency can’t function. The land is being neglected into destruction.
Legislation to sell off “underutilized” public lands. Mining leases expedited. Logging contracts fast-tracked. The land transferred to private hands. Once sold, it’s gone. The public can’t hunt on private land. Can’t fish in private streams. Can’t hike on private trails. The land belongs to everyone. It’s being given to someone. That someone isn’t you. And you voted for it.
Deregulation. Small government. Budget cuts. Selling off public assets. That’s what they voted for. Now the Forest Service is gutted. They asked for this. They just didn’t understand what “this” meant for their hunting land. Small government means no one maintains the trails. No one manages wildlife. No one keeps access roads passable. No one keeps the land public. They voted for the destruction of the thing they claim to love. They just didn’t know it. Or didn’t care. Or were too busy cheering for the team to read the playbook.
Hunting organizations lobby for gun rights. Donate to politicians who vote against the Forest Service. Rally for the Second Amendment. Say nothing about the land being sold off. They’re protecting the tool while losing the place to use it. Won’t fight for the land because the people selling it are “on their team.” The team is selling them out. Too busy cheering to notice they’re getting played.
Politicians campaign on protecting gun rights. Talk about the Second Amendment. Promise to protect gun ownership. Gets hunters to the polls. But while they protect the gun, they’re selling off the land where the gun would be used. The gun rights rhetoric gets the votes. The land sell-off serves the donors. Mining companies. Logging companies. Real estate developers. The politicians use gun rights as a wedge issue. Get hunters to vote against their own interests by focusing on the gun while ignoring the land. And it works. Every time. The hunter votes for the politician. The politician sells the hunter’s land. The hunter thanks the politician for protecting his gun. The hunter loses the place to use the gun. The hunter keeps voting for the same politician. The cycle repeats. The hunter loses again.
Big government is the enemy. But the Forest Service IS government. They want maintained trails, wildlife management, fire suppression, and access roads without the agency that provides them. Want the infrastructure without paying for it. You can’t have public land without public management. Voting against the very government that makes their lifestyle possible. Cutting their own throats and calling it freedom.
They have all three branches of government. Total power. Still losing. The agenda they support isn’t about protecting hunters. It’s about serving corporate interests. They elected the people selling them out. Defending those people while it happens. The gun rights rhetoric was the sales pitch. The land sell-off is the product. They bought the pitch. They’re losing the product. They’re thanking the salesman.
The Forest Service fights wildfires. Underfunding means longer fire seasons. More destruction. Rural communities suffer. Homes burn. Wildlife habitat disappears. The same communities that vote for small government watch their land burn because there’s no one left to fight the fires. The same communities that vote for budget cuts watch their hunting grounds disappear. Voting for their own destruction. Just too angry at the government to see it.
Hunting and fishing contribute billions to the economy. Rural communities depend on outdoor recreation. Local businesses. Guides. Outfitters. Hotels. Restaurants. Gas stations. Destroying the Forest Service destroys rural economies. The people who depend on the Forest Service for their livelihoods are the same ones voting for the politicians gutting it. Voting against their own jobs. Their own towns. Their own neighbors. They think “small government” means someone else’s government. It doesn’t. It means their government. Their jobs. Their land.
Western states are where most public land exists. The impact is visible there. Politicians vote against the Forest Service while their constituents hunt and fish on Forest Service land. Take votes from hunters while selling the hunting land to the highest bidder. The hunters don’t notice. Too focused on the gun. Too focused on the Second Amendment. The politicians get elected. The land gets sold. The hunters get nothing. The hunters vote for the same politicians again. A cycle of self-destruction. The hunters are the ones losing. The ones voting for the people making them lose. Can’t see it through the fog of gun rights rhetoric.
States should manage the land. That’s the argument. But states have less funding. More likely to sell off land to balance budgets. More susceptible to private pressure. The result is less public access. The hunter loses either way. Federal management or state management, the land needs funding. The funding comes from government. The government they vote to destroy. Arguing for a system that will sell off their land faster. Voting for the end of public access while thinking they’re voting for states’ rights. Not voting for states’ rights. Voting for the end of their own hunting grounds.
Public lands are American heritage. Belong to every citizen. Legacy of conservation. Birthright of every American. Selling them off is selling off the country. The people who claim to love America most are letting its land be taken. The same people who wear flag pins and post eagle memes are watching the land get sold to private interests. Patriotism without public land is just symbolism. The land is the country. The country is being sold. And the patriots are voting for the sale. The flag won’t save the land. The vote is what matters. And the vote is destroying what they claim to love.
Selling off public land serves elites. Serves the wealthy who can buy the land. Serves corporations that want extraction rights. Serves the people who can afford private hunting preserves and fenced ranches. Regular people can’t. Public land is the only place where regular people can hunt and shoot. The only place where access is guaranteed by law. Without it, hunting becomes a rich man’s sport. The people who claim to defend regular Americans are voting to make hunting a rich man’s sport. Voting to exclude themselves. Voting to make sure their own children can’t afford to hunt. Voting to make themselves peasants on the land their ancestors fought to keep public. A transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich. And the poor are voting for it.
Young hunters need public land. Private land requires money. Leases require money. Public land is free. If the Forest Service is destroyed, future generations lose access. The tradition dies. The heritage disappears. The gun rights they fought for become meaningless when there’s nowhere to use them. The older generation is voting away the younger generation’s access. Voting to end their own tradition. The young will inherit the gun. They won’t inherit the land. The older generation is selling the younger generation’s birthright. And calling it freedom.
It’s not just the Forest Service. BLM land is under attack too. National monuments are being reduced. All public land is at risk. The entire system that makes outdoor recreation possible is being dismantled. The Forest Service. The BLM. The National Parks. The National Wildlife Refuges. All of it. The attack is comprehensive. The silence from the people who use the land is deafening. The people who claim to love the outdoors are voting to destroy the outdoors. The people who claim to defend hunting are voting to end hunting. The people who claim to protect the Second Amendment are voting to make the Second Amendment meaningless. Voting against every single thing they claim to believe in. And they don’t even know it.
Can’t hunt on land you don’t have access to. Can’t shoot on ranges that don’t exist. Can’t fish in streams that are polluted or dried up. Can’t hike on trails that aren’t maintained. The gun is useless without the land. The Second Amendment is meaningless without a place to use it.
Guns were made into an entire identity. They wrapped themselves in the Second Amendment. Posted the photos. Bought the decals. Chanted the slogans. Voted for the politicians who promised to protect their rights.
Those same politicians are destroying the land that makes the identity possible. They have all three branches of government. They’re losing the one thing that makes their identity real. They have the gun. They’re losing the land. And they voted for it. Every election. Every donation. Every rally. Every chant. Voted for the people taking away the thing they claim to love most. Not victims of the system. Participants in it. Not being tricked. Being told exactly what’s happening. They just refuse to believe it. Rather believe the lie than lose the identity. Rather keep the gun than keep the land. Rather vote against their own interests than admit they were wrong.
The silence is complicity. The hypocrisy is complete. The consequence is permanent.
The land is being be sold. The access will be closed. The gun will remain. It’ll sit in the gun safe. Hang on the wall. Be carried to the range that costs money to join. Be pointed at paper targets on private land that costs money to lease.
The public land will be gone. The freedom will be gone. The heritage will be gone. The identity will have nowhere to go.
The politicians got the votes. The donors got the land. The hunters got nothing but the gun.
And now we don’t even hear, “You weren’t supposed to eat my face, Mr. Leopard!”
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Of course, it’s mostly Republicans/conservatives who want to sell off public land. But last year, it was actually a Republican who was the key opponent to including a massive sell-off in Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill”. (I watched this pretty closely.)
And Democrats (such as the late Harry Reid) are often times key proponents of selling-off public land in some cases (to allow places like Las Vegas and Reno to continue sprawling outward).
There’s a difference between gutting agencies and selling off public land, though I’m not sure of the status regarding the latter (and the article above provides no details/information regarding that.
In any case, the state of California (Newsom and the Democrats) have been busy privatizing land for tribes. The latest proposal would turn over thousands of acres of an existing state park to a tribe (and would exempt the tribe from paying property tax on it – see link below). I learned about this from a former Del Norte supervisor’s Facebook page, who appears to be opposed to it.
This is all part of a larger “land back” movement across the country – privatizing lands for what are essentially private clubs – which don’t even include everyone with native heritage in the first place. (Also notice how they never propose “giving back” cities – instead, they focus on areas that no one is protecting.) Environmental groups are complicit in this.
https://calmatters.digitaldemocracy.org/bills/ca_202520260ab2356
By the way, the Republican I mentioned (and the gun/hunting groups supporting him) ARE the ones you’re referring to in this article. They’re ultimately on the same side as the actual environmentalists. When I say “actual” environmentalists, I’m referring to the ones who understand there’s a difference between social justice vs. environmental protection (and that those two goals are often at odds with each other, if we’re being honest).
Similar to how there’s a difference between corporate-sponsored YIMBYs, vs. tenant advocacy groups.
YIMBYs have no actual interest in affordability. They exist to serve their “corporate masters” so to speak – the same ones who caused housing prices to spiral out of control in Silicon Valley. The same ones who are importing H-1 workers from India, since they know they can pay them slightly less (though still above what the “average” American earns (or is capable of) – probably due to differences in educational systems).
But at this point, I’m not so sure there’s a clear line between conservatives vs. progressives, in regard to public land (or at least – it’s not as clear as it once was).
Teddy Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln were Republicans.