What if we armed a whole squad of naked girls with paintball guns and let them chase a goggled (and cupped) me all around? This would culminate in a big… ahem.
Remember Monty Python’s Meaning of Life where the man gets to choose the means of his own execution?
Anyway, what?
So you’re all comfortable with the fact that this reinforces an image of women as nothing more than objects to be hunted and “mounted”? Let’s take a look at some quotes from Mike Burdick, the genius behind this little pile of crap. From this article on the KLAS-TV site:
Obviously the only problem men really have is not asserting their superiority over women, so this is a good solution. I can’t get to the website (neither huntingforbambi.com or huntingforbambie.com work) but an e-mail I received on the subject from a comrade states the site has the following:
Yes, this is the way men and women are supposed to behave towards each other.
And let’s re-examine this “consensual” business, shall we? Are the women agreeing to do this because they really enjoy being hunted and having pain inflicted on them? Do they think this is the natural way of things? Hell no, they stand to make between a grand and $2500 for an hour’s work or so. Do you think the women doing this would agree to do it for free?
The goggles issue is petty bullshit in comparison. This “game” only provides men who are misogynistic to begin with the opportunity to act out on their feelings and fantasies. It’s utterly disgusting and has no place whatsoever in today’s society.
I don’t think this is healthy, no. It’s tough to say what should be done, given that we are discussing paintballs and consenting (paid) adults. I agree that there will be litigation. In fact, that’s a standing prediction in every endeavor.
The truly disturbing part of this is the whole idea of simulating hunting women. Of course, duh. If I was in law enforcement I’d be all over this business looking at the people who find this stuff interesting.
Note: I was talking about the nekkid girls shooting me with paintballs. By Spinal Tap album cover logic that’s OK, right?
The thread in the pit
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=197417
has exposed this as a hoax.
http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/outrage/bambi.asp
So, all those who were getting all worked up about it can relax.
I don’t think we have to imagine anything. Two men punching each other senseless always seems to draw a large, pay-per-view crowd.
What about those of us who aren’t getting worked up? What are we supposed to do?
Damn the man, I say.
Repulsive.
Well, if it’s actually a hoax, sailor, I for one am damn glad. But it ain’t funny just the same.
“Bumfights” wasn’t funny, either. But it was there.
Although this is starting to look more and more like a hoax. Snopes thinks it’s a hoax. And no one seems to be able to cite anyone except that one news station out of Las Vegas that any evidence of this craziness actually exists.
And even that one news station is seeming pretty quiet on the issue right now.
Man, if I was that guy running that circus, and I was looking to make money, I’d be raking in the suckers right now. Controversy? Free publicity? News? Public outrage? You’d have NO trouble finding ME right now, especially if you wanted to give me money.
I think it’s a hoax.
I disagree with you on two counts Wang-Ka.
Bum fights was hillarious.
This has been reported by many news stations. I saw an interview on Fox. Several radio stations have interviewed the guy. The web site is selling the videos. They are probably staged, but I have seen the footage of the naked women being shot at on the news. It does exist.
Olentzero, chill.
No, but so what? I wouldn’t do my job for free, but that’s certainly not evidence that it’s not a consenting situation.
If it’s a joke, it’s a pretty sick one - thoroughly misogynistic. I don’t think that it should be shut down (provided that it exists at all), but it turns my stomach.
Women hunting and shooting naked men? Sounds like a party game at NOW’s summer picnic, or contest at a gender empowerment seminar 
Ah yes, “Smell the Glove”. Classic. Fran Drescher needed to loosen up and let the boys have their fun.
But really folks, I don’t see what’s so wrong with recognizing a certain element of power and control in sexuality. Are all dominatrixes necessarily misandrous? Not any more than all male doms are necessarily misogynist. They just get off on taking the power relationship inherent to sexuality and blowing it up to visible proportions. Men typically are the aggressors in sexual relations, the ones who initiate the sex act. So some men like to play the weaker role for a little variety, and some men like to exaggerate their dominant role. Really, I don’t understand what’s so bad about this sort of thing as long as everyone is a willing participant.
This has nothing to do with mysogynism or patriarchy or any of that nonsense, it’s just a little sexplay.
It’s looking less and less like a joke; NBC has picked it up, and claims to have been in contact with a spokesman for the company.
As to the non protective gear:
Well, I personally liked to fence without any protective gear on at all, ex-the masque, during the summer heat. My lebanese partner and me inaked to the waist with swords.
All good fun until his went into my leg. That was moderately painful later on. Actualy come to think of it, getting hit was really bloody painful, but you get this rush of pain then numbness.
As for the objectification, eh, it all depends on context. As presented in the joke it was slightly creepy, but theoretically it could be simply funny.
Dudes- it’s a hoax. Well, not entirely- they did make a video and are selling it, but there does not exist a service where you can pay X$ and shoot “live nude girls” with paintballs. They can do a LOT of stuff for a video that would be VERY dangerous if tried by amateurs. And they are relying on people like our OP here to get all huffy so that they get free publicity, and thus sell more of these stupid videos.
However for the last hundred years or more, one could pay money to either get spanked or whipped, or do the spanking yourself. I don’t hear the howls of outrage about: “men can pay hundreds of dollars to whip tied up women”.
Uh, Joey Skaggs, people. Joey Skaggs. The fact that a major network or other major “news” source has picked up a story does not make it true. Reporters are, by and large, far more stupid and gullible than the majority of people. Mr. Skaggs has proven that over and over. Reporters are idiots. They are extremely easy to lie to. They believe any rubbish that is put in front of them and present it as “true”.
Well, I am not surprised that the section of the web page opening this “sport” up to the public for 5 or 10 grand is not true. But, that != hoax. That, to me, is just a tiny part of this. Since I have seen the footage on the news of the hunts taking place and seen the owner of the company interviewed I am fairly certain that this place does exist.
I imagine they are actually selling the tapes. With all the publicity they are getting it would be crazy not to at this point. I am sure they are making a killing.
To me, when someone says flatly “this is a hoax” that means the web site is entirely fake and no such thing really exists. That clearly isn’t the case here.
That poor stripper, you could see her struggling to answer Bill’s questions using that tiny little brain of hers.
I can’t remember the exact questions, and trying to type paraphrases of what Bill asked, and how and what the stripper said in reply, it would be hard for me to convey how hard a time she seemed to have answering these simple questions. The pauses she would take as she tried to think of how to answer what little of the question she understood, the slow way in which she talked… I felt kind of sorry for her.
Actually though, she did reinforce my belief that most of these strippers, exotic dancers, etc., do what they do because they have basically nothing else to offer society. The only other career I could see this girl having is flipping burgers or filling up gas tanks.
But back to the topic at hand. In the case of these videos, I’m reminded of the phrase, just because you can do it, doesn’t mean that you should.
Heck, it sounds like fun. Sign me up.