Putting your head above the parapet means you’re going to cop it from time to time, but I’m going to call some stuff out as unacceptable (Monday rant!)

In my naivety perhaps, I had no idea that when I first started presenting some very small scale TV programmes about fishing many moons ago, I was going to attract some “unpleasant attention”. This was way before social media ever reared its head and became an unavoidable part of all our lives. Doing TV work and then putting myself out there more with fishing magazine stuff and fishing tackle consultancy work and so on pretty quickly drew a few idiots out from behind the safety of their anonymity and then keyboards as social media became so prevalent……………

I didn’t know way back then that a bit of nasty stuff was part and parcel of this kind of work, but I am a fast learner and I am very able to compartmentalise stuff and move on with my life. I have been called all manner of things from the internet and I have even had a few threats of physical harm directed at me, but it’s always the same with these sad, pathetic, lonely idiots putting stuff like this out there. When you meet the odd one of them in real life and actually call them out, they do nothing more than shrink away and try to avoid eye contact or having to speak with the real person they have been unpleasant to. The safety of a keyboard or a phone doesn’t half embolden weaker people.

I’ve been called this and that, and I have been accused of many things over the years. All connected with fishing I might add, which I find slightly ironic when you consider we go fishing because we enjoy it. It gives us pleasure to go fishing, and I have always found pleasure in the success of other anglers. My first thought when I go online is always to be nice. It’s so easy to be nice is it not? Celebrate anglers’ catches and enjoy discussing all things fishing. A smaller bass for a new lure angler might not seem that impressive to an expert for example, but whatever I do or have done in fishing, THE one thing I have always, always clung to is that we all start somewhere - and I pride myself on remembering what it feels like to be starting out. And then how easy it is to be put off by throwaway, unpleasant comments.

It’s no different if you have children - you learn very quickly how much positive influence you can have on their upbringing if you nurture and praise when it is needed and/or hopefully deserved. You also realise pretty quickly how easy it would be to crush your children with the wrong words or behaviour. For sure they then go on to become teenagers and obviously know way more than you, but that’s just part of growing up! You know what I mean here if you are a parent. You hold it within the palm of your hand to help shape your children for the better, but likewise you are able to do the direct opposite if that is the kind of person you are.

I am big and old and ugly enough to be able to take any of the crap that is dished out at me. When it happens I see it as no more than jealousy, but quite why anybody would be jealous of me and my life when I don’t feel remotely envious of anybody else has always been beyond me. I also will never understand how a true angler could possibly be jealous of another angler’s success. Surely good fish or good fishing is to be celebrated? Again, maybe I am a bit naive, but I am perfectly happy being me. Of course I wish that doing my job didn’t attract any nasty stuff, but it’s the way of the world and a few people just aren’t that nice I guess. I would rather people be unpleasant to me and hopefully leave other anglers alone though. I know the score and it’s been an unavoidable part of my life for a long time.

And I let most crap go without getting involved. I might be many things, but I like to think I am not stupid and I am also very observant. Way more than most people realise. I have been at this a long time now and I know way more anglers and angling trade people from all around the world than you can imagine. I also know and hear way more than you realise. I do what I can to stay away from as much toxicity as possible - like some of the Facebook fishing groups for example - but I am not stupid. I pick up on the unpleasant stuff and mostly I just move on and enjoy being alive and loving my amazing family.

From time to time though I am going to call something out, just like the other day when I sent some photos to a marketing person at Savage Gear and wrote a few words to go with them. I have put some of the photos up on here that were used, and yes, I used some of those photos on a blog post the other day so you might have seen them before. Fishing is a business like any other business, and this marketing person put the photos up on Instagram and Facebook, as was intended. Savage Gear and/or Pure Fishing need to do marketing to help sell products, just like a company like Apple markets to me and I buy too much of their gear!

I was tagged in the posts and then I saw this exact comment left on the Savage Gear UK Facebook feed: “Placing sponsored lures on pics no doubt”, along with what I presume is a laughing emoji (I don’t use or really understand emojis). Be rude to me, be unpleasant to me, I usually ignore all that kind of crap, but I don’t tend to feel like brushing off accusations of being dishonest. I have never even thought of changing lures in a photo to try and I guess claim that a fish was caught on a certain lure when in fact it was caught on something else. I have been accused of this a few times and I will not sit by and stand for it. Something as pathetic and dishonest as this would never even cross my mind. I have never seen it done and I would not work with anybody who either did it themselves or asked me to do it. I called the guy out and I don’t think he liked it very much.

Cue various claims from the person that it was meant to be tongue in cheek, that I was “angry” to call him out, and that he or she was surprised I acted so shocked. Here is one of their comments for example: “it was tongue in cheek but obviously hit a nerve ... you have a huge platform and are in a privileged position . As for being an idiot and growing up appreciate the constructive comments ..... by the way plenty of people switch lures for photos , being in the industry as long as you have im surprised you act so shocked......Anyway tongue in cheek”. I would polity suggest that learning to write and punctuate correctly would have helped get the points across a bit better, but hey ho.

If “plenty of people switch lures for photos” then I haven’t come across it, and I am screwed if I am going to take it quietly when I am accused of doing so myself. Sorry for such a protracted blog post this morning. I can take the crap because it’s like water off a duck’s back with me, but from time to time I think that some of the crap should be highlighted. I am old and experienced enough as I said earlier, but just because we can doesn’t mean that we should. If either of my two girls ever behaved like any of the keyboard warriors I get to experience myself - they simply would not anyway - I would come down on them like a ton of bricks…………….