Are campfires a Republican obsession?

[mia]

Just returned from a long Thanksgiving weekend in the heart of Trump country. The campfire there was a permanent fixture in the large and deep backyard. It was always ringed by a couple dozen chairs. We gathered there from morning through night. The whole property was full of towering oak and pine trees. No one seemed to be aware of the potential danger there.

I'm in recovery mode right now and trying to hold on to the good memories of being with all of my children and grandchildren at the same time. Whose family goes to Bass Pro Shops on Black Friday to buy more ammo? Mine does.

Saddest moment was when my 11 year-old grandson asked me to keep the dogs safe inside so they wouldn't go over to the target practice area.

away

[Ohiogal]

1. Hi Mia,

Sadly, that mind set you just described isn't going away any time soon.

I live in a little pocket of blue in a majority red state. I know what you mean.

Black Friday newspaper insert here touted a 9 mm handgun in scarlet and gray colors ... " The Perfect Gift for that OSU Fan On Your Christmas List.".

Because nothing quite expresses the spirit of the season like a death weapon under the Christmas tree in your favorite school's colors.

Sigh ....

[NotASurfer]

13. I hope that ad did not have Wolverine practice targets as stocking stuffers

There is an ideological fault line running through the state, dividing it into "Ohio" and an alt-state of "Ahia"

And it starts to feel dicey when you're on the other side of that fault line

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

16. Heh Heh. +1

[Thyla]

2. Guns aside....

Sounds lovely.

And no, they are not a republican thing.

[marble falls]

3. Its a Texan thing and an Arizona thing, too. Love sitting next to a fire ring laughing, drinking ...

smoking doobs with friends.

At least the kid understood some gun safety. Though most Texans do not drink, shoot and run dogs at the same time. At least the non Republican folks I run with don't.

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

17. +1 Ahhhh "Doobs" Hopefully soon to NEVER put another person in jail EVER.

[randyfew]

4. Rural America

You describe a “Norman Rockwell” image of good friends and family gathering around a crackling fire pit where God, guns and country is the common denominator. Here’s what this image doesn’t depict: My mother ask me the other day why rural/country Americans seem to support Trump while big cities tend to vote blue. I grew up in Western Pennsylvania where scenes like this are a weekend standard. People who live in these rural areas live in a bubble-it’s a bubble that comes with trees, bonfires and long traditions of hunting and fishing but what is also in that bubble are white people, little or no minorities-no Muslims, few, if any people of color, women are rarely invited to campfires and hunting camps. A small comfort zone makes any change or adaptation of cultural differences difficult People who grew up in the city-know a Muslim Family, their friends are diverse in culture and they’re less likely to be scared easily by things like immigration, people of color and progressive thinking. It’s hard to think universally when your comfort zone is a campfire with 8 of your white male Christian friends.

[NotASurfer]

14. Maybe that's part of the resistance to technology

Technology expands the bubble, it's no longer a small closed circle

[gopiscrap]

22. welcome to DU!

[CrispyQ]

5. They are called fire pits & they are all the rage where I live.

on edit: I'm near a huge metropolitan area.

[Siwsan]

6. Most of my family members have fire pits and Chimineas, and we're ALL Democrats

Maybe it's just me, but I find there is just something so comfortably primitive about gathering around an outdoor fire to talk, especially on a cold, starry sky in the Winter. We maybe roast an occasional marshmallow, share stories and laugh. No one has ever been injured, nothing has ever been damaged.

I have a fireplace, too, but that atmosphere is just too civilized.

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

18. That's a sweet fire pit ring in the picture too.

Fire pits don't have to be shoveled out after the fire too. Nice.

[Siwsan]

20. I thought so, too. Here's another great one

The Death Star fire pit.

[aikoaiko]

7. Heck no. Who doesn't like sitting around a fire on a cool evening talking?

:Shrug:

[eShirl]

8. I think it is a human obsession. n/t

[NotASurfer]

9. A campfire is primordial

It feels like it touches something almost genetically deep in me: a small circle of illumination from flickering flames, defiantly dispelling a cold and dangerous world beyond the light; a tribal group of familiar faces, boasting of their triumphs and retelling their oral history, sometimes in song. Cooking something over the coals, even when it's edible to begin with, even if the only tool we have is a stick. And by gathering and talking face-to-face, rehashing the events of the day and planning for tomorrow, it starts to bind those gathered into a community

It's like getting a glimpse backwards in time at the very foundations of civilization. I think we need that experience to understand ourselves, whether it's over an open fire, or in a familiar bar, or meeting for coffee, or talking about Game of Thrones around the water cooler

Or hanging around DU!

[mia]

15. You reminded me of what I once loved about gathering around a campfire.

Thank you.

[Hortensis]

10. It's actually a good question. Like virtually all differences,

it would be measured by the amount of preference that didn't overlap, not in an either-or nonreality.

Practically everyone likes sitting around a communal fire. But we practically raised our children camping in the desert wilderness, far from the light pollution of cities, with friends who'd come from around Southern California to be together, and I can tell you we vastly overdid erasing the stars with those fires. Anyone who's never strolled or sat in the desert looking at the night sky has missed something truly awesome and spectacular. But most of our group, which was majority conservatives, never saw it, or saw it only briefly and poorly on their way from lighted vehicle to join those already communing around a fire, even when its heat was neither needed or wanted.

I was one of 2 or 3 who sometimes walked out into the desert to see the stars, but hardly every time. We'd talk quietly, but those walks weren't all about the focusing on group togetherness that the blinding effect of the campfires promoted.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

11. WTF is this.

[dembotoz]

12. campfires central to camping...at least before camping included all the comforts of home

family camping not much you can do in a tent except sleep.

in boy scouts it was bonfires,,,same thing

don't understand the fire rings at home....not my bag....

think it is more cultural than political

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

19. helps to have a forest on your property too.

hauling wood can be....cumbersome.

[cwydro]

21. How silly. I camp a great deal, and my friends and I LOVE campfires.

We’re all Democrats.

Back in my college days, a group of us got together in October every year to celebrate Janis Joplin. Huge bonfire and lots of Southern Comfort. Those were the days.

[Lars39]

23. I was raised by Depression era parents who were thrifty with resources.

Water and fuel in whatever form would have never been squandered. Somebody had to work to go down to the creek, to chop that wood. You did not make work for someone else to do, especially at a time when people were being worked and gradually starved to death.