Television that Harms the Hobby
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me a handful of relics, more than enough to satisfy that connection between all the research and knowledge I had gained about the site, it's use and location. The relics would be worth about $25 if sold, and it took me many hours of research and detecting to find them, but it was much easier because I knew the history and was tuned into the site. I've never been to Navy Pier, but it may have some small areas like that, with a few interesting relics for someone patient and more interested in history rather that making a buck.
I'm an observant person. I've been detecting and been around detectorists and diggers long enough to know what "looks right." I am 99.9% sure that the "finds" shown on this program are fake or planted. Those that possibly aren't are generally garbage that is talked up with nonsense about provenance. (Not that provenance is nonsense, but if this guy found an early pulltab in Dallas, he'd say it was from a can of beer that Lee Harvey Oswald "could have" consumed the day he shot JFK.) Why am I so sure? Because not every treasure hunt finds treasure every time. How much work did Mel Fisher have to do before he discovered the Atocha? How much history do you think he learned and accumulated and passed along during his search? Often Mel Fisher and I would both come home empty handed from an expedition, his more costly than my failures. Camera crews and travel are expensive. The amount of filming and the many sites covered - with no "fantastic" finds would be massive, if this were all above board. You don't hit a home run every time, but these guys do, and on a limited budget in a narrow timeframe. That's just not reality. For as much as Savage goes on about exposing fake militaria on his website, you'd think he'd be against being such a fraud himself.
And then there's the issue of the value of the finds represented on the show. I've been around antiques all my life. The over inflated payments these guys supposedly get for their piles of garbage and planted relics is astronomical. Dealers buy low. You want a reality check on this? I'd love to see these guys try to sell their finds to the fellows on Pawn Stars and convince them of their bogus claims of provenance. Now THAT would really straighten things out!
Boom Baby! I assure you too that bad manners don't take you very far. If I bellowed like a wild animal when I made a good find, I'd quickly get booted off of someone's property or have the cops called if I were in a public place. Modeling this behavior is damaging to the hobby because people perceive that detectorists are going to behave like this, when actually most of us are exactly the opposite.
Speaking of having the cops called, one episode showed the group getting rousted by police. Great. Now people may think I'm going to bring the police and unwanted attention to their property. This episode also pretty clearly showed a digging tool as a knife or potentially threatening weapon. My digging tool is so dull and harmless I can keep it unobtrusively and safely in the back pocket of my jeans. What a wonderful representation of detecting they portrayed, and to top it off they instantly lost the hard to get permission to detect that they had just been granted.
I watched Savage's team rip out a deck, remove sidewalks and smash through walls. In another episode they inadvertently damage a water pipe and don’t fix it properly. No property owner welcomes that sort of thing. Again, when I ask for permission to detect, what will come to people's mind is that I am going to destroy their property. Whether it is "fixed" or repaired afterwards or not, (the restorations are never shown on the program) most people do not want their property destroyed or altered for any reason. Responsible detectorists try to make any site look exactly like they found it and not to do any damage.
So this show, primarily a work of fiction, which to the unknowing looks like reality, will make it harder for people like me to enjoy our hobby and pursue our interest in history. Public perception is powerful and perhaps the hobby's biggest enemy. That this show is directly impacting that perception in a negative way makes me sad and angry. The general public does not always understand that Savage is an actor, a clown, a performer for pay - certainly his wrestling career exemplifies all that. He may have a genuine interest in history and relic collecting, but this show has bastardized that interest into a circus. Savage lives up to his surname. He is truly the worst type of egotistical blackguard.
Maybe it's a good thing I don't watch much television. This certainly doesn't inspire me. Hopefully Savage's show has finally ended or he will be called out for what he truly is. For me, I'll stick to the YouTube videos made by real detectorists, making real finds. The video quality may be iffy, and the finds solid but unsensational, but I appreciate those that share their discoveries with honesty, a lack of theatrics and the true love of history and detecting.
I'm an observant person. I've been detecting and been around detectorists and diggers long enough to know what "looks right." I am 99.9% sure that the "finds" shown on this program are fake or planted. Those that possibly aren't are generally garbage that is talked up with nonsense about provenance. (Not that provenance is nonsense, but if this guy found an early pulltab in Dallas, he'd say it was from a can of beer that Lee Harvey Oswald "could have" consumed the day he shot JFK.) Why am I so sure? Because not every treasure hunt finds treasure every time. How much work did Mel Fisher have to do before he discovered the Atocha? How much history do you think he learned and accumulated and passed along during his search? Often Mel Fisher and I would both come home empty handed from an expedition, his more costly than my failures. Camera crews and travel are expensive. The amount of filming and the many sites covered - with no "fantastic" finds would be massive, if this were all above board. You don't hit a home run every time, but these guys do, and on a limited budget in a narrow timeframe. That's just not reality. For as much as Savage goes on about exposing fake militaria on his website, you'd think he'd be against being such a fraud himself.
And then there's the issue of the value of the finds represented on the show. I've been around antiques all my life. The over inflated payments these guys supposedly get for their piles of garbage and planted relics is astronomical. Dealers buy low. You want a reality check on this? I'd love to see these guys try to sell their finds to the fellows on Pawn Stars and convince them of their bogus claims of provenance. Now THAT would really straighten things out!
Boom Baby! I assure you too that bad manners don't take you very far. If I bellowed like a wild animal when I made a good find, I'd quickly get booted off of someone's property or have the cops called if I were in a public place. Modeling this behavior is damaging to the hobby because people perceive that detectorists are going to behave like this, when actually most of us are exactly the opposite.
Speaking of having the cops called, one episode showed the group getting rousted by police. Great. Now people may think I'm going to bring the police and unwanted attention to their property. This episode also pretty clearly showed a digging tool as a knife or potentially threatening weapon. My digging tool is so dull and harmless I can keep it unobtrusively and safely in the back pocket of my jeans. What a wonderful representation of detecting they portrayed, and to top it off they instantly lost the hard to get permission to detect that they had just been granted.
I watched Savage's team rip out a deck, remove sidewalks and smash through walls. In another episode they inadvertently damage a water pipe and don’t fix it properly. No property owner welcomes that sort of thing. Again, when I ask for permission to detect, what will come to people's mind is that I am going to destroy their property. Whether it is "fixed" or repaired afterwards or not, (the restorations are never shown on the program) most people do not want their property destroyed or altered for any reason. Responsible detectorists try to make any site look exactly like they found it and not to do any damage.
So this show, primarily a work of fiction, which to the unknowing looks like reality, will make it harder for people like me to enjoy our hobby and pursue our interest in history. Public perception is powerful and perhaps the hobby's biggest enemy. That this show is directly impacting that perception in a negative way makes me sad and angry. The general public does not always understand that Savage is an actor, a clown, a performer for pay - certainly his wrestling career exemplifies all that. He may have a genuine interest in history and relic collecting, but this show has bastardized that interest into a circus. Savage lives up to his surname. He is truly the worst type of egotistical blackguard.
Maybe it's a good thing I don't watch much television. This certainly doesn't inspire me. Hopefully Savage's show has finally ended or he will be called out for what he truly is. For me, I'll stick to the YouTube videos made by real detectorists, making real finds. The video quality may be iffy, and the finds solid but unsensational, but I appreciate those that share their discoveries with honesty, a lack of theatrics and the true love of history and detecting.