Certainly irons are not for everyone. Especially anyone with significant vision issues. Scopes make a lot of thing better for a lot of shooters, whether they started with irons or not. I don't necessarily think a shooter is a better shooter because he or she started on irons. There are some darn fine shots out there who have never touched a rifle the didn't have a scope on it.
I think some people give up on irons as their vision starts to degrade because they have the mistaken notion they should be able to focus on three planes; the target the front sight and the rear sight. In reality no one's eye can focus on more than one plane at a time. In handgun instructor school they preach, "front sight, front sight, front sight." In other words focus on the front sight letting the rear sight and the target blur.
My eyes have gone from 20/10 ten years ago to needing trifocals today. I can still shoot irons very well, though I prefer a receiver sight to a notch and bead. In fact I really don't like a bead at all except for shotguns. Well that and rifles with express sights because they wouldn't look right with a blade. I much prefer a patridge style front sight and a receiver sight for the rear. I might try filing a square notch in a rifle rear sight one of these days and try it with a patridge front sight. I just picked up a Remington model 8, 25 Remington and while it has the receiver sight I like, the front sight is so fine I almost cannot see it. It looks like a piece of spider web it's so fine. I'm definitely replacing that with a patridge blade.
I'd like to treat myself to shooting glasses this year with interchangeable lenses and have my doc give me a correction for distance only, with an amber tint, distance only and clear for hunting, a regular correction with the trifocals for every day use, and a correction for the distance to the front sight of a handgun or rifle.
