The Anti-Gun Lobby has a horrible tradition of twisting available information, wording, and irrelevant fact to tear down gun owners. Everyone who opposes the Anti-Gun lobby is familiar with this. The sad thing is, how successful they can be. Lying, manipulation of facts, scare tactics and broad-generalizations and character attacks, are all fair game for the anti-gun lobby, and it works for them. For those who want a finger to point somewhere, for those who want a cause celebre to blame for all the problems in their city, state, or country, truth is irrelevant if the opposing lies say the right things to give them what they want to hear, need to hear, to point the finger anywhere but internally.
It is a psychological problem. There is a great inability to look inwards and be honest about the characteristics of man (the species, not the sex). Particularly the characteristics we find unpleasant, such as the ability to do violence. We are so afraid of our true nature, we (as a society) blindly lash out trying to hide it away and blame things, instead of people, for what happened. I have spoken about this before, and it is my honest concern that in this great, generally blind, effort to push the darker, unpleasant, characteristics of man under the rug, we will push all the characteristics that make us human under the rug as well.
There is quote, from the movie Se7en with Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt, where Freeman’s character is talking to Pitt’s about the serial killer they are hunting, “If we catch John Doe and he turns out to be the devil, I mean if he's Satan himself, that might live up to our expectations, but he's not the devil. He's just a man.”
When something bad happens, particularly violence, to a person (and bad things happen not just to the victims, but to those in their immediate circle as well) there is one resounding question that most people ask, and that question is why. Why me, why us, why him, why her, Why. They need a reason to explain the great trauma to their soul, and they need that reason to match up to the intensity of that trauma – They need it to be big as God, or bigger. Pointlessness is something people cannot abide; Nature abhors a vacuum and humans abhor un-reason, un-explanation, for their trauma. To look at an act of violence, and have the only answer be “Because it is human behavior”, have the only perpetrator be “just a man”, is not enough – Those answers are unsatisfying because they do not, can not, own up to our feelings of pain when someone we care about suffers at the hands of violence.
I believe part of the reason those answers are unsatisfying is because of a culturally bred refusal to own up to the darker impulses and capabilities of man. There is an idea that admitting each of us comes equipped for murder will somehow make all of us murderers. Despite the fact that similar admissions, we’re all equipped to shove peas up our nostrils for example, or we’re all equipped for prostitution, are recognized as being totally unrelated to psychologically functional peoples decisions to either shove peas up their noses, or sell their bodies for the sexual gratification of others.
So, the survivors of violence (the active victim, if they survive, and their loved ones, the passive victims) have this burning need to have a great evil, a great wrong, to blame for the hurt inflicted upon them. They need Satan himself to be responsible, so they create that Satan. But, remaining mostly psychologically functional they also need that Satan to be somewhat defensible, and rational, in their own minds and to others (because we all feed off other people, and need their support to “prove” our beliefs from time to time, especially in times of stress).
It’s hard to create another human being as Satan – most people wont believe it, because it is simply not true. But, an inanimate object can be infused with whatever qualities we desire, without it being capable of any defense or in fact any action at all to prove or disprove its true nature. It is easy to demonize things – So things get blamed for problems, particularly violence.
Guns are one of those things. Despite the fact that more people are killed every year in these United States by cars, than by guns, guns are a much-demonized machine in our society (to the point that they are an obsession for their demonizers, as I said last night).
The easiest way to demonize something is make others afraid of it – Convince them it will hurt them, and they will loathe it.
Unfortunately there is one great obstacle in the battle to demonize objects – Logical thought and common sense. Sometimes, there is no one to speak up for an object, and the process to demonize it in lieu of correcting the actual social problems (those problems inside the people involved) goes ahead unabated. Lawn Darts come to mind. Other times, a great many people speak up with logical arguments to defend against the masses trying to create a Satan. It is so with the gun debates, the anti-gun community versus the pro gun community.
The pro-gun community, generally, uses sound reasoning, logically provable arguments and truth to make their case and defend their positions.
The anti-gun community resorts to twisting, lying, and purposefully negative over-generalizations to make their cases and defend their positions.
I would cite, as an example, the blog GunGuys Dot Com.
In one of their latest pieces, talking about how AirSoft represents the vile depths of the American Gun Culture (ignoring the fact that AirSoft is a Japanese import and remains bigger in Japan than here – And Japan is not a gun culture, and does not allow ownership of actual firearms), they used a news article about police responding to some teens with AirSoft guns believing they were actual arms, and said the following:
”Call us nostalgic, but as little as thirty or forty years ago, it would seem ludicrous for a teenager to possess an assault rifle. If they were carrying around a gun that looked like that, you’d simply assume it was a toy. But obviously that’s not true anymore.”
They have chosen to miss the point. Thirty or forty years ago most teenagers did possess rifles and had been taught by their parents how to use them, safely and responsibly. Many of those teenagers actually took their rifles or shotguns to school, hunting for their families along the way, put them in the homeroom closet for class periods, and hunted on the way back home again. Thirty or forty years ago school shootings were an unheard of thing (in fact, the only one I can recall at the moment was perpetrated by the
U.S. Government, via the National Guard on the Kent State campus. Despite repeated claims that only those entrusted by the government to bear arms are responsible enough, or safe enough, to do so). And, I am quite sure, that many of those rifles were the “assault rifles” of the day, being M1903 and M1Garand Rifles from the Civilian Marksmanship Program (a common method by which parents of that generation, and of this one, acquired high quality, low cost, firearms for their sons and daughters). Had someone chosen, an M1 Garand rifle can be a devastating weapon in determined hands. The simple fact is no one chose to.
It was not until after firearms became a dirty thing, akin to porno and alcohol, to be kept out of the hands of children, and hidden from children, that the real problems began. When Americans started to approach firearms, with their children, as taboo and not routine, serious, tools, problems began to happen. Power tools can kill you as easily as a gun, yet it is still common for fathers to take their boys out to the shop at a young age and get them started drilling, and sawing, to teach them how to use tools responsibly. Yet you hear relatively little about tool violence, or even accidental deaths with power tools.
This leads to the next piece from Gun Guys I wish to quote, where in they cite news-paper accounts of a Harvard paper purported to prove that educating kids about guns doesn’t make them safer with guns.
The study basically says that programs like Eddie Eagle don’t make kids safer, and that teaching kids gun safety measures does not teach them to behave safely or responsibly around firearms.
The Gun Guys have many things to say based on these news items such as this,
“Teaching gun safety isn’t the same as teaching other safety procedures to children. There is an inherent allure in our culture to firearms (which we might attribute to the NRA, but that’s the topic of another article), and that’s exactly why programs like Eddie Eagle don’t work. Again– children are only safe when you get rid of the gun.”
Again they are being purposefully obtuse (as are the interpreters of the Harvard study, if not the authors of it). Telling kids not to play with fire is not enough to get them not to do it. Telling them not to play with loose electrical wires, or the gearshift in mommy’s car, is not enough. Simply telling kids things, I will offer no argument to this, does not work. However, the implication that it is impossible to teach kids to be safe with guns is patently wrong.
I was raised on a working cattle ranch, as I have said before, where in many situations the only effective means of protecting free-range cattle from predation is firearms, and thus I was raised around guns. My father was a hunter, and I saw the game he brought home. My parents showed me guns and let me handle them starting with the antiques that had been passed down from their parents (always verifying they were unloaded and teaching me to always do the same with every gun I picked up). By the time I was 7, I had a complete understanding of the rules of firearms safety and the reason why those rules were important, because I was taught in a hands on fashion, not simply told “don’t do this because its bad”. I never broke those rules, I never picked up guns on my own, and in the subsequent years (during which I have learned to use firearms) I have never once done harm with a gun, or forgotten those rules. Even as a minor, when friends and I were out with firearms, I was demanding of safety and good behavior. It is entirely possible to teach firearms safety, even to children, and have a home where firearms are present that remains safe for children. I am living proof of that. There are many others like me.
Not that anyone who decides otherwise can be convinced of that, or would even want to. The small amount of power that can be had by being an active member of the anti-gun community is too easily threatened by giving credence to such facts. It is far easier to rally people to the cause by presenting all people involved with guns as red-neck Bubba militia types, disingenuous lying thieving sociopaths, and cold uncaring murder-hearted money-grubbers, as Gun Guys do with headlines and comments such as these:
”NRA Bankrolls Defense of License to Murder Killer in Arizona”
(License to Murder being their intentionally chilling buzz-phrase for laws that specify no duty to retreat from a violent attack, something I tackled earlier
here.)
” Of course, we’re sure the gun lobby isn’t thrilled with any of this. They’d rather this kind of stuff remain in the dark, because they want these guns to reach criminal hands. Why? Because every gun sold, no matter to whom or by whom, just means money signs to them.”
”…our old friend, the .50 caliber rifle, a weapon that has no sane civilian use at all.”
“Yeah the NRA guys are characters. We could have told her that. Oh, and by “characters,” we mean they’re under the impression that the deaths of thousands of Americans per year is completely worth it if you get to shoot a semiautomatic weapon at some junked up cars three weekends a month in the summer. They’re the kind of people who actually buy Wayne LaPierre’s lines about “rights” and “liberties,” and they’re the kind of people who don’t really care whether or not “those kids in them big cities” die every day, as long as it means they can buy a gold-plated handgun on the internet.”
(A common protest from the Gun Guys and many anti-gun pundits is “buy it on the internet”, implying that you can mail order guns like books from Amazon. In fact, all such transactions have to go through a federally licensed firearms dealer. The only people you can buy a gun from and have them ship it to your front door are, well…
the US Government.)
”They worship “the Nuge,” the firearm and the flag. And these are the people who have been in control of our gun policy for the last 50 years. Is it any wonder that gun violence in America is as bad as it is? It’s past time to end the tyranny of the NRA– Wayne and his “jack-booted” Bubba boys have initimated [sic] lawmakers for way too long already.”
”Couple Has 200 Animals in Home, and An Arsenal of Weapons”
There is very little actual substance to what they have to say, and what little is there is masked with these kinds of insults, attacks and disgusting generalizations. Referring to NRA supporters as “Bubba boys”, implying that animal abuse is related to gun ownership, saying that gun owners are insane merely for the inanimate objects they own, even referring to paying respect to the symbol of our nation in a derogatory fashion, as if paying respect to the flag was akin to the KKK burning a cross.
They also have a “daily” tally of gun violence around the nation, a little news ticker of select inflammatory and fear inspiring headlines such as:
”
SC: School stabbing victim loved art, wanted to own gallery”
(Implying that art loving, cultured, people should be immune from violence. And what do stabbings have to do with guns?)
”OH: Man, with crazy forehead tattoo, arrested for shooting during carjacking. Guy had a record a mile long (and had the words “Bonafide Hustler” tatooed [sic] on his forehead), but somehow he got an assault rifle”
”NY: Grand Island teen accused of shooting man in the face after long standing dispute”
”IN: 12-year-old fatally shot when he finds gun”
“IL: Teen, 16, charged as adult in Monday shooting near school”
“KY: Shooting late Tuesday night in Louisville”
“GA: Judge refuses to throw out confession in Atlanta courthouse shooting”
“VA: Police: argument that led to last weekend’s shooting not uncommon”
”IA: Police: Pastor shot mentally disabled boy”
All of these headlines serve to paint the image of guns as capable of delivering death independent of human decision and action, or of gun owners as irresponsible (if not criminal) sadists with anger management issues.
Elsewhere the Gun Guys cite an article claiming the Constitution is antiquated and in bad need of updating, and they also suggest it is wrongly deified by some people. One of the quotations they make much of from the article says that the constitution is not democratic.
This is the face of the anti-gun community. They want to affect change in America, they have their dream for what America should be, but they don’t even know what America is. This country is not a democracy. It is a republic. There is a difference. You want a democratic constitution? Move to one. There are lots of democracies. I hear France is nice.
This is what passes for “truth” and “reason” for a community that uses fear, and manipulation, as their strongest allies. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, small groups using modern tools of global outreach to create, or use, fear and terror to affect change within the politics and polices of nation states are terrorists.
I could go on. I have not read a single entry that did not use inflammatory language, irrelevant character attacks, bigoted generalizations, fear-mongering, or outright manipulations of fact. Given the time I fully believe I could present a fact based and logically un-falsifiable argument against every single “point” made on the Gun Guys site. I wont, not worth the time or mental energy, but I could.
This type of behavior, these irrelevant bits of insult and name-calling, the absolute refusal to understand easy concepts (such as criminals don’t obey the laws, that’s why they’re criminals, gun bans don’t stop them from being armed!), and the unmitigated gall to twist and manipulate anything to suit their needs, is typical of the anti-gun lobby and its supporters/community.
Criminals will always exist. It will always be in the hearts and minds of man to kill. It is human nature. Those who wish to kill will always use the most effective tool at their disposal, but even if we reduce their selection to rocks and sticks, we’ll still have murder, we’ll still have crime.
Guns and gun owners are not the problem – Just an easy target.
