This has nothing - NOTHING - to do with celebrating or protecting the 2nd Amendment. It has everything to do with fear, abuse, shock-value and combativeness. Insecurity. Whatever the psychology is behind this sort of macho flaunting (with little to back it up but a .223).
It just dares someone to say something. "I dare you to say something; I'll shoot." That's the message this open carry shit conveys. It's all about threatening retaliation, and not about opening a dialog about responsible use of weapons.
Right, and while I understand Steve doesn't support nor condone these actions, it appears that he is incorrect about the NRA's stance. Or, I am correct about how far to the right the NRA has moved. Or that the NRA is so concerned about keeping its base happy, it will advocate for anything that is gun right's related.
There is no equivalent pro-gun groups that argues sanity. There is no pro-gun equivalent to the NRA to come out and say stuff like "these guys are idiots and are abusing open carry laws, so please stop helping."
This is the first time the NRA has said anything in support of OC. It may be that they have changed their stance and are ok with it now, but that has not been the case in the past.
The NRA has had very little to do with the OC movement. Granted, I am no expert on their history, but haven't been involved with them in any meaningful way. They haven't supported any legislation. They haven't gotten involved in any litigation, including even doing something as minor as filing an amicus brief. They have also strictly banned OC from their convention.
If I had to guess, I would say that OC movement has grown to the point where the NRA can't afford to ignore them.
I certainly believe you, Steve that this is a new tangent for them. But this is exactly the gun culture I keep railing about, and the NRA--rather than standing up to them, is capitulating to the crazies.
I am not sure what else you need to know that the NRA (politically) isn't what you seem to think it is. It is harmful to our political world and to our democracy.
To be fair, can someone point out any other "rights" group that openly bashes a fringe element of their group? Does the ACLU speak out against Fred Phelps? Does the NAACP criticize the Black Panthers?
To be clear, I wouldn't encourage people to LGOC in a group and go into private businesses. I don't think the NRA should be encouraging this. A better approach to OC would be to stick with handguns, don't dress in camo, and make sure you have the permission of the property owner.
I did a little more poking around and found that 2 weeks prior to the NRA telling the Texas group they were weird, this same group had issued a release to their members to tell them to stop carrying long guns into these businesses. This isn't getting reported.
Well, the main difference is that the Black Panthers and the late Fred Phelps are not driving anything close to policy decisions. They are outliers with absolutely no power and no influence.
You want the OC people to be that, but regardless of teh NRA speaking out against them and telling them not to do it earlier, when confronted with the option of choosing sanity or craziness in public, which one did they choose?
What policy. IIRC, no state has changed their laws in regard to OC. How common is it. I have seen 1 person OC'ing in public...ever. How many have you seen?
Let me put it another way. The ACLU and NAACP don't have prominent members calling for pretty outlandish things. They don't have to distance themselves from members, because their approach is pretty clean. Controversial in their own way, but not because of people like Ted Nugent.
I think you don't want to acknowledge the harm the NRA is doing politically. That seems to be the only reason. You know they invited Sarah Palin to speak, applauded loudly as she endorsed torture. You saw them back away from even commenting negatively on idiots taking guns into restaurants. Yet, for some reason, you can't see it.
11 comments:
Hopeless: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/06/07/1305250/-WTF-Is-The-Man-Doing-In-The-Baby-Section-Of-Target?detail=email
This has nothing - NOTHING - to do with celebrating or protecting the 2nd Amendment. It has everything to do with fear, abuse, shock-value and combativeness. Insecurity. Whatever the psychology is behind this sort of macho flaunting (with little to back it up but a .223).
Out. Of. Control.
It just dares someone to say something. "I dare you to say something; I'll shoot." That's the message this open carry shit conveys. It's all about threatening retaliation, and not about opening a dialog about responsible use of weapons.
Right, and while I understand Steve doesn't support nor condone these actions, it appears that he is incorrect about the NRA's stance. Or, I am correct about how far to the right the NRA has moved. Or that the NRA is so concerned about keeping its base happy, it will advocate for anything that is gun right's related.
There is no equivalent pro-gun groups that argues sanity. There is no pro-gun equivalent to the NRA to come out and say stuff like "these guys are idiots and are abusing open carry laws, so please stop helping."
This is the first time the NRA has said anything in support of OC. It may be that they have changed their stance and are ok with it now, but that has not been the case in the past.
The NRA has had very little to do with the OC movement. Granted, I am no expert on their history, but haven't been involved with them in any meaningful way. They haven't supported any legislation. They haven't gotten involved in any litigation, including even doing something as minor as filing an amicus brief. They have also strictly banned OC from their convention.
If I had to guess, I would say that OC movement has grown to the point where the NRA can't afford to ignore them.
I certainly believe you, Steve that this is a new tangent for them. But this is exactly the gun culture I keep railing about, and the NRA--rather than standing up to them, is capitulating to the crazies.
I am not sure what else you need to know that the NRA (politically) isn't what you seem to think it is. It is harmful to our political world and to our democracy.
To be fair, can someone point out any other "rights" group that openly bashes a fringe element of their group? Does the ACLU speak out against Fred Phelps? Does the NAACP criticize the Black Panthers?
To be clear, I wouldn't encourage people to LGOC in a group and go into private businesses. I don't think the NRA should be encouraging this. A better approach to OC would be to stick with handguns, don't dress in camo, and make sure you have the permission of the property owner.
I did a little more poking around and found that 2 weeks prior to the NRA telling the Texas group they were weird, this same group had issued a release to their members to tell them to stop carrying long guns into these businesses. This isn't getting reported.
Well, the main difference is that the Black Panthers and the late Fred Phelps are not driving anything close to policy decisions. They are outliers with absolutely no power and no influence.
You want the OC people to be that, but regardless of teh NRA speaking out against them and telling them not to do it earlier, when confronted with the option of choosing sanity or craziness in public, which one did they choose?
What policy. IIRC, no state has changed their laws in regard to OC. How common is it. I have seen 1 person OC'ing in public...ever. How many have you seen?
Let me put it another way. The ACLU and NAACP don't have prominent members calling for pretty outlandish things. They don't have to distance themselves from members, because their approach is pretty clean. Controversial in their own way, but not because of people like Ted Nugent.
I think you don't want to acknowledge the harm the NRA is doing politically. That seems to be the only reason. You know they invited Sarah Palin to speak, applauded loudly as she endorsed torture. You saw them back away from even commenting negatively on idiots taking guns into restaurants. Yet, for some reason, you can't see it.
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