Saturday, January 19, 2013
Gun Appreciation Day
I've allowed myself to be ambivalent about firearm law reform for so long that I don't think anyone could accuse me of being "anti-gun." But my knowledge of firearms & "gun" laws, never strong, is now completely inadequate to the issues at hand. It's past time for our society to make some serious changes in our laws & attitudes. So, the next time I goto the main library, I'm checking out some books on firearms, firearm handling & safety, & reading them.
There is something to the cliche, "Changing the script." Today is "Gun Appreciation Day," but the news is about three people accidentally shot at gun shows. Don't blame it on the "liberal" media. The Newtown massacre was the worst of a series of horrific mass shootings; it wasn't the climax of a movie, a fiction, with no more to come. It suggested the possibility that guns, & gun culture, might be inciting the madness. In the aftermath, the more outspoken gun defenders themselves sounded crazy, beyond inappropriate & vulgar. It's difficult to capture the attention of Americans & hold on to it for very long. Sounding crazy is one way to do it.
It's like when the owners of Chick-fil-A were exposed as fanatical homobigots & marriage equality opponents reacted to the bad publicity by appointing a day to crowd in their restaurants as a show of support for prejudice against LGBT. Eat chicken filet sandwiches because marriage is between one man & one woman. The more rabid gun enthusiasts are stumbling into the same kind of loony scenario, & I say, let them.
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be." Thomas Jefferson
There is something to the cliche, "Changing the script." Today is "Gun Appreciation Day," but the news is about three people accidentally shot at gun shows. Don't blame it on the "liberal" media. The Newtown massacre was the worst of a series of horrific mass shootings; it wasn't the climax of a movie, a fiction, with no more to come. It suggested the possibility that guns, & gun culture, might be inciting the madness. In the aftermath, the more outspoken gun defenders themselves sounded crazy, beyond inappropriate & vulgar. It's difficult to capture the attention of Americans & hold on to it for very long. Sounding crazy is one way to do it.
It's like when the owners of Chick-fil-A were exposed as fanatical homobigots & marriage equality opponents reacted to the bad publicity by appointing a day to crowd in their restaurants as a show of support for prejudice against LGBT. Eat chicken filet sandwiches because marriage is between one man & one woman. The more rabid gun enthusiasts are stumbling into the same kind of loony scenario, & I say, let them.
