And, he's using the tried (and, somewhat true) formula of pitting hunters against the rest of the gun-owning community. He starts out misrepresenting a proposed TN gun law:
As you've probably heard by now, Tennessee legislators are hard at work on a bill that would make it legal for gun owners to carry handguns into crowded bars and nightclubs where alcohol is flowing freely.Except, Bryan, that alcohol won't be flowing into the person carrying the gun - it's against the law. And, you forget the provision where guns aren't allowed in any place that restricts admission due to age, like most real bars. Finally, you fail to mention where this will most likely take place - in restaurants.
What I really hear you saying is
People purchase handguns to protect their homes, their families and themselves -- and while those are rights I believe in whole-heartedly, they've got nothing to do with the outdoors.Wanna bet? If you believe that, don't read this, this and this.
Here is a polarizing statement if I've ever heard one:
When gun owners and hunters get lumped into one great big category, hunters get dragged through the mud and the muck every time a gun crime is committedBut gun owners don't? Bullshit, Bryan.
Using such tragedies as ammunition in a fight against hunting is horribly disrespectful to the people whose lives were lost or affected when the guns went off.Using such tragedies to drive a wedge between hunters and gun owners is, too, Bryan.
So if you're one of the folks who've e-mailed recently, asking me to speak out in favor of the new bill, you'll have to convince me first why it's any of my business as an outdoors columnist.If hunters don't want to get caught up in public gun control, why would other gun owners get caught up in fighting EPA lead bans, protected lands, and the various other schemes being used to take away hunting land?
Throw us under the bus, and there'll be no one around to join you when they come for your land and rifles.
(h/t to the Conservative Scalawag)
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4 comments:
Thanks for the link. I know gun owners and hunters have different views of gun ownership. However,as I have expressed many times,we all need to stand as one and never let the 2nd Amendment be infringed upon.
It goes BEYOND "standing as one" in defense of the second amendment.
As a hunter AND owner of an extensive collection of firearms from relics of the 15th century to Evil Black Things and AUGs, "anti-firearms hunters" as I think of the odd bunch that don't embrace all their shooting brethren as brothers, might reflect upon the fact that the AR type rifle backorders at the various US manufacturers surpasses ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND BACKORDERED RIFLES as of last week.
I think there are more people like me than there are "purist anti-gun hunters" that are attempting to be throwing wrenches in the works for the rest of us.
It's not just hang together or hang separately, some of us might take a trick from the IRA and start knee-capping these self-professed "sportsmen".
Many of us have already written off the NRA as being of much use any longer. We have very long memories regarding slights and collaborations with gun banners.
Remember S&W getting buried by us for collaboration with Clinton to the point of ending up bought out and re-organized and many still won't buy their products? Ruger, the same over ten round mag limits? Recently, Cooper Precision where we applied so much pressure Mr Cooper himself had to resign from running his own company that he founded (under pressure from Remington because we put so much pressure on Remington for using his products)? The list is endless.
If you are an anti-gun person that somehow thinks of yourself as a purist hunter and do things contrary to promotion of the second amendment, people like me have a habit of burying your sort and destroying your business and trade, most especially if you are in the hunting and firearms industries but we at times extend it past that. Jim Zumbo, anyone?
Anybody who tries to use government to oppress fellow Americans over differences in political views isn't an American.
Don't send the government to do the work for you. We can sit on my porch and you can explain to me in person why 'tis OK for me to have a .30-06 but not a M1A1 and you're welcome to try and take away the A1. I'll be working on putting you out of whatever business you engage in while you try and figure out how to be complicit in outlawing some of the firearms in my ownership.
Money talks and many "hunter types" that allowed themselves to get separated from the general gun owners have found themselves in pretty ugly places and not at all through any form of physical violence or intimidation. The pleasure of watching an enemy of the people go bankrupt as they watch their live's work destroyed is much greater than literally shooting anybody in the knees ever could be.
Well said Tom, wish I could put my thoughts down like that.
Whatever happened to Wal-Mart's planning to videotape customers who purchased firearms at Wal-Mart? I and a few others wrote them and reminded them what happens when you step out of bounds like Smith&Wesson and others did. Haven't heard anymore about it.
I was wondering the same thing.
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