Month: October 2009

Michael Bane has some observations about my post regarding the spectrum of the public’s beliefs on guns. I want to make clear I am not at all advocating a political accommodation with the other side, where we give up something, in the hopes the public at large will see us as reasonable fellows, and the camel will naturally not put his head and neck in the tent as well. I think everyone knows by now that type of political accommodation does not work. But that’s not to say the great unwashed masses don’t matter. If they did not vote, and did not donate time and money to causes, they wouldn’t.  But many do, and for that reason we can’t discount them.

We can advance on our issue only through a detente with the public. The vast majority of them are ignorant about our issue, and if compelled to vote on that ignorance, would do great damage to our rights. I could gather Cam’s “Man on the Street” interviews and show them for weeks. It would be a parade of ignorance. Those who are regular listeners of the show can attest to this. Half the entertainment value of that segment is just in being amazed at what people don’t know, or what they think they know that’s totally wrong. One thing I consistently walk away with is just how effective the Bradys have been at confusing the public about our issue.

I don’t agree with Michael that the primary reason we’ve advanced is because we’ve been more uncompromising as of late. I actually don’t think there’s a primary reason, but rather a complex set of things we started learning to do better after getting our asses handed to us in the late 80s and early 90s. But if you had to boil it down, it really comes down to bringing more people who are inclined to be supportive deeper into the issue, and advancing the issue in contexts outside of the traditional rural gun culture. It’s in the former context that I think entertainers like Ted Nugent have made the greatest contribution. Back to Michael:

As far as the great bulge in the middle, it is better understood as a weathervane, blowing first right, then left, driven by prevailing winds in the media, in entertainment, in the fleeting currents of popular culture. Ted Nugent’s unrelenting, entertaining, line-in-the-sand personality has done more to sway the middle to our side than all the thoughtful reasonableness of the last 50 years. Again, my opinion…your mileage may vary.

Ted Nugent is indeed an effective voice for the Second Amendment, but he is only one section of the orchestra. Having seen Ted in action on radio and TV, I think his contribution is reaching people who are culturally inclined to be favorable to the issue, getting them involved, making them understand what’s at stake, and firing them up for action. We do need people in that role, and Ted Nugent is about as effective as they come.

But Ted Nugent isn’t going to do much to help a Manhattan financial consultant, or a Chicago lawyer not freak out and donate a lot of money to anti-gun groups when we come in and start dismantling their respective city’s gun control laws in the next few years. I don’t think Ted Nugent will be able to take a whole lot of credit in making persuasive arguments that convince federal judges the Second Amendment means something. Those are all types of people we’re going to need to influence over the next decade to keep moving forward, and some activism and messaging is going to be more effective in that context than others.

I would not be so bold as to suggest there’s only one style of activism that works — there are many kinds. But effectiveness is dictated by circumstance and context in which they are practiced, which is why I’m very skeptical of any form of activism that claims it’s always the right thing to do in all circumstances and in all conditions. I don’t think that’s ever true. People are too varied and different for it be.

We’ve had a lot of talk in the blogosphere lately about normalizing guns within the culture, and have discovered substantial disagreement. For my part, I think the only way we can educate and enlighten people is for individual gun owners to reach out to the to people they know and associate with, and give them real information on our issue in a context they can relate to. It’s for that reason I’m not particularly sanguine about methods like open carry to promote cultural change. It’s just not conveying enough information to the ignorant to help bring them closer to our position. That’s not to say I think open carry has no value, and is inappropriate under all circumstances. Rather as a general tool to promote social change, I’m skeptical of it’s effectiveness. More than a few folks say they want proof. I don’t think either side has proof. All we can offer is evidence. Into that debate I’m going to put forward some evidence of what ordinary people on the street think on the issue of guns.

Cam Edwards from NRA News, in his evening radio show, runs a segment during his breaks called “Man on the Street,” where he sends his producer down to the streets of Alexandria, Virginia with a cameraman and a microphone to capture the opinions of people walking by. These segments are very helpful to understand the diverse and often incoherent opinions of the general public. I have captured a collection of them from this past week to share with you, some of which even touch on people’s attitudes towards carrying firearms.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drkgotcnvMw[/youtube]

You can see they do find people who are strong believers in the Second Amendment, but notice the couple from Texas who was with us all the way up until the point where he said he doesn’t approve of civilians possessing machine guns? Notice the ignorance on semi-automatics that can be converted to automatic? And this is someone who knows and has carried firearms! Here’s another segment, including a woman who’s from England, the North of England judging from her accent:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9OPdbytxFSE[/youtube]

You can see from these videos that the assertion by Michael Bane, that people are really on one side or another isn’t really true. There is a rich tapestry of opinion on the issue of guns in this country, and the truth is that the majority of people, even the majority of gun owners, are somewhere in the middle between our position and the people who want to prevent gun ownership. Our success over the past decade has largely been due to reaching people who are conceptually on our side, like several of the people here who voiced general but weak support, and getting them to understand the issue better. But to do that, we had to reach them with real information, and on a lot more issues than just carrying firearms.

My skepticism of open carry as a means to effect social change is based on the fact that I don’t believe it reaches people with enough information to help them put it in context and understand its role in the political and cultural struggle for gun rights. It is one of the great dangers in any kind of activism, that if you spend too much time only speaking with other activists, that you lose touch with what average people think about your issue. It’s through that mistake, to switch the context to gay rights for a second, that you go from “We just want to be equal and accepted members of society” to the Folsom Street Fair.

There are two messages competing for the loyalty and votes of the types of folks you see in these videos, our’s and the Brady’s. The more our message is outside of context they can relate to and understand, the more appealing the Brady message is going to be. That’s why I advocate more discretion and restraint than many harder core folks are comfortable with. We can do very well using certain kind of outreach methods, but others I think are less effective. All I’m advocating is that when folks think about outreach, they keep in mind the people in these videos.