Why Liberals *Should* Love the 2nd Amendment

[Nik the Greek]

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/07/04/881431/-Why-liberals-should-love-the-Second-Amendment

It's all true. I'm a liberal anti-authoritarian, and my two favorite amendments are the first and the second. It's deeply frustrating to me that otherwise thoughtful, rational and intelligent individuals go empty headed real quick once firearms enter the discussion.

Still, if you have liberal friends or family who are anti-gun, and they're politically minded, this might be a good way to reach out to them.

[EMC]

Great article, thanks for sharing.

[fuse]

Kind of gives those on the left a little too much credit, IMO.

[Nik the Greek]

Kind of gives those on the left a little too much credit, IMO.

I'm open to a discussion. What specifically do you mean?

Edit: It's easy to develop misconceptions about what 'the other side' thinks, or why they believe what they believe, in an echo chamber.

[Suvorov]

In my experience and opinion, the term liberal has been hijacked by progressive statists. While is a small percentage of those on the left who truly embrace the concept of personal freedom, the majority hold to progressive leftist ideology which is the very antithesis of liberty. In short, the vast majority of liberals aren't. In fact, the calling of the leftist faction in this country "Liberals" is an obscene example of double speak.

This writer makes a long series of valid and indisputable points, but his words will fall on largely deaf ears.

[Kyle Reese]

I think that the term "liberal" is misused these days.

Many on the far left want to deprive the rest of us of our right to free speech, expression, the right to keep & bear arms, etc. That's not "liberal", it's more along the lines of fascism/statism. They have much of the mass media on their side as well (echo chamber), and will stop at no fabrication, lie or distortion to achieve their ends.

[Suvorov]

I'm open to a discussion. What specifically do you mean?

Edit: It's easy to develop misconceptions about what 'the other side' thinks, or why they believe what they believe, in an echo chamber.

Reading the comments at the end of the article however shows that while this "liberal" may very well be on target, most of his colleagues are far from adopting the same equal defense of the RTKBA. It isn't an echo chamber, it is "the other side" in their natural habitat.

[cclaxton]

http://www.liberalswithguns.com/page2.html
http://guntotingliberal.com/
http://democratsforgunownership.org/
http://www.saysuncle.com/2009/03/20/democrats-and-guns-10/
http://www.theliberalgunclub.com/
http://www.gunlovingliberal.com/
http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-819628
http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2010/07/robert-farago/harpers-cover-story-liberal-gun-owners/

Times have changed. A recent poll shows 46% of Democrats support concealed carry. A 72% majority think citizens should have the right to obtain a concealed carry permit, 46% of Democrats and 57% of Republicans. A majority of Americans believe people should have the right to use deadly force to defend themselves and their loved ones in their homes. 77% of Republicans strongly support a background check before allowing the sale of a firearm.

Don't know where you have all been, but the war on guns is over....the 2nd Amendment has won!

Look at Pennsylvannia...it has gone Democrat both at the State and Federal levels in terms of politics, but remains heavily gun-friendly.

Gun rights are no longer a left vs. right argument...regardless of how you try to redefine "liberal" and "Conservative".

The gun bans did not dramatically reduce gun violence, and that fact cannot be dismissed by anyone...left or right.

Here is an intersting poll result: 27% of Republicans think there should be strong regulations or restrictions on gun ownership. Only 6% of Americans think there should be no or very few restrictions on gun ownership.

This is a recent poll located at: http://www.ipsos-na.com/download/pr.aspx?id=11545

Democrats and Liberals have changed their thinking on guns and personal safety. On the other hand Republicans seem to support some gun regulations and background checks.

It's not the 70's anymore!

CC

[Nik the Greek]

I think that the term "liberal" is misused these days.

Many on the far left want to deprive the rest of us of our right to free speech, expression, the right to keep & bear arms, etc. That's not "liberal", it's more along the lines of fascism/statism. They have much of the mass media on their side as well (echo chamber), and will stop at no fabrication, lie or distortion to achieve their ends.

I can agree that the term is widely mis-used, but I should point out that I think that it's possible to want to build a healthy society and a functional government without that pursuit automatically devolving into an Orwellian nightmare too. I think it would be fair to say that the intention of most liberals is to create an open, egalitarian, free and just society where the maximum percentage of the population is socially and politically empowered and enfranchised. That gets expressed different ways, some of which I disagree with vehemently. I haven't ever heard anyone, anywhere, in any of my personal, professional or scholastic pursuits push for absolute authoritarian government control. The Soviet Union certainly did it, but no one I know, or have read, wants anything like that here. People tend to conflate 'Socialism' with 'Authoritarianism'. Not that it would be accurate to characterize all American leftists as socialists, but if they're socialist they're still not authoritarians. Regardless, if anything, they fear fascist, jingoistic "jack booted thugs" from the right. When the Patriot Act was passed, I know I was more than a little concerned. It's ironic that we conjure the same images to scare ourselves into fearing and reviling our fellows. I believe that more unites us than separates us.

That said, from "this side" it seems as though conservatives in government mostly want to limit 'entitlements' and shrink the government into irrelevancy. With that in mind, I see a grand hypocrisy that pushes bigger military spending and reduced domestic spending on education and social welfare. I also see a lot of religious oppression on that side, with strong push to legislate a single religion's concepts of morality (ironically, except the parts that involve helping the poor. It's usually about keeping gays from getting married or some other similar personal freedom infringing bullshit). It also seems that concepts get pushed under the guise of fairness, that aren't really fair at all (like flat tax rates). It seems, from this perspective, that the political conservatives in power invest a lot of time and money manipulating a voting base in the interest of pursuing their business and financial interests.

I haven't run into too much from the left that involves limiting speech or expression (unless you're talking about overturning People's United?). I'm curious as to what you mean?

There are a ton of reasons why the media tends (slightly) toward the left. There are hugely important and traditionally conservative structures, like big business and the military, which thrive on secrecy. Journalists aren't keen on secrecy, and it creates an environment of opposition and mutual mistrust ("Those guys are hiding something, probably something they're doing wrong" vs. "Those guys will irresponsibly unveil important secrets!". Chips fall accordingly. A lot of it is related to education - and while there are schools that are indeed heavily liberal, universities aren't really vast liberal brain washing apparatuses that I've seen them characterized to be. I've had critical thinking skills and mental rigor emphasized far, far more often in my schooling than any particular liberal philosophy. Liberals tend to associate conservatives with dogmatic, faith-without-evidence kind of thinking (which I know to be untrue). Personally, I arrived at my political philosophies on my own, influenced strongly by history. I believe strongly in personal freedom. I also believe that the 'big guys' should be regulated and watched carefully, because history teaches that when they aren't, they stomp all over the little guy.


This writer makes a long series of valid and indisputable points, but his words will fall on largely deaf ears.

Some will be deaf, no doubt. Not all, though. Hell, I used to be one of those guys saying "c'mooon. A shotgun is fine for home defense - what do you need an AR-15 for?" As I got educated, I changed my mind. Exposure to ideas changes minds, but it's a gradual process, because human beings aren't wired to change our minds. We're wired to try to win arguments even when we know we're wrong. We're wired for confirmation bias. We're wired to hold onto our ideas, tightly.

Anyway, looking to the comments section of any given website for rational and even-handed discourse is like expecting a meth addled howler monkey to give a dissertation on philosophy.

Both of the major parties suffer from gross hypocrisies. Our two party system needs to go. American political thought is far more complex than either party would have us believe. It's in their best interests to maintain existing power structures, but those power structures restrain effective political expression.

[Suvorov]

Don't know where you have all been, but the war on guns is over....the 2nd Amendment has won!

Kalifornia, Chicago, with layovers in New York, New Jersey, and Massachusetts.

What do these states all have in common other than draconian gun laws? :confused:

Hell, in the Peoples Republic of Kalifornia we are in a death struggle right now to be able to keep are already morbidly neutered ARs. I can assure you that the congressman leading this attack does not have an R after his name.

The war is still burning hot my friend.

[Suvorov]

I can agree that the term is widely mis-used, but I should point out that I think that it's possible to want to build a healthy society and a functional government without that pursuit automatically devolving into an Orwellian nightmare too. I think it would be fair to say that the intention of most liberals is to create an open, egalitarian, free and just society where the maximum percentage of the population is socially and politically empowered and enfranchised. That gets expressed different ways, some of which I disagree with vehemently. I haven't ever heard anyone, anywhere, in any of my personal, professional or scholastic pursuits push for absolute authoritarian government control. The soviety union certainly did it, but no one I know wants anything like that here. If anything, they fear fascist, jingoistic "jack booted thugs" from the right. It's ironic that we conjure the same images to scare ourselves into fearing and reviling our fellows.

Most of the revolutionaries in 1917 Russia never imagined Lenin and Stalin's final product either (read Darkness at Noon), but the fact is that history has constantly proven that when you allow ambitious men to create massive governments, what you get is an Orwellian nightmare.


I haven't run into too much from the left that involves limiting speech or expression (unless you're talking about overturning People's United?). I'm curious as to what you mean?

Consistently in High School and College. While I will grant you that I had some very good professors who were "liberals" and who encouraged free exchange of ideas as long as they could be backed up, I had others that would prohibit anything that would challenge their brainwashing. The media runs far more slanted and uniformed pieces about guns than I can keep up with.


Anyway, looking to the comments section of any given website for rational and even-handed discourse is like expecting a meth addled howler monkey to give a dissertation on philosophy. Both of the major parties suffer from gross hypocrisies.

Our two party system needs to go. American political thought is far more complex than either party would have us believe. It's in their best interests to maintain existing power structures, but those power structures restrain effective political expression.

Here is where we will both agree. The Conservative/Liberal paradigm is inaccurate and inconsistent. While I may still be registered a Republican, I certainly no longer consider myself a Republican for a variety of reasons. I am however now more than ever a single issue voter largely, and that single issue is guns, and I am seeing far more attacks coming from the left than the right.

[Nik the Greek]

Kalifornia, Chicago, with layovers in New York, New Jersey, and Massachusetts.

What do these states all have in common other than draconian gun laws? :confused:

Hell, in the Peoples Republic of Kalifornia we are in a death struggle right not to be able to keep are all ready morbidly neutered ARs. I can assure you that the congressman leading this attack does not have an R after his name.

The war is still burning hot my friend.

Yep, SB249 looms on the horizon. The struggle is far from over.

http://stopsb249.org/

I will never accuse either the democrats or the republicans in the CA state legislature of being intelligent or effective. Our state congress mirrors our national congress in un-adulterated awfulness.


The media runs far more slanted and uniformed pieces about guns than I can keep up with.

Truth. And stories about guns used for self defense never get national attention.

The anti-gun push on the left is easily one of the ridiculously irrational, poorly researched positions that anyone liberal adopts. The problem is that that Brady campaign made very good propaganda. It referenced EU states that had tight gun control and suffered comparatively low crime rates. It references mistakes our nation made early on regarding interpreting the 2nd Amendment as referring to sporting firearms. To someone who hasn't been exposed to detailed information from gun supporters, it seems compelling.

Of course, now we have stats that show, convincingly, that more guns do NOT equal more crime - but these weren't available during those big Brady pushes. There's a good chance that increases in gun ownership help reduce crime, though that hasn't as yet been proven. Correlation does not imply causation, alas, no one really knows why crime rates in the US are dropping. To really shift the Left on American gun ownership, more studies are needed, from sources that at least appear relatively neutral.

[derekb]

Yep, SB249 looms on the horizon. The struggle is far from over.

http://stopsb249.org/

Does anyone else think the video on their front page is maybe not the best approach to informing folks who don't already have an opinion?

[Nik the Greek]

Does anyone else think the video on their front page is maybe not the best approach to informing folks who don't already have an opinion?

Probably not. It's a stupid premise. I think bullet buttons are bullshit. We should have access to the same tools the rest of the country has access to, so presenting them in a negative light is less than clever.

It's still the easiest way to link interested parties who might want to help stop the law.

[derekb]

Probably not. It's a stupid premise. I think bullet buttons are bullshit. We should have access to the same tools the rest of the country has access to.

It's still the easiest way to link interested parties who might want to help stop the law.

I guess my concern is that he's trying to say 'look at how not-dangerous this gun this law would ban is, especially when I compare it to this other gun I could totally still have!'

That seems... counterproductive.

[Nik the Greek]

I guess my concern is that he's trying to say 'look at how not-dangerous this gun this law would ban is, especially when I compare it to this other gun I could totally still have!'

That seems... counterproductive.

Agreed. If I were anti-gun and watching, I'd probably be thinking "Wtf? Why can you have any of those?".

Gun rights supporters are all too often their own worst enemies. Fortunately, it's likely that only those who are already interested in stopping passage of the law will ever see the site.

Still, seems that the messaging could be managed better. I don't know who's in charge over there.

[cclaxton]

Kalifornia, Chicago, with layovers in New York, New Jersey, and Massachusetts.

What do these states all have in common other than draconian gun laws? :confused:

Hell, in the Peoples Republic of Kalifornia we are in a death struggle right now to be able to keep are already morbidly neutered ARs. I can assure you that the congressman leading this attack does not have an R after his name.

The war is still burning hot my friend.

Those States will eventually change. It will take time to pull down 40 years of severe gun restrictions, but it will happen and is happening. There may be some holdouts, such as NYC and Chicago and LA, but the principle of being able to defend yourself is has already won over 72% of Americans and that cuts into Democratic and Liberal populations.

But it will take work to get them overturned. Maryland is close, NJ has a gun-friendly governor, and California has the majority on its side. I think the key is win over the Democratic representatives, as we have seen in the House where 65 Democrats joined Republicans and wouldn't revive the assault weapons ban. The NRA writes of three Democratic Governors who signed gun-friendly legislation. I think we have to be careful not to direct our fire at potential gun-friendly Democrats and Liberals.

CC

[TCinVA]

NJ has a gun-friendly governor

...and still has a bunch of severely gun-unfriendly laws on the books that aren't going anywhere anytime soon.

"Gun friendly" has to mean more than someone not actively in the effort to ban more stuff at the moment.

[Chuck Haggard]

I really enjoy hitting "liberals" with the facts ref the history of gun control in the US, that it is in a vile and racist thing, started to keep guns out of the "wrong" hands, those hands being blacks in the sought and the Italians and Irish in NYC.

The cognitive dissonance hitting them in the face is fun to watch.

[cclaxton]

I really enjoy hitting "liberals" with the facts ref the history of gun control in the US, that it is in a vile and racist thing, started to keep guns out of the "wrong" hands, those hands being blacks in the sought and the Italians and Irish in NYC.

The cognitive dissonance hitting them in the face is fun to watch.

I suggest the goal should be to win them over, not punch them out.
CC

[rsa-otc]

...and still has a bunch of severely gun-unfriendly laws on the books that aren't going anywhere anytime soon.

"Gun friendly" has to mean more than someone not actively in the effort to ban more stuff at the moment.

As I understand it Christie wasn't so Gun Friendly as an US Prosecutor. About the only thing that he's done was let the poor guy out of jail who really didn't deserve to be there because the judge on the case wouldn't let the jury hear the letter of the law. Christie also removed that judge from the bench for a number of horrible legal rulings on all sorts of things.

About the best thing that came down the road has been a NJ court ruling that Gun ownership is a legal right in NJ (previously NJ courts have held that the 2nd amendment didn't apply in NJ and that gun ownership was a privilege.) Hopefully that and the court case to remove the Good and Substantial need clause (similar to MD) from our carry permit process will break the ice and start things going gun owner’s way in NJ.

Did you know you cannot lend a family member a gun unless you are actually present the entire time that family member has possession of it? Its things like this that drives us Jersey residents batty.

[BaiHu]

REDACTED FOR EASE OF READING

1...It seems, from this perspective, that the political conservatives in power invest a lot of time and money manipulating a voting base in the interest of pursuing their business and financial interests.

I haven't run into too much from the left that involves limiting speech or expression (unless you're talking about overturning People's United?). I'm curious as to what you mean?

2 There are a ton of reasons why the media tends (slightly) toward the left. There are hugely important and traditionally conservative structures, like big business and the military, which thrive on secrecy. Journalists aren't keen on secrecy, and it creates an environment of opposition and mutual mistrust ("Those guys are hiding something, probably something they're doing wrong" vs. "Those guys will irresponsibly unveil important secrets!". Chips fall accordingly. A lot of it is related to education - and while there are schools that are indeed heavily liberal, universities aren't really vast liberal brain washing apparatuses that I've seen them characterized to be. I've had critical thinking skills and mental rigor emphasized far, far more often in my schooling than any particular liberal philosophy. Liberals tend to associate conservatives with dogmatic, faith-without-evidence kind of thinking (which I know to be untrue). Personally, I arrived at my political philosophies on my own, influenced strongly by history. I believe strongly in personal freedom. I also believe that the 'big guys' should be regulated and watched carefully, because history teaches that when they aren't, they stomp all over the little guy.



3 Some will be deaf, no doubt. Not all, though. Hell, I used to be one of those guys saying "c'mooon. A shotgun is fine for home defense - what do you need an AR-15 for?" As I got educated, I changed my mind. Exposure to ideas changes minds, but it's a gradual process, because human beings aren't wired to change our minds. We're wired to try to win arguments even when we know we're wrong. We're wired for confirmation bias. We're wired to hold onto our ideas, tightly.

4 Anyway, looking to the comments section of any given website for rational and even-handed discourse is like expecting a meth addled howler monkey to give a dissertation on philosophy.

5 Both of the major parties suffer from gross hypocrisies. Our two party system needs to go. American political thought is far more complex than either party would have us believe. It's in their best interests to maintain existing power structures, but those power structures restrain effective political expression.

To make this easier, I'll relate to the numbers I labeled above.

1) That is true of any party, which dovetails with what I labeled as your 5th point.
2) The media leans left precisely b/c the education administered is typically left-leaning. Unless you are in the hard sciences, most children will naturally be taught left of center without having strong parental/mentor/personal guidance shifting them towards the right. The public education system is a federal system that literally pays each state more for every minute they are in a classroom-meaning less gym (physical violence), art (free expression) and music (death metal :p). Here's a link about the importance of extracurricular activities: http://www.educationnews.org/education-policy-and-politics/the-academic-value-of-extracurricular-activities/. As for the more tax dollars per classroom minute, I got that from local teachers I know, but I can't find a link, b/c my google fu is wearing off.
3) Good on you, but most people as you mention towards the end of this point, will not change their minds. If you grow up liberal/anti-gun, then the chances are you'll stay that way. We are lucky that we are as center/right a nation as we seem to be.
4) Yes, but man if you get 100 of those monkeys, you might get some wicked acid-trippy version of Shakespeare.
5) Absolutely, I think the introduction of the Tea Party will help to shake the parties up-they don't seem happy with either party...yet.

[jslaker]

One of the easiest ways to turn somebody off from supporting gun rights is to use "liberal" as a synonym and slur for gun control.

Supporters of gun rights have a tendency to be incredibly self-defeating on this point.