This story is a bit troubling.
Four gun shows, all about an hour’s drive from Newtown, Conn., all canceled….the venue backed out. Same with three other shows in New York’s Hudson Valley, according to the organizer.
Gun advocates aren’t backing down from their insistence on the right to keep and bear arms. But heightened sensitivities and raw nerves since the Newtown shooting have led to toned-down displays at gun shows and prompted some officials and sponsors to cancel the well-attended exhibitions altogether.
Some of the most popular guns will be missing from next weekend’s gun show in Saratoga Springs, N.Y., after show organizers agreed to bar the display and sale of AR-15 military-style semiautomatic weapons and their large-clip magazines.
“The majority of people wanted these guns out of the city,” said Chris Mathiesen, Saratoga Springs’ public safety commissioner. “They don’t want them sold in our city, and I agree. Newtown, Conn., is not that far away.”
Now shows and venues have the right to cancel or limit what can and can’t be sold. Still what worries me is that this may be controlling the message. No gun show, and no semi-auto rifles? What “Majority” has spoken out about this?
I suspect its all BS and Knee-jerk reactions, and what troubles me is that the uninitiated will think its true.
This is why we need to be out there, talking to people, and spreading the truth.
That only works if people will LISTEN… and the left won’t…
depends on your definition of “The Left”. There are the political players. Those people are intrenched, and know the data and look the other way. Meanwhile there are the uninitiated who lean left. They aren’t intrnched, and they haven’t given a serious look at the issue, and they very well could be swayed by information and debate.
There are plenty of people who just don’t pay attention to politics.
Or when they do they just go with the “surface”/MSN line.
Because -well- they’ve got other things in their lives.
This also happens with guns. I have plenty of friends back East who didn’t really think about guns, other than what the conventional wisdom was, until they were taken to the range and things were explained to them.
The power the over-culture has is immense in that it sets many of the cultural defaults.
On a larger point this is another part of the “benefit” the Antis reap from high gun control states.
The stronger the gun control laws the harder it is for a law abiding person to get a gun (the criminals are immune from this). This means that less people in a given area will have second hand, let alone, first hand experience with guns.
As I’ve found with my friends back in NY, the ones that have seen and acutally used an EBR or a pistol are far more likely to be skeptical of the antis claims, especially when it contradicts their own experiences.
Also the more anti-gun a state is, the more pro-criminal they are. Here in Mass we have all sorts of penalties for lawful citizens to own guns. When the bangers get caught those charges are frequently plead away, and they also are often quickly shunted out of the penal system into an overworked parole system which is rarely supervised.
Its a win-win for the blood dancers, and a lose lose for anybody who’s intentions are good.
But yeah when somebody lives under a set of laws, be they gun or otherwise, they most frequently assume that the laws are like that everywhere, and those laws are good. Just look at people from states with registration talking about events in states without it. How frequently have you heard somebody from New York, Massachusetts, or California asking “Was the gun registered?” when talking about an incident in a state without a registry?
The same thing goes for gun free zones. The antis take the situation they’ve built to their full advantage.
It even goes to such mundane things as vehicle inspections.
And you’ve described Chicago perfectly — with the added bonus that Chicago has cut their PD and has a hard time even finding who pulled the trigger in their shootings.
But it’s the down-state hunters who are the problem…
What I’m not clear about is whether some of those Shows were FORCED to Close by the Local Politburos, or if the Show’s Promoters decided to lay low. With all the Insane Price Increases over the last month, I don’t think the Promoters would be willing to let all that Cash slip by them from the Entry Fees and Table Sales. So if this is the Local Politburos, then all you people who live in those VolksRepubliks better watch your asses. What’s Next?