I thought they were mythical creatures, like unicorns or well-educated conservatives. Then I ran across one on a Google+thread, and he was exactly the kind of gun-grabbing asshole that conservatives always said existed. The thread started out innocuously enough;
Every time there is a mass shooting the public screams this is unacceptable , this must stop. How could that madman do such a thing. Walk for one thing , he didn’t act alone, his accomplices were every member of the NRA. His accomplices were every politician that took their dirty money. His accomplices are the people of Florida and Texas and Pennsylvania. The spoiled brat generation that think a gun is manly. The great White hunters of this nation that worship the errant second amendment. The dentist that killed A harmless old lion , who would shit his pants if he didn’t have have his trusty elephant gun and a safari. Their manhood, and in some cases their womanhood is their gun. Those kids in Porkland have your number and they will eventually take your AR playthings away from you. One teenager told BillMaher,”Your generation fucked up , but that’s alright we’ ll straighten it out !” My money is on the youngster!
All Texans, blah, blah, blah. I really hate broad generalizations. I figured I’d set the man straight on his terminology. “Armaphiles is the word you are looking for. All Texans may have guns, but not all Texans substitute guns for sex.”
…and then the unicorn showed up.
I’m a Texan, and I have never touched a gun. There are a lot of non gun owners here. I was born in Tyler, now in Dallas.
Randy Ellis
“You are a weird Texan. I know, because I’m a Texan. Wasn’t born here though. I grew up in Texas from about age two, if you count Texas as being all the lands that once were Texas. You grew up in a small town and never used a gun? What a waste of freedom. I carried my b-b gun everywhere with me. I managed not to get into too much trouble with it. I never lost an eye, either.”
I was trying to be light hearted and clever. That was my mistake.
I never felt the need for a gun. I’m not a pussy.
Randy Ellis
“That’s a knee-slapper there. I was shooting pheasant and goose with my dad when I was 14. It’s called hunting. I’m sure you’ve heard of it. The thing you used to have to do to eat? Before there were supermarkets? You probably don’t remember that far back.
You act like our Governor and Lt. Governor and the conservative majority of the state aren’t actively seeking to arm teachers, students, clergy members and anyone else they think should have a gun. I’m surprised they haven’t tried arming the pets yet. So you might think that sexist slurs (as if pussy-owners aren’t capable of handing your balls to you on a plate if most of them felt like it) about people who own guns in Texas might be just a little bit off. You might want to sit and think on that one for a spell.”
I was still trying to keep it light, even though the guy had some serious misogyny issues there, thinking women were weak and other such foolishness. His next response showed me what level of ignorance I was up again.
I’m not in favor of more guns. In fact, I want to destroy the fucking things.
Randy Ellis
You don’t like my opinion, go fuck yourself. I think Abbott is a sorry piece of shit,and I will vote straight Democrat to get rid of the NRA owned assholes.
I think gun owners are cowards, afraid of their own shadow.
That sound you hearing is me rolling up my sleeves. “This is just another example of total adherence to confirmation bias. I think this way, therefore everyone should think this way.
Just like the author of the thread that condemned all Texans even though Democratic turnout in Texas doubled in the primaries. Doesn’t matter, all Texans think one way.
…but which way is it? Like the cosmopolitan Dallas resident who doesn’t realize he’s almost a state of one person? Or like the OP says Texans are? Which way is it?
I have a very (very) nuanced opinion on guns. I’m frequently called a gun grabber. I expect to be blocked here and called a gun nut. I think I’m a realist, but then I would think that because of confirmation bias.”
Then there was his final volly.
You started on me. If you need a gun, and have to kill for fun (hunting when you don’t need to) you’re not much of a man.
Randy Ellis
The guy goes around calling the majority of his fellow Texans weak, misattributed his beliefs as the beliefs of the majority of Texans, then states flatly that I’m not a man (my children would say otherwise) …and he has the gall to say I started in on him. What the actual fuck is going on here?
You Randy Ellis are the poster boy for every liberal that the NRA smears. You are doing them a favor with your knee jerk responses “just ban guns” “gun owners are sissies” (again, coded sexist language that portrays women as weaker) I’m aware that there are Texans who don’t own guns and never have touched a gun, but I’m genuinely shocked each time I get a confession from one because they are as rare as hens teeth everywhere but the cities in Texas.
I grew up in rural farm country in the seventies. You hunted for food even then. People still hunt for food now, they just don’t have to (food deserts in central cities aside. Hunting for food there takes on a different meaning) I moved around in Texas from one small town to another until I finally made it to Austin. Everywhere but Austin, everyone pretty much owned guns, used guns.
I don’t need guns, I own guns. I have only needed a gun once (thankfully) and I didn’t have to use it because the police arrived before I was forced to shoot the man trying to bash down my apartment door. I would have shot him had they failed to arrive in time but the shotgun would have made an awful mess. I was glad I didn’t have to clean that up. I generally tell everyone I meet that hasn’t used a gun to try shooting a few times before deciding on whether they want to take a side in the gun argument. I say this because you simply sound uninformed without some experience handling firearms.
If you, Randy Ellis, were actually interested in convincing your conservative neighbors that you had ideas they couldn’t dismiss out of hand, you might start with the argument that there should be no semi-automatic weapons (not assault rifles, semi-automatic weapons) available to the general public. That owners of these semi-automatic weapons should pay for licensing and insurance for them, just like you have to do with automatic weapons today. Once the gas-powered receivers that enable semi-automatic fire become rare on the market, you will see fewer and fewer mass shootings, just like everywhere else in the world.
Your armaphiles neighbors will retort something about criminals not following the law or I’ll make my own weapon, but you can counter that there are few machinists that are capable of the fine work required to make a semi-automatic weapon fire reliably, and they will not be anxious to be sued and jailed for making weapons that are required to be registered and insured by the owners of those weapons. A machinist capable of doing all the work required to produce reliable semi-automatic firearms is certainly going to charge more than the average street criminal can afford to spend.
You could point out that there is no need in the general public for a weapon that reloads itself. You could expand the argument to include revolvers and repeaters if the armaphiles won’t see reason on the semi-automatic argument. Or you could talk about reinstating the draft for weapons training if the other arguments don’t work.
In the end, we cannot continue as we are now. That would be crazy. As crazy as you are for not recognizing a fellow traveller, Randy Ellis.
Ted Nugent encouraging his followers to shoot Liberals and Democrats should be grounds for his arrest and confiscation of all his weapons. Any harm that some crazy person does because their crazy leaders tell them to do these things should come back squarely on these peoples (Nugent, LaPierre, Norman) shoulders. They should be held accountable for their reckless statements and behavior. Nugent and Norman specifically should see jail time for dangerous threats and reckless behavior.