Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Cracked and Guns... who knows?

So Cracked has a new article up on trying to "bridge the divide" on the gun control debate.

What I find fascinating is that the writer tries to keep a neutral tone. And goes with a sort of "hey both sides are crazy and should totally agree to this."

But let's look at what he's actually saying.

See Gun Grabbers should realize that not all gun owners are fat old white 'murrican!  men.  They should give up on their dreams of banning assault weapons because the bans are based on cosmetic features and are on guns that are hardly used in murders anyway.   They should also give up on magazine bans.  Oh and they should put facts before fear mongering and know what they're talking about.

Meanwhile gun nuts should admit that their Red Dawn fantasy camp dreams are just that.  That it's okay to own guns for fun.  Oh and gun people should calm down since no one's coming for your guns and that Universal Background checks are popular.

Note the difference?   Well the writer is telling the gun grabbers to give up and stop being ignorant and prejudiced.   Meanwhile the gun owners should be more honest about how nerdy their hobby is and calm down.

Maybe I've gotten the wrong impression, but it's funny how in an attempt to be "even handed" the writer basically writes off gun control's hole agenda of banning things.

See it's a compromise!


And note that the last two Gun Lover points aren't quite right.  Given that the President himself demanded an Assault Weapons Ban, and a magazine ban, and endorsed the states that passed said bans.  So that there isn't a federal ban on those guns owes more towards a lack of political power than presidential desire.  Is the idea of rushing to buy guns before they're made illegal really that crazy when there was a federal push with that exact goal and several states... did exactly that?

And amusingly for an article that denigrates gun control as being motivated by ignorance the writer doesn't actual define what Universal Background checks would entail, how they would function, or what they could ban.  Just that "Hey people like it when you say " making sure the dude buying a Glock doesn't have a restraining order or history of schizophrenia"

Because that's totally the same thing as making it illegal to loan your friend your hunting rifle.   Here's a dirty secret, when they say "expanding background checks" they don't mean expanding the check itself.

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