It’s been a weird few weeks. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of health care subsidies and marriage equality, which is a bit like a drunken hippopotamus sweeping a gymnastics competition with perfect scores all around.
But there’s one thing that wasn’t solved, and that was gun violence. Yet another mass shooting came and went, with no policy changes of any kind, nor any hope that such a thing could possibly happen. For whatever weird reason, it sparked the removal of the Confederate battle flag from all sorts of buildings, and that’ll perhaps lead to an incremental improvement in matters of entrenched racism, but it certainly won’t solve the underlying problems related to gun violence.
You see, the United States has a problem with guns. Despite 6 in 10 Americans thinking guns make us safer, the evidence is overwhelmingly the opposite. As gun ownership rates rise or fall, gun homicides follow the same pattern precisely. As gun ownership rates vary by region or state, gun homicides vary right along with them. More guns = more murder.
This shouldn’t come as much of a surprise, except for those 6 in 10 Americans who think the exact opposite of reality. If you’re one of those people, you’re simply wrong. And your wrongness is destroying America.
But this is a problem that can be solved.
With racism.
You see, if there’s one Americans hate more than the metric system, it’s weird foreigners. Just take a look at the last century of American cinema, with Russian villains all over the place.
Outside of film, we even have entire color-coded paranoia movements, like the Yellow Peril and the Red Scare. Remember “No Irish Need Apply?” And segregation?!?
This fear is misplaced, of course. Terrifying though Dolph Lundgren may be, it’s the Americans who are killing you. But Americans have pretty much made a national pastime out of being scared of the wrong thing. Just look at Shark Week.
As for guns, the problem for quite some time has been that gun-loving Americans view easy access to gun ownership as fundamentally good. And how can we possibly get gun-loving Americans to view easy access to gun ownership as fundamentally bad?
Easy. Get Muslims to do it.
Take a look:
This photo comparison made the rounds on the internet, generally under the title “Explain the Difference.” But a lot of gun lovers claimed they could explain the difference, and quite easily, because one is a freedom-loving American, while the other is a freedom-hating Muslim.
As far as this plan goes, it doesn’t matter if they’re right or wrong. The only thing that matters is that they view only one of these as fundamentally dangerous. They’re happy to see white people getting guns, but they’d be absolutely horrified to find a bunch of Muslims doing the same thing.
Hence, bunch of Muslims:
Start doing the same thing.
Load up on as many guns as you can. Tweet about it all day, every day. Talk about how easy it is to get assault rifles and grenade launchers from the neighborhood vending machine without even having to show an ID of any kind. Post photos of your kids holding assault rifles with captions like “isn’t it so cute how they can barely lift them?!” You can even use toy guns, since they look the same anyway. Go ahead and mention how it’s practically impossible to get a gun in your home country, but here in America it’s soooo easy!!!
In fact, you don’t even have to do it. This’ll work even just saying so. Go ahead and write letters to NRA members thanking them for ensuring the ease of your many assault rifle purchases, and mention how you’ve recently expanded your collection with high-capacity magazines, explosive rounds, laser scopes, and bullet-proof vests so no one can stop you. Oh, and make sure to sign it Muhammed. That’ll get their attention!
Heck, you don’t even have to be Muslim. Americans can barely tell them apart from Sikhs and Hindus anyway, and I’d be willing to bet that anyone of Mediterranean or Latin American descent with an especially nice tan could scare the hell out of white America just as well as anyone. And Iranians?! Do I even have to mention how terrified Americans are of Iranians?!?! This plan practically writes itself!
Besides, you don’t even have to be within the US to do this. You can even borrow photos already posted by whichever paramilitary group is making headlines this week, and just start passing them around online, claiming they got all the guns at a Wal-Mart in El Paso, laughing and shouting “Can you believe they didn’t even do a background check?!! Thanks Obama!!!”
Yes, make sure to throw an Obama in there. And remember to call him Barack Hussein Obama, and mention how when he personally handed you your assault rifle and map of nearby elementary schools, he said, “It doesn’t matter if you have a criminal history. That’ll just be our…no, your little secret,” and he winked at you, and a tear streamed from your eye.
We’d have gun control in 5 minutes.
Do it, guys. Do it for America. We’ll never be able to do it without your help. We’ll thank you later, by making you the super-cool villain in every action movie for the next 50 years.
return the previous post for answer, a private transaction, is just that, private, it violates the 4th, and the 5th.
I will also mention, that while I don’t agree with the background checks thing for private sales, I do agree on a reasonable level to due diligence by the seller. they are selling a tool that’s purpose is to maim or kill, which can be an amazing defense when deployed for that reason, it is also good when hunting. don’t need your food running off someplace other then the dinner table right?
but what will really get YOUR feathers riled up all these felons really need to do, is get a 3d printer that can do metal printing, and the autocad files for just about ANY firearm.
they can make the single shot plastic pistols, to the AR-15. and they don’t need to say a thing, or even put a serial number on it.
personal arms manufacturing is a legal process in America and your not required to put a S/N on the firearm. the illegal part only comes as felon in possession of a firearm.
anyway. my sincere question to you is why do you believe someone should give up their freedoms because you think it is right?
you seem to travel a lot, should you give up your freedom of movement to do so because someone else says it is what is best for the rest society?
the freedoms granted pertain to individual liberty, not community, or social liberty.
it is not my place to say it is okay to violate ones rights simply because I believe it is the best way, we can argue it, come up with ideas, but ultimately it is not our place to enforce our ideals on another simply because we feel justified in doing so.
it is a slippery slope, as we cannot enforce our ideals on others without allowing others to enforce their ideals on us.
and with my opinions and leanings, “I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than those attending too small a degree of it.” – to quote Thomas Jefferson
take this quote and think about it for a while, give yourself a couple days and then reply to me what you think he meant.
In specific response to the ability of freedom of movement, I have a passport. It is my travel license. So no, I don’t have complete freedom of movement. I have to fill out an application to get permission to travel, and my travels are recorded in order to keep track of anything suspicious. I have certain problems with the current system, but I don’t have any problem with the idea of a passport itself. How would that be any different from a national gun license?
As an iraq vet, I have seen first hands what guns are made for. To kill; whether it’s people or animals for hunting to put food on the table. I am definitely in favor of my right to bear arms and it’s something that should be a right for all. BUT with that being, because of how dangerous guns are, I agree that there needs to be some control. Just because I say gun control doesn’t mean I want to abolish guns completely. Hell, I own a firearm review site. Let’s just control the chaos a little bit while still maintaining our gun ownership rights. Criminals are going to get their hands on guns one way or another, and guns are going to end up in the wrong hands and do some serious damage. More of a reason why I want a gun to protect myself and my family. There needs to be a middle ground or no solutions will ever be made.
I have never heard someone in favor of gun ownership mention something supportive about gun regulation. Thank you for your respectful and thoughtful response. It always seems weird to me…every gun owner wants other gun owners to be responsible, right? Well…then it sounds like the same issue with anything else, where a license would make sense. We can debate the specifics, of course, but, just like you said, “gun control” doesn’t mean “no guns,” just like “car ownership regulation” isn’t doing much to stop people from buying and driving cars all the time.