I emailed author of article about the 2nd Amendment being racist

[Bang]

Irresponsible journalism serves a purpose. If brought up short, they can claim innocent ignorance, thus avoiding a charge of deliberate misleading.

[win67]

If the guy works in an office and lives in a sterilized suburban neighborhood, he may sincerely believe the stuff he wrote, since the MSM is the only source of info he has about guns. That being the case, I think his relatively short article is a great bullet list of easily refutable (incorrect) talking points that suburban soccer moms tend to sincerely believe are true w/r/t/ guns:

I have only begun to process his not-guilty verdict, announced Friday afternoon.

There is so much suffering, so many reasons to mourn.

If you're looking to virtue-signal, Walmart is having a sale on home decor signs with stupid quotes on them. You should buy one, because it will be taken much more seriously than this kind of crap.

Rittenhouse may be legally innocent, but blood will remain on his hands, his heart, possibly for the rest of his life. The people I know who have killed others say such actions — firing a gun at another human being, watching the body drop, the blood spill from wrecked flesh, the breath stop — will distort and haunt for time immeasurable.

Whether or not this is true, has no bearing on the issue at hand. Since it came up though, I suspect most people, black, white, or otherwise, would rather live with a vague feeling of discomfort than be fucking dead or worse.

Self-defense, his lawyers claimed.

Would such a claim apply for every American?

Did you watch the Rittenhouse trial? The media made no mention of this, but he was in fact attacked- shot at, to be precise- before he so much as laid a finger on anyone. And yes, you or anyone else acting as he did would be right to claim self-defense.

Consider local history. Ed Johnson facing a white lynch mob, the Cherokees facing forced removal, five Black women shotgunned by the Klan in 1980 — if they had armed themselves and shot their white attackers in self-defense, would the courts have set them free?

Yes.

It is hard for me to imagine a present-day Black teenager carrying an AR-15 to our city's next protest, shooting three white people, claiming self-defense and receiving the same treatment and verdict as Rittenhouse.

That's a) because you don't actually know any black teenagers other than the dead thugs you read about in the media; and b) because no one has actually done that in the way you're presenting it (i.e., omitting the part about the mob shooting first), so of course you won't find any examples to go off of.

The criminal justice system seems more schizophrenic than blind; it has ruthlessly eaten up the lives of so many, while bending over backwards to allow and sustain others' freedom.

Correct. Do you expect a system so dysfunctional to guarantee your safety, or would it be better to trust yourself- who you've implied to be an expert on this- to handle the job?

I think of Tony Oliver [..............................], authorities visited their home. Found the gun [................................] Oliver was a felon on probation; he is prevented from possessing a firearm.

With his daughter watching, Oliver was cuffed and sent back to prison.

Why?

"Why"?! What part of "prohibited person" are you having trouble understanding? I understand he may be a nice guy, but for someone who has a documented history of inability to follow rules, that they may continue to suffer from that is not a huge shock.

His wife owned a gun.

For self-defense.

Look, no one makes perfect decisions all the time, but if her concern was to avoid the effects of violent crime... not sharing a bed with a convicted violent felon would have been a good place to start too.

Ms. Anderson's book delves into the real reasons framers of the Constitution included the Amendment — mainly the threat from armed slaves and free Blacks."

"The eighteenth-century origins of the 'right to bear arms' explicitly excluded Black people," writes Anderson, a decorated, best-selling professor at Emory University. Elsewhere, she writes: "The Second Amendment ... was designed and has consistently been constructed to keep African Americans powerless and vulnerable."

This is why people need to read on their own. The quote above is 100% pure, unadulterated, bullshit, not even deserving ofg a serious response- and anyone who spends 30 seconds reading the text of any pre-1960 gun control law will deduce that on their own.

Can you think of any time in American history when Black people collectively armed themselves against white violence ... and received full support of the Constitution, police officers, judges and politicians for doing so?

Yes. You might too if you spent a few minutes looking for one or, (God forbid!) you spent even a few minutes a week talking to people outside your echo chamber of fellow white yuppies.

Philando Castille. Alton Sterling. Tamir Rice. John Crawford. All Black. Each carrying or possessing a gun. (Rice, 12, was playing with a toy gun. Crawford was carrying a BB gun he'd picked up off the Walmart shelf.)

They were all shot and killed by police.

Philando Castile was shot because he's a violent thug doing violent things, and met the same end he should have if he was white or any other skin color. The other incidents you mentioned are tragic but happen to people of all races. There is no clean-cut silver bullet for this problem but you're not wrong to say that among some public agencies, there is a problem with accountability. If we can all stop stirring racial wars for a minute, we may be able to work together effectively enough to make meaningful progress toward a solution. In addition, experience since 2020, when the "Defund the Police" movement started, have clearly shown that while the police were never perfect, they treat people far more equitably and safely than the gangs that step up in their absence. Most policemen work very hard to make us all- black, white, and otherwise- as safe as possible, and we are foolish to make an enemy of people who want nothing but to be our most powerful ally.

Who gets to carry guns in this country?

You, most likely, even though we both know damn well you've never tried it. But you should. And more minorities should too, because they're the people most likely to be harmed by the thugs among us. I know you won't hear this in the media, but since I'm a real, live, 2A supporter here talking to you now, I want you to know that we love you, and want you to be safe. And we love our colored countrymen and want them to be safe too. We want the same things for our families they do. And if you talk to other real, live, 2A supporters, you WILL find that if you want colored people to have better, safer, lives, you will never find a more committed group of allies to your cause.

And who doesn't?

Fuck around and find out.

I, too, own multiple guns. But if my Black brothers and sisters can't carry their guns in the same way I can

Where are you getting your information about whether certain people can and can't carry guns? Let's go to the range, and I think you might learn an interesting new perspective. And BTW, I know you're lying about owning guns, because if you spent any time at actual ranges or gun stores you would already know that not only white people have guns.

[Story]

The other day, I read an article titled "Opinion: Who gets to carry guns in America? And who doesn't?"
I did reply and thank him for his reply and also suggested he check out Tony Simon and the Diversity Shoot

This is the thumbnail background of David Cook, the man you wrote to.

David Cook is the award-winning city columnist for the Times Free Press, working in the same building where he began his post-college career as a sportswriter for the Chattanooga Free Press. Cook, who graduated from Red Bank High, holds a master's degree in Peace and Justice Studies from Prescott College and an English degree from the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. For 12 years, he was a teacher at the middle, high school and university levels. A Marshall Memorial Fellow, Cook published in magazines (The Sun, Utne Reader, Geez), academic journals, an anthology on homelessness ("Personal Struggles, Professional Lives: Ethics and Advocacy in Research on Homelessness" — Lexington Press) and an anthology on grandparents and grandchildren ("Grandparenting with Heart" — North Atlantic).
https://www.timesfreepress.com/staff/david-cook/