Get ready for some incredibly mediocre photos from a flip phone.
Today, I’m at “Marching On: A Conference on Gun Violence Prevention” in Exley Science Center, a conference hosted by CT Against Gun Violence (CAGV). The conference runs from 8:30 AM to 2:00 PM, and consists of a Welcome, a session about gun violence in CT, two breakout sessions, and a keynote speech by Dannel P. Malloy, Governor of Connecticut. Click past the jump for the liveblog.
(Visited 40 times, 1 visits today)
The single-mindedness of the gun ban people is stunning! It’s like they’re ammune to facts, such as the decrease in all violent crime by a full 51% over the last two decades (even as the number of guns in private hands set record heights). Or that the weapons used at Sandy Hook were in compliance with Connecticut’s so-called “Assault Weapons Ban” at the time. That they call for “reduced ammunition clips” (more correctly called “magazines”) even though the worst school shooting in history — Virginia Tech — involved NO “high capacity” or extended “clips.” (The shooter simply changed magazines many, many times.) They poo-poo the NRA’s suggestions that armed “good guys” in schools is part of the solution even as President Obama and AG Eric Holder targeted massive funding toward that very thing according to today’s news.
Most glaring: blaming neighboring states for crime when crime is LOWER in the accused “supplier” state! So what is that supposed to mean — that you’re mad because gun buyers in Virginia are better behaved than gun buyers in DC? Or is something being completely overlooked, like the huge GULF between traditional American “gun culture” and GANG/criminal culture? Here’s a much needed data point: who is doing the shooting? Disgruntled NRA members pulling drive-bys? Hunters who decide that ducks and deer aren’t as much fun as hunting people? Or maybe gangs, drug dealers, pimps and any other petty criminal who is concerned with things like “turf?” If solutions to “gun violence” are really the goal, then why aren’t we looking at these things?
No, they keep yapping about banning “assault weapons” even though they don’t know the definition (they sure do LOOK scary!) and that ALL rifles only account for about 4% of all gun-related murders each year. “Assault weapons” are just a small subset of that group.
I think that conference attendees would be astounded by how much support they’d have — how much common ground there is — between NRA members/gun owners and themselves when it comes to making our streets safer. Yet ignored are those who know guns the best! Instead, it’s the hoplophobes, gun-ignorant and people amped-up by emotion with no better information than things they’ve heard endlessly repeated by the media who are crafting these so-called “gun control” proposals. They don’t make the logical connection that in ALL of these shootings, many, MANY laws were broken and that if we create new laws, those will be broken too. The logic that says that new policy punishes only those that will follow it: when you restrict ammunition capacity, you give the criminal the upper hand. Same for any bans. Disarming the innocent makes nobody safer.
And before anyone mentions it, the fact that guns are used somewhere between 20 and 80 times more often to SAVE a life than to take one is completely ignored, or denied like the right does global warming. Facts are pesky, pesky things. As Neil deGrasse Tyson says, facts don’t care if you don’t believe in them. What do the gun ban advocates say to all the survivors who have guns to thank for their lives?
Thank you so much for coming to the conference and blogging about it; it’s important to keep the conversation going and we appreciate your support in doing so.
Feel like an explanation is needed as an FYI, merchandise “pitching” has to be done to keep programs like this conference accessible and affordable… or possible! We are a 501c3 and run on so little money. Donations are imperative to the organization’s survival and selling merch is one way to get funding.