I’ve received a flood of mail in response to the Oregon shooting and this item on whether the United States is doomed to be the only developed nation that tolerates mass-fatality shootings as routine.
The message quoted below is related to the evocative photo above, showing the moment in 1967 when armed Black Panthers marched into the California state capitol building in Sacramento. (This moment is also part of a great new documentary on the Black Panthers, which its director Stanley Nelson discussed with our editor James Bennet at the Washington Ideas Forum this week.) This reader imagines what it would be like if today’s Muslims applied a similar approach:
One sentence in your article reminded me of an idea a friend and I have had for a couple of years to combat the NRA. "[The President] highlighting the disproportion between America’s sky-is-falling sensitivity to the slightest potential risk that could be defined as 'terrorism' versus its blasé acceptance of unending home-grown killings." What if gun control advocates combined the two and exploited that terrorism sensitivity?
One evening, my friend, who happens to be of Indian and Sri Lankan descent, noted the potential hypocrisy of many Second Amendment supporters in that all hell would likely break loose if he walked the streets with an AR-15.
Over drinks, we imagined a video project whereby Muslim Americans legally purchase and carry firearms within the bounds of existing laws. However, maybe in the introduction they are wearing hijabs, maybe they are speaking Arabic, maybe they are praying to Mecca. And then with the help of body cameras, you can watch them purchase firearms at a gun show without a background check and maybe watch them buy 5 guns in a month. Pursuant to proper permit, you can watch them carry, either concealed or openly, such firearm(s) to their mosque, to the park or to the grocery store. Lastly, you can watch a group of Muslims Americans fire off hundreds of rounds a minute legally at a gun range.
Additional videos could feature other minority groups which many 2nd Amendment supporters might consider members of the scary "other". A 6'8'' African American male taking an assault rifle to a Black Panther meeting! A bandana and tattooed clad Mexican American with a gun in his low rider. The point being to highlight the deficiencies in the existing system with Americans that NRA members might fear, or at least not be sympathetic to. You can also explain how real undesirables, existing mass murderers or individuals with undocumented mental illness, exploited the system and/or stockpiled firearms and ammo.
If the videos got big enough, it would be interesting to see the NRA's response as supporting everyone's right to easy access to guns may alienate some of their members and supporters.
Both my friend and I are attorneys with young families so while we would actually like to undertake this labor intensive endeavor, there will likely never be the time.
I am a registered New York Republican. My father was in law enforcement for 40+ years and I grew up in a home with firearms, which were properly protected. I believe in the 2nd Amendment but obviously agree with your writings that there are reasonable restrictions that could and should be put in place to reduce the risk of mass shootings. A part of my humanity died on December 14, 2012 as a result of the shooting itself but also the failure to take any steps to prevent further bloodshed. I know it is underhanded to play off the biases of people but if it serves the greater good and results in less death and tragedy, I could look myself in the mirror.