[Filthy Rich]

Oh man, rabid anti-gun hoplophobes really try my patience!

No matter how much you talk to them, no matter what facts you present, despite all efforts to remain civil and to engage in an adult conversation it all ends up for naught... Apparently, the only conclusion to a conversation that they will accept is one where you willingly renounce your Right to Keep and Bear Arms, but there is no way that's gonna happen!

Just recently I was at a person's house and the topic of Michael Moore came up [my lunch almost did the same thing!] and I got the whole "You really should watch Bowling for Columbine. He makes some good points about gun ownership in the US..." schpeal for the ten thousanth time, yay... Well, that just about did it apperently because I then asked them if they would make a Jewish person read Mein Kamfp because they thought "Hitler made some good points..." and told them that I had no interest in the fat bastard's bullshit movie...

It would appear that my patience is nearing its end when it comes to this stuff... Look, I try to engage in adult-style discussions and work [very hard, I might add] to view things from the opposition's viewpoint but in the end the effort invariably ends up being one-sided! Oh my word, just thinking about that makes me flash back to my last girlfriend and what a world-class mega-liberal nutcase she turned out to be! Aaaaah! But I digress...

Exactly how much foolishness should I endure from hardcore anti-rights gun grabbers? When did our fellow Americans begin cherishing weakness and espousing pussy-ass-powder-blue-sweater ideals like civilian disarmament? Ugh, I guess the only thing to do is stay cool and :: represent :: to the best of my ability, present myself as a living contradiction to the stereotype portrayed by the rabid anti-rights fools, and take more fence-sitters out to the range...

The nutjobs sure make it tough to stay cool, though.

Filthy Rich :twisted:

 

[Janq]

FR,

Your first step toward winning those people over wouldbe to not look at or think of them as "liberal nut jobs".
A long time ago a mentor told me that when on the phone trying to sell people stuff to keep a mirror on the wall above my desk directly at my seated eye level. When talking with a mark...errr, potential customer always without fail look into this mirror and sell myself on the grift....errr, package. Be sure to smile and to pause paying attention to speak normally as I would to my own self. Do this and the results will carry over and through the phone to that person on the other side of the line.
I was told as much back when I was fresh out of HS and working my way through college, I think I was like 19 or 20 at the time. I thought he was full of dookie. Then one day on a goof I tried it.
That mirror stayed on my wall for a month and my sales numbers went up. I'm 36 now and run my own company keeping two offices. Guess what I have always kept above my desk and people commonly ask about thinking I'm nutty or simply vain. Yep, a mirror.

So whats that got to do with the cost of Winchester Whitebox?
When talking with liberals who are gun adverse, very likely gun ignorant which largely is no fault of their own, and are generally distrustful of conservativ and/or republican gun crazy nutjobs, it's important that you not challenge them with barbs or brwo beat them with rolly eyes, redfaced vitriol or cover their face in spittle. Just talk to them as though you are talking to yourself, sell them the package via a vis you.
Look into their face and see yourself before you were gun comfrotable, gun knowledgeable and not a nut job.

Some of us liberals require stats, others may require a little understanding as to how exactly a firearm actually works mechanically as we generally only here of them as being inherently evil like snakes, spiders and corporations. Others may have had bad experiences with other gun friendly nut jobs taking them out for a day of shooting only to be handed some handbreaker 454 Casull or a 3.25" Magnum shotty loaded with slug and no instruction as to how to proper hold & handle the firearm only to be laughed at upon discharge and flying backward to land square on their butt. Liberals and people in general have very many varying reasons for not wanting to have anythign to do with firearms and/or for looking at those of us who do as nut jobs.

So in closing take it easy, it takes time, and know that it's easier to catch fish with a net than it is to shoot the few who leap into the proverbial barrel.
Keep on truckin' mate but just let backon the gas a little as you'll save fuel and go alot farther in the end.

Oh and I almost forgot, welcome to the board.

- Janq is a liberal who just so happens to like guns and is pro-CCW

 

[jamz]

Best thing to do, if you can, is to get them to the range. A solid, practical and physical demonstration of safe gun handling, and the confidence of firing a small caliber gun at a target and hitting it does more to turn anti people into pro people, because as Janq said, most anti-ism is simple fear and ignorance.

Most people get their gun information from movies, CSI, and Law and Order, none of which are accurate or realistic, but are more or less presented as fact. Hard to blame people really that they have skewed attitudes.

The trick is to get people to think rather than feel their way around the subject, because most people find it easier to give in to their fear rather than think and change their worldview.

 

[Janq]

...most people find it easier to give in to their fear rather than think and change their world view.

//Write to long term memory for future quote use.//

- Janq

 

[vacca rabite]

I have several friends that are either anti-gun or squeemish around them. Most of them have been shooting with me at some point or another, and said that they felt better around firearms after having some experience with them.

Most folks that are staunchly anti gun are so for a couple of reasons:
1) Have been, or know someone close who has been victem of a crime involving a firearm. My moms sister was shot to death in 1975 - she was in the worng place at the wrong time and was a bystander when some guy shot his ex-girlfreind. This is the type of person who will never be convinced that firearms are a good thing.

2) People that are brought up without exposure to firearms in general. TV, the movies, the news all portray 2 types of people that own guns: criminals and cops. If you are brought up in a family that does not have firearms, chances are that the only exposure you are going to have for them is via the media. The media says guns are bad...

3) Folks that adopt anti-gun mindsets as part of thier political being. I am a liberal, I am also a gun (nut) owner. This makes me a minority in the group of people that I generally talk politics with.

Groups 2 and 3 can be shown that guns arn't just tools for the criminal. Liberal friends in college that thoght I was kinda weird for going shooting every now and again shoot with me now whenever they can. Some of them own thier own, other just use mine.

The thing is, non-gun people need to be shown that guns are tools. That guns arn't only owned by criminals and cops and the occational ******* hunter. Once they see people handling firearms safely and responcibly - and get to do so themselves, their perspective changes.

The other thing to consider is that the most vocal part of any organization is generally the smallest and most wacko part. Unfortunalty, this leads to easy labeling on both sides of the argument.

Zach