Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney (AP Photo/Steve Helber)

[The following is a letter sent by Dennis Petrocelli, MD to Richmond, Virginia Mayor Levar Stoney regarding hizzoner’s proposal to ban firearms near permitted events in the city.}

Dear Mayor Stoney,

Congratulations on distinguishing yourself as a newly-minted member of the elite circle of “guns for me, none for thee” authoritarian rulers. Although you saw fit to accept an armed security detail–whose size and cost remain shrouded in secrecy–you decided that the average Richmonder should be denied their inalienable right to self defense if they should stray too close to an event that is, or “should be,” “permitted.”

Your proposed “ban” isn’t a ban at all, because there are no provisions for perimeter security or metal detectors, which would be required to ensure the absence of guns. Instead, you turned the exercise of an inalienable right into a new, victimless crime.

Unsurprisingly, the mainstream media ran with your proposal as a “ban” because it didn’t take the time to think this through, perhaps because they were still mesmerized by your meeting with #BLM protestors two months ago.

richmond robert e. lee statue
Statue of Robert E. Lee in Richmond, Virginia (courtesy Jeff Hulbert)

They should have realized that your proposed law provides an additional source of new recruits for Virginia’s prisons. That’s why your statements to the press carefully avoid any discussion of what penalties are attached to your new crime, because doing so would alienate your base and reveal that your ban is no ban at all.

Your proposal, sadly, is just another government infringement in an unbroken chain of abuses that proves that gun control is racist. It’s obvious to everyone except your local sycophants that you introduced this missive just days before a Black Guns Matter event was scheduled to occur in Richmond later this week.

I had hoped that your connection with Michael Bloomberg during his failed campaign’s tour through Richmond would have stopped a veneration in return for his financing of your party, but sadly it seems you’ll be emulating him as well. The only question that remains is when you’ll begin to implement his stop-and-frisk policy targeting people of color.

Your public statements regarding your proposal have been completely vacuous. You said:

The City of Richmond proudly hosts hundreds of public events each year, but I believe it’s in the interest of everyone’s safety to take guns out of these spaces when neighbors, visitors, and families gather,” said Mayor Stoney. “Under this proposed change, Richmond residents will be able to attend public events with a greater sense of security, knowing that the city is actively prioritizing their safety.

As a city, we must exhaust all possible options to reduce gun violence in our communities and neighborhoods,” said Mayor Stoney. “I’m thankful the state has finally given us a vital tool in building a safer Richmond.

Apparently we are to conclude that the guns of law abiding citizens pose a risk, but the guns of your armed security detail do not, which is all the more interesting given the data that shows that concealed permit holders are more law-abiding than the police.

Pro Gun Rally Virginia
Peaceful demonstrators — most of whom were armed — during a pro-gun rally, Monday, Jan. 20, 2020, in Richmond, Va. (AP Photo/Sarah Rankin)

It is entirely unclear how disarming people without providing security should somehow engender a “greater sense of security” when the evidence shows that gun-free zones attract atrocity. I do appreciate your candor regarding “all possible options.” I know that no amount of “gun control” or “gun safety” will ever appease hoplophobes and you have admitted to as much.

All of your “bans” are just dress rehearsals for the next infringement. You banned guns in city buildings, as if there was an “epidemic of gun violence” breaking out there, and, when that accomplished nothing, you introduced the next infringement, and it is clear that you won’t stop.

Courtesy Jeff Hulbert

Please understand that your constituents have cleaned out local guns stores of their inventories. Every time I’ve done my part to contribute to the record number of gun sales during this plague, I’ve been impressed by how many new gun owners there are, and how many people of color have joined the welcoming family of gun owners.

Your constituents bought these guns to defend themselves, not to occupy safes at home. There is no reason to believe that they will take kindly to being told that their inalienable rights end, and their career of criminality begins, when an event that “should” be permitted happens, unbeknownst to them, along their path of travel.

Enjoy the support of the gun-grabbers that espouse this nonsense, because you’re losing the support of everyone else. Twitter blew up yesterday in reaction to your proposal, from all political corners: #BLM, Libertarians, Conservatives, even Antifa, were not pleased. I guess throwing in with the confiscationists is one way to finance what is no longer an uncontested re-election campaign.

Sincerely,

Dennis Petrocelli, MD
Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership

 

Dennis Petrocelli, MD is a clinical and forensic psychiatrist who has practiced for nearly 20 years in Virginia. He took up shooting in 2019 for mind-body training and self-defense, and is in the fight for Virginians’ gun rights.

This post was originally published at drgo.us and is reprinted here with permission. 

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39 COMMENTS

    • Nice to see the Doc included the race factor in Gun Control. Nothing a democRat hates worse than being tied to their embarrassing history of party racism. They tried so hard and for so long to whitewash their party history by calling their opponents racists and the tactic kept some decent people from winning elections.
      In the sixties the democRat Party got big headed when beat down gullible Black Americans flocked to the trinket promising democRat Party. A giddy democRat Party thought they had gotten away with their racist atrocities Scot Free.
      Unfortunately today for the democRat Party many Black Americans see through the democRat Party and realize that a Black American belonging to the democRat Party makes as much sense as a Jew belonging to the nazi party.

  2. Here’s my letter to Levar Stoney:

    I would like to direct this to the distinguished Mayor: You lousy cork-soaker. You have violated my farging rights. Dis somanumbatching country was founded so that the liberties of common patriotic citizens like me could not be taken away by a fargin icehole like you.

  3. Between the Mayor of Richmond and the Governor of Virginia, there is no way I will bring any of my money to be spent in VA. Even though I have family and friends trapped within your jurisdictions, I will not join them until your anti-second amendment policies are overturned.

  6. Here is a letter from someone not so elegant:

    Come and take them, and if you try, we will make an example of you and the rest of your constituents, again.

  7. Perhaps a ban on un American,anti Constitutional Marxist’s such as the self esteemed Mayor Stoney.

  10. he would do well to familiarize himself with the virginia state flag:
    because whats past is prologue

  12. While it probably felt good to write that letter, I don’t see it being effective.

    First of all, the Mayor will not read it. At most he will read the first sentence and promptly throw it in the trash.

    Second of all, even if the Mayor bothered to read the entire letter, he still would not care. Why should he since he will not pay any personal penalty for violating our inalienable rights?

    • Letters are never effective on their own. They might get some attention if they arrive by the thousands, but even then nobody’s reading them, so the crapsack politician in question might think he’s got support instead of opposition.

      The only thing that works is de-electing them. And even that doesn’t work because some bastard just like the last one always comes back around.

  13. “A prominent example involves Philip II of Macedon. After invading southern Greece and receiving the submission of other key city-states, he turned his attention to Sparta and asked menacingly whether he should come as friend or foe. The reply was “Neither.”
    Losing patience, he sent the message:
    You are advised to submit without further delay, for if I bring my army into your land, I will destroy your farms, slay your people, and raze your city.

    The Spartan ephors again replied with a single word:

    IF

    Subsequently, neither Philip nor his son Alexander the Great attempted to capture the city.”

  15. Drop a deuce in one hand, write a critical letter to a politician in the other, see which fills up first…

  16. Hey, that’s what Trump’s suits would look like if they weren’t baggy and ummm… chatoyant.

  17. August 13, 2020

    The Honorable Gun-Grabbing Mayor Levar Stoney
    City of Richmond
    Commonwealth of Virginia

    Dear Sir,

    So glad to see you’re learning to play the game, though the tactics you’ve employed so far are only the beginning steps to a future free from pesky constituents who seek to thwart our proper rule over them. Now that you’ve proven yourself to be committed to this path, I invite you to visit me and my associates in Sacramento for consultation in these matters, as we have a decorated history of creatively depriving our Golden State’s citizens of their ability to exercise any so-called rights. As a bonus, our Attorney General Xavier Becerra – who was preceded by the now-famous Kamala Harris – will be able to provide his expert advice on the nuances of scuttling the Conservative Right through judicial delays, appeals, and endless smoke and mirrors.

    Together, we can end the Constitution and its influence on our two great states. I look forward to working with you, and eventually with the Mistress of the Dark soon-to-be Vice President Harris, who surpasses both of us in her hatred of liberty.

    Cordially,
    Gavin “Hair Gel” Newsom
    Governor, State of California

  20. I live in Kentucky, open carry is not uncommon here, especially in smaller rural towns. At last summers parade, I walked from one end of the t’doings and back looking at all the venders and such. I stopped counting at 50 ‘open’ firearms and didn’t include the LEOs in the number. Who knows how may were concealed. All those guns in a crowd of several thousand and nobody got shot. According to the lefties, that shouldn’t be possible.

    Chris T, I was born in the Old Dominion and had planned to retire there, but instead, mostly because of the hubbub over gun rights, settled in Kentucky.

  21. Some of you might recall the so called “study” in The New England Journal of Medicine that purported to prove that the gun ban in Washington DC actually reduced homicides. The total number of murders actually did decrease during the study period. However; the population of Washington DC also decreased during the study period. It was analogous to some doctor claiming that their study proved that Marijunna is a cure for cancer because the number of their cancerous lab rats that died decreased. However; the study neglects to mention that the animal liberation front raided their lab and liberated most of their cancerous lab rats, enabling the lab rats to die elsewhere so that their deaths could not be counted in the study.

    The dirty little secret about Washington DC and Richmond Virginia is that most of the cancerous lab rats who were liberated from Washington DC were African Americans who emigrated to Richmond Virginia where they continued to kill other African-Americans as well as White Americans who were native to Virgina. The desecration of Confederate monuments in Virgina was motivated not by outrage over slavery but a desire to demonstrate their dominion over the white citizens of the old dominion. They now seek to exploit their overwhelming political power to disarm the law abiding citizens of Virgina so that they can be more readily victimized.

    Virginians better wake up to reality and be prepared to defend themselves from their new neighbors, their politicians, and if necessary, the police.

  22. Um wait. He’s black. Doesn’t that give him a carte blanche on whatever he decides to do? Currently a black person cannot be penalized or criminalized for what they do because their ancestors were forced into slavery by white Americans. The Lebron Basketball Association aka NBA is an example of the what happens when an ethnic group (the only ethnic group to my knowledge) riots in the streets. As white people we must acknowledge our past sins and kneel before Shaka Lebron James.

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