The idea that Americans who cherish their Constitutionally protected right to keep and bear arms are racists is a particularly pernicious piece of anti-gun agitprop. I did my best to shoot it down yesterday. But here it is again, this time in a mainstream outlet. Over at cnn.com, former George Bush speechwriter and Jewish Canadian (I kid you not) David Frum writes that America’s gun problem is not a race problem. Translation: Americans who “cling to their guns” (President Obama’s term) are white people who are afraid of black people. Racists. I swear I’m not making that up. Again. Still. Here’s the warm-up . . .

The typical murder has one victim, not many. The typical murder is committed with a handgun, not a rifle. And in the typical murder, both the perpetrator and the victim are young black men. Blacks are six times as likely as whites to be the victim of a homicide. Blacks are seven times as likely to commit a homicide.

The horrifying toll of gun violence on black America explains why black Americans are so much more likely than whites to favor gun control.

I don’t think that memes what Frum think it memes. And even if it’s true, how sad is that stat? Anyway, here’s the pitch:

Conversely, fears of being victimized by violence explain why so many white Americans — especially older and more conservative white Americans — insist on the right to bear arms in self-protection. They see gun violence as something that impinges on them from the outside. They don’t blame guns for gun violence. They blame a particular subset of the population. And they don’t see why they should lose their right because some subset of the population abuses theirs.

See what he did there? Like I said, Frum wants his liberal readers to believe that people who support firearms freedom are whites who fear blacks. Frum tries to “soften” this outrageously wrongheaded racist theory by saying white people are also victims of “gun violence,” albeit self-inflicted.

Guns offer equal opportunity tragedies. More than 8,000 white Americans had to be treated for nonfatal gun injuries in 2008. Eighty percent of those who commit suicide with a gun are white males. The gun that the suburban family buys to protect itself from “thugs killing thugs” ends up killing its own: One important new study finds that a gun kept in the house is 43 times more likely to kill a household member than to be used in self-defense.

Ah yes, the Kellerman study. Far be it for me to ask Bruce Krafft to put Mr. Kellerman back into the file marked “Astrology, etc.” Suffice it to say, no.

More to the point, contrary to Frum’s willful mischaracterization, gun rights advocates and pro-gun commentators who raise the alarm over the preponderance of gun violence in minority communities are not trying to marginalize their suffering. It’s exactly the opposite.

They’re trying to bring the issue to the public’s attention so that law-abiding members of those communities can exercise their right to armed self-defense. So that minorities can defend themselves, their families and their community against the criminal element plaguing their lives.

In short, Frum is an evil idiot with dangerous ideas who no more deserves a national platform that David Duke. If further proof be needed of Frum’s perfidy, here it is:

Those young men in Baton Rouge who are killing each other in such horrific numbers do not manufacture their own guns. They did not organize the gun trade that brings the guns to their town. They did not write the laws that prevent their town government from acting against guns. They carry guns — and misuse guns — thanks to a national system of gun regulation that makes guns easily accessible to those least likely to use guns responsibly.

The gun laws intended to put guns into the hands of “good guys” are the laws that also multiply guns in the hands of “bad guys” — bad guys who might not have become such bad guys if the guns had not been available to their hands.

Do people actually think that way? That bad guys wouldn’t be so bad if they didn’t have guns? There’s naive, seriously naive, insanely naive and what you just read. In fact, if you wanted to put all the insanity of civilian disarmament into two sort paragraphs you could hardly do better than that. Or worse.

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

73 COMMENTS

  1. Americans who “cling to their guns” (President Obama’s term) are white people who are afraid of black people, are Racists???

    Racists??? So be it!

  2. I posted this yesterday, you should really consider why you are so deathly afraid of other people if not for racism. Well, cheers 🙂

    “The problem is that progressives and leftists have a very multi-faceted understanding of history.

    This is unfortunately due to science. Liberals have an increased capacity for reason and empathy; conservatives, on the other hand, have enlarged amygdalae, the lizard fear-centre of the brain, responsible for cave man emotions and simple fight or flight fear and violent responses. Sorry guys it’s the truth. Maybe you should try meditation? It works for a lot of people with mental issues

    http://www.alternet.org/story/155210/why_is_the_conservative_brain_more_fearful_the_alternate_reality_right-wingers_inhabit_is_terrifying

    • Dear Comrade Lenin:

      If it weren’t for Comrade Trotsky you would be an unknown malcontent raving about the great proletarian revolution while your buddy Benito was running Italy. Therefore, I think you need to be a little more humble in assessing the intelligence of others.

    • I am not sure if your trolling or joking but that article is the biggest piece of crap I have ever seen. Because, it is the exact opposite. If the liberals where so objective, then the video yesterday of the councilmen walking out of a meeting due to the fact that someone speaking was a CCW holder would have been the opposite of what happened. The conservatives would have walked out and the two liberals would have remained.

      The issue is that both sides have reduced the arguments to name calling and demonization and there is enough fear to paint the planet red 10x over.

      The only thing that is removed from all arguments is cold hard facts.

      Such BS!

      • I’m not sure that the actions of a few politicians have anything to bear on a scientific study done using MRI that shows conservatives have enlarged amygdalae, the primitive fear-centre of the brain, and smaller anterior cingulate, a portion of the brain responsible for empathy, emotion and other rational functions.

        Here is another article 🙂

        http://www.salon.com/2010/12/29/conservative_brains/

        It’s okay we just want you to be aware of your physical shortcomings 🙂

        • One of the mental problems you have, among many, is called projection. You keep posting links to radical, communist websites, like they mean anything to anyone around here.

        • And there have been studies that show the dopamine, and serotonin levels in the left-brain(the side that deals with reason and logic) of liberals are in lower quantities than in conservatives. The right side of the liberal brain(the side that deals with emotion and imagination) are in greater quantities than in conservatives. Basically, most liberals are chemically imbalanced. Their ability to reason and to think logically are greatly diminished, while their ability to imagine and act emotionally are greatly increased. It has been speculated that the liberal mind is so out of balance, that the basic animal instinct of self-preservation is, in many, practically nonexistent. Like playful sheep who are constantly running from the wolves of reality, you run and run to try to escape, and when reality finally catches up, as it always does, your instinct to fight is so entirely overwhelmed by a flood of beta endorphins that precipitates a feeling of euphoria, and that causes your head to tilt backwards offering-up your throat to give reality the quickest kill.

          No, I’m not going to provide you the easy links. Most of you liberals are incapable of reason and logic, or you’re too afraid of what horrible truths you might discover about yourselves. Most of you are hanging on by a thread as it is.

    • Great Lenin’s Ghost. Now who is stereotyping? I also love how you use alternet as a reliable unbiased source which is a joke. Listen, I am not going to say that there are not gun owners who are xenophobes and racists. There certainly are as there would be among basketball players, golfers, scholars, lawyers, or any other group of people large enough.
      However, I am not one of them, and that you presume to know me based on my gun ownership or perceived politics is simply sad. I grew up in a very multi-ethnic neighborhood, went to a very multi-ethnic public school, and am quite liberal on many social issues. Perhaps libertarian would be more accurate, but nonetheless I believe in equality under the law, support gay marriage etc. But I also believe in preparedness and self reliance, if that makes me racist then you are the one who is delusional. Painting all gun owners as racist is vitriol plain and simple and you know it. Further, the idea that your politics determines whether or not you are a good and kind person is absurd and one of the problems in America. Most conservatives I know give greatly of themselves for others they just don’t believe the government should dictate how they act or how they feel.
      And finally, I don’t see how liberals don’t identify some of their own hypocrisy. There are many good, decent, honest liberals who live what they preach and I respect their point of view even when I don’t agree. However, I know plenty of liberals who, while preaching compassion, equality, and inclusiveness, live in the most homogeneous places possible. For example, the preponderance of liberals living in the upper east side of NYC, Fairfield County Connecticut, or the upperclass suburbs of DC. Further, these “liberals” send their children to the most exclusive, predominantly rich and white, private schools. In fact many of these hypocritical liberals are your congressman, senators, and political pundits. Look at the bio of David Gregory and the majority of your MSNBC talking heads and you will see that a very large percentage come from extremely white bred neighborhoods, were educated in America’s elite private schools, have their children in the same schools, and yet they have the audacity preach against school voucher programs and call conservative gun owners xenophobic or racist. What really gets my goat is that the poor they profess to speak for never call them on their hypocrisy because they are placated with promises of more government assistance. Just because of how these rich liberals vote, and what they say on TV and write, are they any less xenophobic or scared of the lower classes? I don’t believe so. Just saying, its easy to look at the other side and make them all out to be crazies, but it is more difficult to look at your own side and realize that you are also far from perfect or pure. Rant off

    • Great Lenin’s Ghost wrote, “Liberals have an increased capacity for reason and empathy …”.

      Whether liberals are somehow intellectually or emotionally superior to conservatives is NOT relevant. The problem is that people who claim to be superior also claim that they have authority to dictate the lives of inferior/little people. This obscene, perverted mindset is the philosophical foundation of the Hitlers of the world.

      Here is a newsflash: rights are unalienable. That means they are not subject to your overinflated view of your own self importance.

      • This.

        And I would add that GLG’s thesis is one gigantic ad hominem argument–in other words, a logical fallacy–that does not directly address the question of gun control or any other matter.

    • so if this is science i do see any link to the peer reviewed study? what about testing methods and the number of subjects tested? all of this is lacking. Joshua Holland the writer doesnt seem to have any science background i can find via google….

    • The amygdala is intricately involved in learning, memory, and other higher-order cognitive processes, including evaluation of trustworthiness.

      It is, in short, far more than a “fear center.”

    • Usually I hate the term RINO because I see it get used against people who simply hold one or two positions that Republicans as a whole don’t like–I think it’s frequently used as a lash against anyone who doesn’t 100% toe the party line.
      In this case though? I can’t remember the last time Frum actually advocated a conservative position. At all.

  6. Sir Bedevere: There are ways of telling whether she is a witch.
    Peasant 1: Are there? Oh well, tell us.
    Sir Bedevere: Tell me. What do you do with witches?
    Peasant 1: Burn them.
    Sir Bedevere: And what do you burn, apart from witches?
    Peasant 1: More witches.
    Peasant 2: Wood.
    Sir Bedevere: Good. Now, why do witches burn?
    Peasant 3: …because they’re made of… wood?
    Sir Bedevere: Good. So how do you tell whether she is made of wood?
    Peasant 1: Build a bridge out of her.
    Sir Bedevere: But can you not also build bridges out of stone?
    Peasant 1: Oh yeah.
    Sir Bedevere: Does wood sink in water?
    Peasant 1: No, no, it floats!… It floats! Throw her into the pond!
    Sir Bedevere: No, no. What else floats in water?
    Peasant 1: Bread.
    Peasant 2: Apples.
    Peasant 3: Very small rocks.
    Peasant 1: Cider.
    Peasant 2: Gravy.
    Peasant 3: Cherries.
    Peasant 1: Mud.
    Peasant 2: Churches.
    Peasant 3: Lead! Lead!
    King Arthur: A Duck.
    Sir Bedevere: …Exactly. So, logically…
    Peasant 1: If she weighed the same as a duck… she’s made of wood.
    Sir Bedevere: And therefore…
    Peasant 2: …A witch!

  8. I’m Asian so where does that put me? What the gun grabbers do not understand is that white folks are not the only gun owners. I’m in California and we have a huge population of Asian gun owners.

  9. WOW another delusional troll posting here!

    “The problem is that progressives and leftists have a very multi-faceted understanding of history.”

    Yes they do. In fact, it is so multi – faceted that they completely fail to understand it at all. Linking to an article written by yet another delusional moron hardly proves your so – called point. It does quite the opposite, it proves you are a easily led sheep with no grasp on reality. There are far more books and articles written by smarter people with better credentials that show progressives and authoritarians are mentally ill. Anyone who truly believes they have the right to impost their will on other people by the force of arms is twisted and sick. Not the principles this country was founded on. If you are so enamored with authoritarianism, move to a country that better suits your illness, like North Korea.

  10. Please cf: “MLK Was a Gun-Carrying Republican”

    So it’s clear Dr. King was ALSO a racist. Right? Of course not.

  11. So me ,Mr Colio Noir , and other black and biracial gun owners are racists?

    Interesting. I must have misplaced my KKK mask.

    The political left is like a frustrated safecracker . If they can’t bust into the public mindset the subtle way, they break out the sawzall of intentional deception and hope no one notices them altering history for their own purposes.

    • The left has no monopoly on this tactic. It’s just particularly noticeable when the opposition applies it to an issue you care about. I’ve seen both the behavior and the outraged reactions on both sides, depending on the issue.

      Not endorsing it or saying it’s a good idea, just pointing out the equal-opportunity hypocrisy.

    • I’m really surprised some of them have made this argument for the reason that it is so easily turned on them given a lot of their proposals. Adding the taxes and costly training they like to propose unfairly targets the low income population which are largely minority.

  12. I believe the exacerbation of the racial tensions in the US will be the final wedge that completes the division of our population. Hell, a good This is true desperation. The race hustlers have fanned the embers of our disgrace of slavery, while bigots have provided enough ammunition and fear to validate those arguments. BTW by race hustlers I am not restriction my definition there of to any single group. We have not the blessing of a shortage of agitators of any physical description. But behind the disarmament frenzy hides the true motivation. Our economy. We are headed for disastrous financial times which may have an effect just short of a nuclear exchange. Disarmament is an attempt to take the weapons out of the hands of the angry, starving mobs (RE: French Revolution) before the people become angry, starving mobs.

    PS The next disenfranchisement move will be to brand Black American gun owners as Uncle Toms. No offense, but I really see this coming.

    • Natural Human phenomenon is not ‘racial tension’. Being at war with emotion (terrorism) brought about by hysterical town criers (news media) is not ‘racial tension’. Being White and disgusted at the prejudice directed at White folk is not ‘racial tension’.

      The only colors the right wing moon bats care about is gold and green, of course they have preferences…green being easier to ‘grow’ than gold which is harder to obtain given the fact that access to requires coercion/commerce/war with other racial tribal groups so as to amass an ever growing stockpile of the stuff.

      Make no mistake though, racial heritage is not simply ‘a color thing’. Its an allthing that Americans once upon time had, but are now quick to forget about due to the prospect of having to fight for preservation. Conservatives and RINO’s are only willing to fight for the Green printing machine, and they do so very ineffectively.

  13. Yeah, OK Frum. Now go join the other co-conspirators in your little clique – Feinstein, Boxer, Schumer, Lautenberg, Bloomberg…

  14. So how do these people explain someone like me who is a young Hispanic American that believes in the 2A and is not a criminal?

    • Exactly. And it was completely taken apart in the first month after publication. Anyone citing it now clearly wasn’t paying attention the first time.

  18. Yet another example of cognitive dissonance.

    1. Start with an irrational premise: guns are evil.
    2. Failing (or failing to try) to reconcile #1 with reality, conjure up arguments for why #1 is true no matter how many logical fallacies said arguments present.
    3. Since #1 is true, anyone in favor of gun is by extension also evil.

    Anthropomorphism is great for telling stories about your dog, not so great when it comes to reasoned discourse.

  19. My response to CNN (awaiting moderation – which most likely means they will only allow anti-gun hysterics and idiot “gun owner” comments):

    “One important new study finds that a gun kept in the house is 43 times more likely to kill a household member than to be used in self-defense.”

    Load of absolute crap. And it isn’t new or important. Sit tight, because this is getting shredded.

    First off, it is 43 times more likely to be involved in the death of an occupant in the house than to be used in the death of a forced intruder. The vast majority of self defense cases in the home involve ZERO shots fired. I don’t have in home death stats handy so I’ll just make my point with total firearm deaths being in the 20k range annually. Contrast this with estimates of defensive gun uses being between 1.5 million at the low end, and 2.5 million at the high end, and at worst case you have a 75:1 ratio of self defense use to deaths of a household member.

    Second of those 43, approximately 41 of them were suicide. Ask Japan if gun control has done anything to curb suicide there. There is absolutely no causation link between owning a gun and killing yourself. People that want to kill themselves find ways even in maximum security prisons while on suicide watch. I feel bad for those that feel driven to suicide, but they didn’t get there on account of a gun, and not having a gun hasn’t stopped anybody from doing what they wanted to do.

    Then there are the remaining 2. It wasn’t explicit, but it is assumed that they are a combination of accidents and domestic violence. As accidents go, it is a statistical fact that 5 gallon buckets are a greater hazard in the home than firearms even though common sense precautions prevents either from resulting in injury or death. Compared even to having a pool, having a gun doesn’t even make the risk meter needle bump. Then there is domestic violence. I’ll be blunt on this one, if a guy want to kill a wife or girlfriend, they know darn well where she lives and in virtually all cases could kill her with there bare hands, or a knife, or a hammer, or a brick. The woman on the other hand could likewise kill a guy in their sleep without a gun. But especially in the case of a woman, being able to get to a gun and use it to either hold the guy off and leave or shoot the SOB if he pushes the issue (which would have also been part of that 2), has in a number of cases been the last viable option a woman has had to get out and away from an abuser.

    CNN: fact check your crap or you’ll keep looking like idiots.

    • That “43 times more likely” was shredded, re-shredded, then pressed into composite material, and shredded again during the 90’s. I’m surprised to see someone trot that back out again, because it’s like waving a handful of pulled brisket BBQ in front of a Rottweiler and expecting to keep one’s hand.

  21. I have a rather low estimation of Mr. Frum’s intellect after having to inform him in the mid-2000’s (when he was at National Review) of why large class 8 trucks don’t attain the same sort of mileage (or mileage gains) that automobiles have in the last 20 years.

    There’s a reason why a Class 8 truck gets only 6 MPG on a good day, and his Prius gets 40: It’s because the Class 8 truck, fully loaded, weighs about 27 times what his Prius weighs, and has the air resistance of a two-car garage, and over four times the rolling friction of a four-wheeled car.

  22. Does anyone even bat an eye when people are acused of being racist? We are at the point if you hold a position that the President doesn’t you are racist for disagreeing with a black man. It can be a ridiculous position that can be well argued from a number of positions. Doesn’t matter. I’m a racist because i think we have a spending problem. I’m a racist because I think abortion as birth control is wrong. I’m a racsit because I don’t think spending $4 billion on vacations is a good use of public funds. I’m a racist because taxing me for not participating in commerce is unconsitutional. I’m a racist because I don’t think man is the cause of climate change. And I’m racist because I don’t think the personal tragedies of 26 families should trample my rights and the rights of humdreds of millions more.

  24. Funny. I just tested with several comments, and anything with words like media, lying, lies, BS, etc. gets filtered for moderation and disappears. Looks like CNN has caught up with the Brady bunch on hiding from the light.

  25. YAWN…I’m so tired of this Anti-Gunner argument that Gun Owners are Racists.

    It’s indisputable historical fact that Gun Control Laws are Racists. The Right to Keep & Bear Arms is about as Egalitarian is it can get.

  26. “43 times more likely to kill a household member than to be used in self-defense.”

    I would *love* to see how that figure was quantified.

    • I posted this earlier:

      Load of absolute crap. And it isn’t new or important. Sit tight, because this is getting shredded.

      First off, it is 43 times more likely to be involved in the death of an occupant in the house than to be used in the death of a forced intruder. The vast majority of self defense cases in the home involve ZERO shots fired. I don’t have in home death stats handy so I’ll just make my point with total firearm deaths being in the 20k range annually. Contrast this with estimates of defensive gun uses being between 1.5 million at the low end, and 2.5 million at the high end, and at worst case you have a 75:1 ratio of self defense use to deaths of a household member.

      Second of those 43, approximately 41 of them were suicide. Ask Japan if gun control has done anything to curb suicide there. There is absolutely no causation link between owning a gun and killing yourself. People that want to kill themselves find ways even in maximum security prisons while on suicide watch. I feel bad for those that feel driven to suicide, but they didn’t get there on account of a gun, and not having a gun hasn’t stopped anybody from doing what they wanted to do.

      Then there are the remaining 2. It wasn’t explicit, but it is assumed that they are a combination of accidents and domestic violence. As accidents go, it is a statistical fact that 5 gallon buckets are a greater hazard in the home than firearms even though common sense precautions prevents either from resulting in injury or death. Compared even to having a pool, having a gun doesn’t even make the risk meter needle bump. Then there is domestic violence. I’ll be blunt on this one, if a guy want to kill a wife or girlfriend, they know darn well where she lives and in virtually all cases could kill her with there bare hands, or a knife, or a hammer, or a brick. The woman on the other hand could likewise kill a guy in their sleep without a gun. But especially in the case of a woman, being able to get to a gun and use it to either hold the guy off and leave or shoot the SOB if he pushes the issue (which would have also been part of that 2), has in a number of cases been the last viable option a woman has had to get out and away from an abuser.

  27. It’s evident that one of their tactics now will be “We must take your guns away before you harm yourself. It’s for your own protection. You might intentionally hurt yourself”. Well if a mother has the right to abort her unborn baby, shouldn’t I have the same “right” to abort myself? What’s good for the goose is good for the gander. Just sayin.

    • GSD, don’t be silly. You can’t be allowed to “off” yourself without the government doing it to you. They murder all those unborn infants so they don’t grow up to get their hands on firearms one day and harm themselves. [yes, I am being facetious]

  28. The jackalope thinks he’s Kreskin. I mean, dontcha just love it when some d!ckhead with three undergraduate credits in psychology tells millions of people what they’re thinking? I know I love it.

    Hey, Frumpbag, can you tell what I’m thinking now?

  29. “They don’t blame guns for gun violence. They blame a particular subset of the population.” – Yes, that subset of the population is known informally as “felons”.

    • Felons consider themselves “political prisoners” in light of fact they contest the authority and yet sabotage the enemy with use of legal aid to defend themselves and their actions through due process after the initial act.

      You know very well what this implies.

  30. Frum, a strange America hating, secular humanist, atheistic, Jew who wants religious Jews and Christians to worship little g (gov) over big G (God) and have little g (turned into ‘Big Gov’) which will in turn transform us into Zyklon-B sniffing furniture. Yup, my world famous (and by now renouned)……Pelvic Ashtray.
    Stupid libtards.

  31. Neocons are the worst. They are all about welfare for the rich. True conservative values of independence, self reliance, and smaller government are only buzz words to them. There are republicans that will disarm the public without thinking twice. They are just waiting for the opportunity for somebody else to initiate gun prohibition measures to take the blame and give themselves cover.

    • While not a big fan of Neoconservatism, at least you wont be turned into a Pelvic ashtray which libtardism will lead to.
      Lesser of two evils and all.

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