Average "liberal" not really anti-gun?

[GoSlash27]

I stayed home from work today (too much partyin' on a Thursday night ) and did some research about last week's D.C. handgun ban reversal. Along the way I checked in on the Anti-gun thread.
This led me to ponder just how many of the internet "liberals" were indeed gun-grabbers. The results are kind of shocking.
First I checked out FARK. "Hero" tag by the story and a celebration ensues. Now granted, FARK isn't quite as left-leaning IMO as many around here make it out to be, so maybe the fact that the overwhelming majority of respondents happen to be pro-gun doesn't really mean anything. Maybe FARK isn't "liberal" enough.
I moved on to DailyKos. Same result The guy who wrote the article opens with the statement that he's personally pro-2nd amendment and voices approval of the decision. The respondents (that is, those who cared enough to comment) are overwhelmingly pro-RKBA as well.
Okay, so that's weird. I had to really hunt to find any mention of it at all and the small response is...positive?? Maybe it's a fluke.
I moved along to Democratic Underground. No mention of it there whatsoever. I'm rapidly exhausting my short list of left-leaning websites...
Next in line was TalkLeft. Same thing. The author actually applauds the ruling and the majority of the respondents concur.

I'm beginning to suspect a pattern here. I can't find a gang of "liberals" who are pro-gun control!
Sure, I can find all sorts of pundits and politicians, but not rank & file voters.

What's going on here? Could it be that gun control is actually unpopular with these people and they only *think* they're in the minority? If so, that'd suggest an opening to be exploited. At the very least, it'd suggest that the real enemy isn't these people, but rather their leaders.

Is it just me? Can anyone here find a liberal forum ( and by "liberal" I mean left-leaning political site, not a dedicated gun grabber site) where they're unhappy about this? What are your thoughts?

Edit as I add more search findings:
FireDogLake: No mention
Talking Points Memo: No mention
AmericaBlog: No mention
MyDD: No mention...

 

[michibilly]

Well look at the threads that have been going on here the last few days. There are a ton of gun owning libs. I cant speak for the others here but I feel very jaded in politics right now. I dont see anybody that even comes close to my views so I really dont know what im going to do in a year or so.People call me a blue dog democrat but I really am not sure what that means.What is a blue dog democrat guys ? I cant really help you becuase I dont know of any more lib sights to check but Im pretty sure your onto something.

 

[685cmj]

I can probably speak a little to this conversation in that I have only in the past two years come over from the other side. Though I am in my 50's and have lived all my life in a huge hunting state (Minnesota) and grew up in the home of an avid hunter (my step-father) and was introduced to hunting early on...I never personally experienced anything that ever made me think people needed guns other than for hunting. I don't even know if I knew what the 2nd amendment said, and if I did, I certainly didn't understand it. For years the NRA's public statements grinded on me and, frankly, worried me. The thought of people with guns out there running around in public simply equated to the daily headlines I read every day of the thugs and their criminal activity. More of them and less of us was the way I thought, if I thought about it at all. It was just so removed from my life.

Then my wife and I were assaulted two years ago by career criminals. It changed our whole lives. I found out about the local gun community (had no idea they existed though I have lived in the Twin Cities for decades) went out and got training, permits and guns. Now I am enthusiastically 2nd amendment, so much so that my gunning acquaintances look to me for information and explanations on important issues.

It was sheer ignorance for me...not the bad kind where I wouldn't be educated, but the kind where I just simply never had any experience with the gun community. No one that I ever knew belonged to it other than hunting, and other than the inflammatory rhetoric of the NRA and Charleton Heston, no one ever spoke intelligently to real-life issues (and yes, I am a new NRA member). I never saw the use of it in my own life. I think most of the "liberals" are like me...they just simply never knew anyone who had a gun, never heard intelligent reasons why someone would own or use a gun, and never had any experience that would cause them to question. More guns=more crimes because there is no other use for a gun out in the public square. So the upshot of this long post is this--I think the absolute very best thing that every single one of us can do is introduce friends to gunning in a delightful, reasonable, intelligent way! Maybe the failure is ours more than theirs?

 

[bp78]

Neo-Libs seems to see through gun control...

I too am a bit surprised and a bit relieved. It appears that the new generation of liberals might actually see through the BS of gun control.

Digg.com is overwhelmingly liberal, other sites on the net refer to Digg submitters as "diggerals". Just about every other article is "impeach Bush", "Cheney kills...", etc.

However, several recent articles on the front page got very stong Pro-2A support. Checkout the comments on NJ's proposed .50bmg ban.
http://digg.com/world_news/N_J_considers_outlawing_powerful_50_caliber_gun
Granted their are still a lot of clueless comments but the theme seem to be that gun control laws are pointless and the constitution should prevail.

 

[GoSlash27]

I decided to find out whether my suspicion about the "Kossacks" was correct.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/3/16/204758/820

It is.

Poll
Are you pro-gun?

Yes 50% 35 votes
No 40% 28 votes
Dunno 8% 6 votes

| 69 votes | Results

So now the question becomes how would we capitalize on this? I've been taking liberals shooting for years and it has never failed to convert them on the issue. What more? I talk to them en masse online from time to time, but it seems that the internet anti-gun liberals are a minority.

 

[JuanCarlos]

Seems most "liberals" I know are split. None are really against "firearms" ownership, including handguns (among those I know or talk to that live in the US, that is). Few care much one way or the other about "assault weapon" bans...though many would mind seeing one enacted. The biggest split I see among them is in regards to concealed/public carry. About half see it as a right (though most see no problem with requiring one apply for a permit and receive some training...under the naive assumption that this kind of program would never be used maliciously to restrict that right), where the other half think it's something best left to states/localities.

So very few are "gun grabbers" as we like to call them. Most don't much care what kind of arsenal you keep in your safe, they just aren't sure they want you running around town packing heat. Seems to me such people could be reasoned with; at the least they could be used to keep ownership rights intact.

As I said in the other thread, I suspect it may be possible to take away gun control as a Dem/Pub polarizing issue...but I think it's largely on us.

 

[GoSlash27]

JC,

As I said in the other thread, I suspect it may be possible to take away gun control as a Dem/Pub polarizing issue...but I think it's largely on us.

Agreed.

 

[JuanCarlos]

And, also as I said in the other thread (and as I've said in other NRA threads) I think a big step would be convincing the NRA to routinely endorse pro-gun Democrats...especially when they're just as pro-gun as their Republican opponents (and especially when their Republican opponents are obvious losers). As it stands, Democrat candidates have little incentive to be pro-gun or worry too much about their voting record regarding guns...they're never going to get an NRA endorsement anyway, and a majority of Democrat voters (including myself...please don't hurt me) don't necessarily put gun-rights issues above all others.

 

[GoSlash27]

I think a big step would be convincing the NRA to routinely endorse pro-gun Democrats

Oh, is that all? Shouldn't be any more difficult than convincing the ACLU to find religion about the 2nd Amendment....

 

[BillCA]

I suspect that for many "liberal" people, gun-control ranks low on their list of causes. They probably are more interested in voting for liberal Democrats to promote social-support programs (e.g.welfare, anti-poverty programs, drug treatment, elective abortions, environmental programs, etc). The fact that supporters of these programs are often anti-gun as well is less important.

I'll bet if we took a poll on certain issues, asking TFL members if they supported an issue or not, analysis would show a centrist or only slightly right leaning membership (depending on the questions asked).

 

[JuanCarlos]

Oh, is that all? Shouldn't be any more difficult than convincing the ACLU to find religion about the 2nd Amendment....

Yeah, yeah...I know. In fairness to the ACLU, they do try to remain "neutral" on that one. In fact, as that case I saw mentioned here from Texas shows they're even willing to go to bat for gunowners when whatever 2A rights their state decides to be nice enough to grant them are violated.

 

[RERICK]

Average "liberal" not really anti-gun?

Oh please. Not really anti gun my foot. Nine out of ten are anti gun

 

[JuanCarlos]

Oh please. Not really anti gun my foot. Nine out of ten are anti gun

You've got polls? Stats? Interviews with real-life liberals? Experience from being friends with large numbers of liberals? Or are we supposed to lend more weight to your foot than to GoSlash27's interesting OP?

If you've got a substantial response to anything he or anybody else has said, share it. But your foot really doesn't seem like it should carry all that much weight to me.

EDIT: Out of curiosity, how did your foot come up with that 9 out of 10 number?

 

[robc]

HEY FELLAS!!! WAKE UP!!!

I don't give a flying fart whether libs are pro or anti gun. And the important fact is... they don't either. If you were a pro-2A dem. from Minnesota in the last election, you still voted for Amy Klobachar. She won. She's gonna vote for gun control.

We should not get caught up in how the lib-on-the-street feels. Guns are too far off their radar. The people they put in office vote against us. These libs might be pro-second ammendment, but they would still say, "oh, sorry about that , but I really needed my free-abortions-for-everyone bill to pass. I really agree about your guns, I just can't vote with you right now, um-kay?" :barf:

 

[Playboypenguin]

I am a card toting liberal and I am pro-gun. I am also a conservative. It just depends on what issue we are discussing.

So instead of being considered liberal or conservative over-all, I would just rather think of myself as a rationalist. I like to think I take every issue on it's own merits and make my own mind up based on facts and consequence.

This being said, most of my friends in Oregon are VERY LIBERAL. They are also not anti-gun. The vast majority of them have no problem with gun ownership and quite a few of them even go to the range with me on occasion. They are very much like me in the feeling that some restrictions are needed but if a person can legally own a gun (over 18, not a felon, or a proven danger to society) they should be able to do as they please.

Liberals tend to be pro-choice about alot more things than abortion.

Unfortunately for them, the far right couldn't turn people against them by saying "they want to allow you the freedom of making up your own mind while still providing for the basic needs of the common man" so they tweeked it a little until it came out "they want to steal your personal rights and tell you what you can and can't do."

 

[RERICK]

You've got polls? Stats? Interviews with real-life liberals? Experience from being friends with large numbers of liberals? Or are we supposed to lend more weight to your foot than to GoSlash27's interesting OP?

If you've got a substantial response to anything he or anybody else has said, share it. But your foot really doesn't seem like it should carry all that much weight to me.

I don't need anything but my life experience. And It tells me that 99% of the liberals that I have run across in my life are anti gun. Maybe you and Playboy are that 1%. If so than thats a good thing. Now if we can get the rest on board maybe there wouldn't be so much whining about polls and interviews just because I state my opinion.

 

[tube_ee]

Theres a disconnect between

the average liberal voter's opinion on guns and the average senior Democratic politician's opinion.

That disconnect won't last forever.

I bet that 20 years ago, the number of pro-gun liberals was much smaller than it is now. When most of the senior Democratic leadership were junior legislators. Back then, to be a Democrat and to address crime meant gun control. Folks like Ted Kennedy and Chuck Schumer hitched their wagon to that horse, and they're too old to change their minds now. But they won't live forever.

As the younger left moves away from the idea that regulating the firearms ownership of the law-abiding will reduce crime, which they are, because it doesn't work, you'll see the politicians they elect begin to reflect that view. It's as close to a political law of nature as you'll find... Politicians who get too far away from the opinions of their voters end up needing new jobs. They don't like that.

The worm has turned. The liberal activists I interact with online fall into three categories on guns, mostly:

1) Strong supporters of gun rights.

2) Not well-educated. These are the folks who tend to softly support things like "assault weapons" bans, because they don't understand that the legal definitions are purely cosmetic. Or they still believe that gun control = crime prevention. When educated, politely, they tend to change their minds.

3) Dedicatedly anti-gun. Many of these are pacifists, folks who simply think that all violence is morally wrong, and no one should have the means of violence. I think they're wrong, but I don't argue morality... Anyway, these are a minority.

Group 2 is the biggest, but #1 is much larger than most conservatives think. And #1 is working hard to change the minds of #2. And we're succeeding. Slowly, but we are.

In 10 years or so, gun control will be a dead issue on the Left. That's great if you're a gun owner, not so great if you're a partisan conservative Republican.

--Shannon

 

[stanger04]

The problem is most people say gun control is evil. I see gun control no different than getting a driver's license. Both need to be there for a reason. Not everyone choses to own or carry firearms and not every one has the sense to own a full auto.

I have no problem with people wanting to have one but I think they should be done like the silencers and by that I mean newer ones, I know we can get pre guns.

Most people want to label a pro gun people as nuts and for some reasons I can agree, anyone that thinks a gang banger with no felonies has the right to go by a full auto is nuts.

Too many people lose their heads too fast now a days, some are people that only buy a gun to use it once but there are people out there with the mentality if I only had this or that they would be sorry.

The less control on certain guns means the more there are in homes that can be robbed. In turn that puts an even more dangerous firearm at undeserving peoples finger tips.

I agree with both sides on different points, there is no way a person in good mind could honestly vote either way totally, in my opionion.

 

[sasquatch]

Juan Carlos

"And, also as I said in the other thread (and as I've said in other NRA threads) I think a big step would be convincing the NRA to routinely endorse pro-gun Democrats...especially when they're just as pro-gun as their Republican opponents...."

Please give me a list, say half a dozen, of these Democrats (preferably US house or Senate) who are as "pro-gun" as their "Republican opponents". I'm not talking about ones who claim to be pheasant hunters, or actually went deer-hunting once. I am talking about dyed-in-the-wool supporters of the 2nd Amendment, who also have a record of voting in support of gun-owners.

 

[Indrid Cold]

This led me to ponder just how many of the internet "liberals" were indeed gun-grabbers. The results are kind of shocking.

One of the main points of my political science course last semester was that there is no real "red" or "blue" polarization within the United States. In reality, the United States is varying shades of purple all over, with some places being more red, and some places more blue. The media is the big framing influence, as they only highlight a few issues, and only really show the people with the most extreme views on the subject. Consequently, people think that everyone on one side is of a certain perspective, while those on the other side hold the complete and polar opposite views. Very interesting class.