I didn’t pay much attention to the anti-gun kick Rolling Stone magazine was on last month. For some reason I came across its article the supposedly explains how gun control advocates can win against the National Rifle Association (NRA). The article is mostly bullshit but one item stood out to me because of how blatant it was:
4. Act, Don’t Dither
When catastrophic events like Newtown unfold, there’s an impulse from many elected officials to slow down, to gather facts, to ensure that cooler heads prevail. Politically, this is why gun-control dies.
This point is so blatant yet so correct. It’s true that gun control dies when the facts come in, which is why gun control advocates need to exploit tragedies immediately if they hope to gain any success. But I would argue that any movement that dies because of facts isn’t a movement worth fighting for.
I think the biggest reason gun rights have been winning against gun control is because the latter relies on deceit and falsities. Gun control’s heyday was the era directly preceding the information age. Before widespread Internet connectivity it was much easier for gun control advocates to control the message and conceal the facts. Now that so many people have access to the Internet the facts are impossible to conceal and the facts speak pretty clearly in favor of gun rights. So the only hope gun control has a succeeding is making a move before the facts have actually been gathered.