Second Amendment Blog
What do the Bradys Think of Gun Owners?
Posted by:Sebastian on 
Feb 5th, 2010 | 
Filed under: Anti-Gun Folks
The Brady Campaign openly endorses this intolerant piece by Mark Morford:
Oh, please do not misunderstand! We are all terribly impressed. It is so very patriotic of you to show off your little popper! Are you in a gang? Are you a drug dealer? Are you going to shoot some scary terrorists, Mr. pallid paranoid Constitution-misquoting videogame-addicted guy? Protect all of us here in the casual neighborhood coffee shop from those crazy liberals and their health care reform and organic pretzels? Thank you so much! But really, I think we’ll be OK without your little display. Enjoy your frappucino, won’t you?
Anyone who’s read this blog has known that I have not been all that supportive of open carry activism, but I find it amazing that a guy like Mark Morford who doesn’t like people shoving their Second Amendment rights in his face, but oh, he has no problems shoving this in the face of San Franciscans (NSFW, don’t say I didn’t warn you), as evidenced by this passage:
That’s right, it’s S&M for charity. It’s S&M for hope and health and progress. Keep your bake sale and your car wash and your telemarketing scams. You want to raise some cash for a cause? Bend over in your buttless leather chaps in a charity spanking booth and let a large hairy sweaty grinning man slap your ass with a leather paddle until it’s the color of a tomato in summer. And sing while he does it. And hand out flowers. And condoms. And smile at the over 300,000 passersby.
Mark Morford would like you to think he’s tolerant, but he’s a piece of intolerant garbage. He’s only tolerant of thinks he believes are enlightened, of things he believes should be tolerated. That’s not tolerance, that’s actually no better than the people he derides as “religious conservatives” trying to “force their morality on everyone else.” Maybe the reason Morford hates them so much is because he has seen the enemy, and it is him.
UPDATE: Apparently my point was lost on the Brady folks, who have updated their post to respond to mine. As someone who supports both gun rights and gay rights, I’m equally sympathetic to both the notion that perhaps we do not advance either respective agenda by shoving guns or assless chaps into anyone’s face who is perhaps less than comfortable wither either. What angers me about people like Morford is they deride and sneer at others for practices that they themselves promote in their own favored cause. Even most open carriers have the consistency to argue that the San Francisco gay rights activists’ flamboyant public displays are equally effective and acceptable. Can’t we expect the same courtesy from someone like Morford to perhaps accept that maybe some gun rights activists are as enthusiastic, and perhaps misguided, as those who would wear assess chaps for a public flogging at a gay pride fair, believing that they are advancing their cause? If one is OK, so is the other. And one doesn’t have to believe in either banning homosexuality in public or banning guns in public to accept that some people will take it farther than is wise. Morford doesn’t offer us that courtesy, or even accept that we’re honest citizens with legitimate grievances and concerns. Does the Brady Campaign agree with that?
UPDATE2: I guess since we’re both snowed in, it’s a virtual snowball fight with the Brady folk.
Being concerned about lethal weaponry in the hands of people with no law enforcement training inside a coffee shop patronized by families with kids is simply not in the same universe as outlandish behavior at a “gay pride fair”. They aren’t even remotely comparable.
This is really the heart of the pro-carry/anti-carry debate, and where we’ll find no common ground. They defend Morford’s dichotomy by rejecting the comparison to gay rights altogether. I would not argue that the respective causes are precisely similar, but I think most ordinary folks with children would probably not agree that no one is harmed by seeing one man whip another man with assless chaps. Certainly there are many that would rather their child see an openly holstered firearm carried by someone who is not law enforcement. Which act would you rather explain to a young child?
But we’ll find no agreement, because they believe the mere act of carrying a firearm is dangerous, unless you have some magical “law enforcement training” which will naturally make the gun not dangerous. We do not believe the act of carrying a firearm to be inherently dangerous, because a holstered firearm (and unloaded in the case of these California activists) is not a dangerous item. Nearly all other potentially dangerous acts involving firearms in public are crimes which people can be punished for, save for self-defense, and if it comes to that in a public place like Starbucks, you’re probably going to be glad someone was there with a gun, whether they have magical “law enforcement training” or not.
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February 5th, 2010 at 9:26 pm
People like Mark M. are not worth responding to.
I hope no one sends him a long rant – he’s just trolling for responses to his “insight.”
I would say he is beyond redemption or hope. Ignore him.
February 5th, 2010 at 10:12 pm
[...] like Mr. Morford hit a nerve with Sebastian over at SnowFlakesInHell. Sebastian calls him — wait for it — “a piece of intolerant garbage” [...]
February 5th, 2010 at 10:38 pm
Oh. Looks like Brady reads this blog.
Can’t believe these Brady guys get so worked up over an inanimate object.
What’s next – knives, baseball bats and nail guns? Let’s regulate them all and have “common sense laws.” I know I would be “intimidated” by a group of guys carrying baseball bats… scary!!! I better start avoid pizza parlors in Spring.
February 5th, 2010 at 10:44 pm
Those of us who are members of the Pink Pistols hope nobody takes Mr. Moford’s verbal swill to be representative of anybody else in the sexual minority communities.
I don’t much care for frappuchino, either. And I prefer my weapons concealed, so the bad guys can’t tell who to shoot first.
February 5th, 2010 at 10:49 pm
Maggie, I’m sure that you don’t approve of the bizarre crap that they do in San Francisco, but there’s a reason that S.F. police were told to not arrest anyone for actions at these events that included men ejaculating from second story windows onto the crowd below. And it’s not because only 1% of 1% of the people of San Francisco thinks that’s so cool.
I certainly believe that one can be homosexual and a grown-up. But from living in the Bay Area as long as I did, it is clear that there is a lot less intersection because those two sets that one might assume.
February 5th, 2010 at 11:00 pm
Clayton, may I suggest your experience is of a cohort defined not by their sexual orientation but by their willingness to live in San Francisco?
Glad you got over it. See? It *can* be cured.
Here in the (relatively) free Commonwealth we’re clinging bitterly to our guns and our choice of religions and waiting for the 2010 elections. :-)
February 5th, 2010 at 11:35 pm
FWIW – Morford is the “Obama is a lightworker” guy.
February 5th, 2010 at 11:36 pm
I remember that. I wonder how he thinks his lightworker is working out. Maybe as well as the Bradys?
February 6th, 2010 at 12:00 am
So, if I got this straight, Brady’s support Mark Morford, because *they* say he’s going after a small subset of gun owners, and not to be taken as an attack on the whole community, so it’s o.k. But it’s wrong for you to call him out on it.
Is this where that saying *grabbing for straws* or something along those lines, comes in handy?
February 6th, 2010 at 1:19 am
Man those Brady folks who run that blog really are pants pissers.
Someone should invite them to Knob Creek just to see them have a heart attack.
Oh and how come they run the “NewsWatch” anonymously? Who writes those blog posts? It seems pretty odd that there is no byline attached to the linked blog post.
February 6th, 2010 at 5:30 am
They updated again. They claim it’s ‘not comparable’ because they don’t want it to be. The PSH is flying:
“This isn’t about “intolerance” of some sort of “victimized” open carry gun advocate minority. It’s about the rest of the community not wanting to get shot because they went to Starbucks — a company that has yet to say, “Unless you are a police officer, no guns allowed in our stores.”
I think it’s beautiful that, just a little overr a decade ago, they were at the forefront of keeping states from passing CCW laws and were for a time successful.
Now they’re having to go house by house and store by store to try and keep CCW and Open Carry out.
February 6th, 2010 at 5:40 am
I like Morford, which will come as no surprise to you I’m sure. I do get tired of his verbosity and sarcasm though, but I agree with his ideas, especially this one.
February 6th, 2010 at 8:50 am
http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_14343847?nclick_check=1
Looks like Starbucks just pissed in the Brady’s Cheerios!
heh
February 6th, 2010 at 11:08 am
The Brady Bunch is truly desparate at this point.
They need a victory to crow about soooooo badly and they can’t even get Starbucks to sign on.
Too funny.
February 6th, 2010 at 11:46 am
Poor Mr. Morford apparently didn’t expect Starbucks to pull the rug out from under him. His piece looked like something from a high school newspaper already, but to have it contrasted side-by-side with a simple, sober statement from the actual business in question that takes exactly the opposite position to his (“We’ll follow all the laws and you people can sort out your political issues on your own time”) cannot be helping.
February 6th, 2010 at 12:06 pm
I’d opine that it’s better to thankfully and respectfully engage Starbucks than it is Morford or Brady.
The latter two are grasping for relevance. Why give them any?
February 6th, 2010 at 3:01 pm
I’m actually delighted that the Brady’s think Morford is some kind of punditry treasure. More than anything else it demonstrates the organization’s complete lack of (a) coherence and (b) class.
February 6th, 2010 at 3:41 pm
What an arrogant, condescending prick!
Molon labe. cretin!
February 6th, 2010 at 7:50 pm
[...] ever will. It was this post by Mark Morford and this one from the Brady Campaign blog that got Sebastian from Snowflakes in Hell riled up and I think he has a cause to be. While Mark Morford wants to point out how [...]
February 6th, 2010 at 8:50 pm
Morford can be as snide as he wants.
He can afford to be snide, because lawful gun owners will just think he’s a jerk. I doubt he’d talk that way to real criminals.
February 7th, 2010 at 5:14 am
Wait, “That’s a separate issue” isn’t valid argumentation around here?
When did that happen?
February 7th, 2010 at 10:32 am
So to recap.
Rock out with your cock out? Cool!
Rock out with your Glock out? OMG!!!!!111eleventy!!
Makes sense.
Not!
February 9th, 2010 at 4:33 pm
I wonder what the brady cats think of the Pink Pistols?
February 9th, 2010 at 4:36 pm
I wonder what the brady cats think of the Pink Pistols?
A nefarious gun lobby plot. Supposedly pro-gun gays, but has anyone checked to make sure they are really sexual minorities?
About sums it up I think :)
February 9th, 2010 at 10:13 pm
They do occasionally float rumors that we are NRA funded…kind of queer astroturf.
Which isn’t true.
In fact, not all the members are sexual minorities; it’s not a requirement for membership. I’m pretty sure about some of us though. :-)
February 9th, 2010 at 10:20 pm
Pink Pistols?
I think the thought of them or the concept of them is too much for the Bradys and like-minded to bear. In a way, it’s similar (but not equal) to the thought of “liberal gun owners”, or “college professor gun owners”, or African-American gun owners.” It doesn’t fit preconceived notions and is just really uncomfortable. I for one really enjoy breakers of stereotypes. In anti-gun Chicago today there were 5 letters to the editor published about McDonald case … and only one was an antigun perspective. Gun rights supporters in Chicago? NO! Can’t be …
BTW, I was thrilled to see the PP amicus brief in Heller. It was spot-on and most welcome!
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