Shall Not Be Infringed (SNBI)

Making Amends - Armed and Safe

As is often the case for me, I found that my comment to this post grew a bit lengthy. So, for once, I decided to just make it a post of my own. The main thing that got my attention in this post was his reference to the "SNBI extremist" slur that floats around some of the gun blogs. To that, I had this to say.


While I do see the "SNBI" mentality criticized off an on, I really don't see people criticizing the belief that "shall not be infringed" means just that. It was my understanding that SNBI was used to refer to people like the following:

1. Believes that just yelling "Shall not be infringed", or similar, in debates/conversations about gun rights is an effective tactic to sway those in the middle with no real opinion.
2. Sees any law pertaining to firearms that infringes in some was as a horrible violation on us, even when it's a law that actually makes things better for us.
3. Believes there's a realistic chance of having every bad gun law (i.e. virtually all of them) wiped away in one fell swoop, and anything various groups do to improve things that still fall short of that are proof of us "selling out".

Frequently, the issue the people who use the term SNBI really isn't with a lot of what the "SNBIs" believe, but with how they present it. It's also with the fact that many of them don't take a long view of things, because that perspective requires patience. I actually had the misfortune to work the VCDL table (www.vcdl.org) at a gun show with someone that personifies what I think of when people talk about SNBIs. He wasn't a bad person. But he came across as almost beligerent when trying to get people to learn more about what the VCDL does for gun rights in the state. All that did was make people that aren't active in the gun rights community want to stay that way even more. He just had no grasp of the fact that we're trying to sell a product, that product being the concept of self-defense and individual rights.

There are a few things that I think are pretty safe to assume are true. First, gun owners are a minority, and gun owners that really care about gun rights are an even smaller one. Second, until we get more people in the middle to look at firearms the same way they do at a fire extinguisher, power tools, or a spare tire, we won't have much chance at getting the court decisions and laws that we would really like to see.

Personally, I refuse to alter my behavior to accomodate those who fight to take away my rights. But I will alter what I say and do to sway those in the middle towards my point of view. The way I see it, the former is just a pointless compromise, because nothing you will change their goal. But the latter drastically increases my chances of adding more people into our fold.

Primaries, Voting, and Teaching "Them" a Lesson

“How will [abstaining from voting] send a message? It will send the message that the "business as usual" way of doing politics is no longer acceptable. It will send the message that the American voters demand meaning in their politicians, and if they don't get it, they will turn away and strip them of their power.” – Nikki

As the primaries moved to the point where McCain seemed the obvious one to be the Republican candidate, I started seeing statements like this more and more on the various blogs that I read. Sentiments like this come up, to one degree or another, every election. But it definitely seems more widespread this time around. Every time, some disgruntled group decides that they’re not voting to teach “Them” a lesson.

Whenever I see people talking about this, I can’t help but notice that these otherwise intelligent people just can’t grasp how stupid their words sound. I hate to target Nikki specifically here, since I’ve seen this all over. But her post on this stuck with me the most since, of those that have said this, she's the one I respect the most. As much as I respect her opinion on most things, I really feel like she, and many others that feel like her, are letting their anger about how the primaries turned out blind them to truly effective solutions.

“..the American voters demand meaning in their
politicians,”

Sorry to break this to everyone, but they really don’t. The American voters are morons that demand about as much meaning from their politicians as they do from the shows that they stare at blankly on TV. Honestly, how much can you expect from our “peers” when the top 3 rated shows this week were American Idol, the American Idol results show, and Dancing with the Stars. American voters don’t demand meaning, they demand pretty hair and catchy sound bites. Hell, if they demanded meaning in a candidate, that might mean they were actually intelligent enough to know that the President can’t do most of what these idiots are promising.

Too many people are completely missing the fact that our “peers” are the ones that put McCain where he is now. Granted, part of the problem is that Ron Paul came across as a nut and Fred Thompson seemed to think he could campaign without actually campaigning. But, as far as I can tell, the primaries just turned into a big game of “Whose name do you recognize the most on the ballot.” The American people don’t research candidates, and they most certainly don’t pay any attention to things like past voting records. As I see it, there is nothing substantial we can do to fix things before this election. However, I think there are a couple of things we can do that will make a real difference in the next election, and one of those will require actual sacrifice on our parts.

The first thing we need to do is start reaching out to our neighbors, friends, and co-workers. We don’t need to make them agree with our beliefs. But we at least need to get them to care enough about their own to be willing to research the candidates before picking one the next time around. Honestly, can you imagine how much better this country would be if everyone, in every party, actually expected real substance from their candidates?

The second, and more challenging, is that we need to start getting involved in the primaries. All you have to do is look at the states that do their primaries earliest to know that most of us are effectively shut out of the process. By the time things reach the more populous states, a lot of the candidates have already been driven out of the race. The only way I can see for us to fix this is to take the time to go help campaign for our candidate of choice in those early states. If I think there’s a reasonable chance that my candidate still won’t be running by the time he reaches my state, the most logical thing is for me to convince those voting earlier that he should be their candidate as well.

I’ll be completely honest at this point and admit that I don’t have a clue about how to make that work. But I’ve got 3-4 years to figure it out.