How Do You Convert A Believer?

T

TheBluesMan

Moderator Emeritus
What I mean by "Convert" is simply to open someone’s eyes to the fact that our Right to Keep and Bear Arms is in peril, and to get them more active in supporting our rights.

Background: I have an acquaintance who owns several guns. Some are simply collector’s items, a couple are modern hunting rifles. He also has a shotgun or two and, I think, about three pistols. He is a reluctant member of the NRA, (a relative signed him up) he reloads and doesn’t vote. He thinks that I am some kind of "gun-nut" because I know and care about the state of the RKBA in our great country.

I have another aquaintance who owns one shotgun and goes hunting twice a year. It’s a hobby for him, like golfing or fishing. He is a member of the U.S. Army Reserves, likes to talk about modern machine guns, .50BMG rifles, and grenade launchers. He is worried about me climbing a tower with an AK-47. :confused:

These guys know that I keep up-to-date on civil-rights issues, write my congressional representatives, circulate petitions at gun shows, belong to NRA, GOA, OFCC, etc.

Often while sitting around the campfire, others will bring up subjects that are political in nature, sometimes regarding Second Amendment related rights. I usually have pretty well thought out opinions on these subjects. (Thanks to all the members of TFL) :) I am also usually the most "right-wing" of our little group. (I even temper my comments... Go figure!) Invariably, these two guys in particular will express their concerns over my involvement with "gun-nuts."

Statement: These guys should be easy to convert, right? They are already gun owners, they say they believe in the RKBA, but they don’t think that there is a problem with infringement yet. Neither are opposed to background checks or waiting periods, and neither owns a self-loading rifle. (aka: assault weapon) They both say that they are against registration, but that the government can’t, by law, keep a list of gun owners, so they’re not worried about it. I’m sure many members know people like these two, perhaps you’ve gone hunting with their type. I think that many of the good people that lurk here at TFL fit into this mold.

Question: How do you open their eyes, just a crack, to let them see what is happening? How do you convince them that de facto registration is already the law. We’ve had conversations in the past regarding RKBA, but they don’t "believe" in the cause. I’d be happy just to get the first guy to vote, but he doesn’t think it makes any difference. Ideally, I’d like them to get politically active, and do their part in preserving our rights.

I would appreciate any and all input on this subject, just give your two cents worth. Hopefully we can collectively come up with some ideas that will help each other to "convert" folks like these.


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RKBA!
"The people have the right to bear arms for their defense and security"
Ohio Constitution, Article I, Section 4 Concealed Carry is illegal in Ohio.
Ohioans for Concealed Carry Website
 
Invite them to live in California :). Seriously though, check out the 'SKS buyback' in CA and the effect of the CA court ruling about the assault weapons ban. http://www.sksbuyback.org/

However, the hunters that I have met aren't terribly interested in RKBA.
 
I understand them. I have been an off an on NRA member for 30 years, more off than on. I felt the NRA got too radical and all I got from them was junk mail asking for more money.

What brought me back was Clinton and his sneaky ways and his attempts to restrict gun ownership. The NRA infomercials showing what has happened in the UK countries also had an effect.

I am sure that many like me have reacted to those things.

My wife a former liberal (with some rare lapses) has a CC permit and went to a gun show with me last weekend to get a new concealed carry holster for HER .380.

Keep at it it may take time.
 
I've been sitting here thinking about your friends and why they aren't politically active. I guess it's because they don't see it happening to them. They figure that assualt weapons and handguns are the only weapons that are going to be affected. They don't realize that it will spread to their rights also. The problem being that it's a situation where they don't see it coming clearly. It is an insidiously slow and devious progression. A little here and a little there as opposed to one day the Gov't just passes a law that bans all guns period. Assult weapons and handguns today and all other weapons soon there after. Just like the Gov't isn't going to spring it all at once on us, that is what you'll have to do with your friends. Make them more aware of whats really happening out there. But ya hafta do it a little at a time. Be patient with them but show them that Big Brother means to take away our 2nd Ammendment rights completely. Maybe they'll come around and then again maybe not. Just my 2 cents on the subject.

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***Torpedo***
Life is great if you can survive it!
 
Bluesman, I know quite well the kind of gun owners you're talking about. In fact, probably half of the gun owners I know fall into that category. The best solution I've found so far is to email them good articles, such as the ones found on TFL. Eventually, it seeps in. If it doesn't, I figure it's going to take a few bursts from a government MP5 before they've figured out what's been going on.

Dick
Want to send a message to Bush? Sign the petition at http://www.petitiononline.com/monk/petition.html and forward the link to every gun owner you know.
 
Phone an anonymous tip into the BATF about their having converted some of their guns to full auto. Shortly they'll either be true believers or dead.

Nah, I'd never do that.

It's the old frog in the boiling water thing; Things have been changing too slowly for them to notice. What you need is something that will bring the extent of the change to their attention... but without getting their guards up.

Old gun magazines. I don't know how, but get your hands on some pre-'68 gun magazines. The paper sort, not metal and springs. ;) Get them to go on a nostalga trip, and pretty soon they'll start to notice all the stuff they could have bought mail order back then, no waiting periods.

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Sic semper tyrannis!
 
I don't know what will happen to these gun owners in the long run, but Brett's analogy of the frog in the boiling water strikes a cord with me.
You can a least be hopeful if that they are at talking about the subject. You have to start talking and thinking about things before you can change your mind. They have internal issues to reslove before they can become active in RKBA issues. Its not certain , though.
Don't expect some one to convert just by having one conversation. be patient. there is no other choice, actually. Its good that they are at least mulling it over in those thick skulls.
 
Well if as you say they believe in the RKBA's.... That they believe that the 2nd protects their rights as citizens to keep and bear arms... then get them a copy of two things... one the 9th district court case of Hickman vs. Block and the oral arguments of the feds in U.S. vs. Emerson....

I woke up our whole gun club with Hickman vs. Block.... They were all just normal hunting gun owners... most believed as the fellows you describe... They could not believe that our government has taken the position that the 2nd only protects the rights of the states to maintain a militia....



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Richard

The debate is not about guns,
but rather who has the ultimate power to rule,
the People or Government.
RKBA!
 
Frog in hot water indeed. Also throw in that people generally have poor reasoning powers. Because something never happened before they think it won't happen in the future. So use England, Canada, and Oz as the examples.

Isn't there a video showing the guns in Oz getting cut up and melted? That would give the sensitive a jolt that could get them moving.

I several people like that too. It's a real astonishing thing to hear them talk about how they have rights when the rights in some states have almost disappeared.

Get that video. It seems to be pretty good. One guy said his stomach hurt watching it.
 
Thanks for the replys and the suggestions. :)

I think that these guys bother me so much because not too long ago, I was just like them. Can't remember what it was that finally opened my eyes. I guess it was a number of little things, no single event stands out to me as my "turning point."

I like the idea of keeping on with the examples of what's already happening elsewhere in the world with registration and confiscation. It's hard to not feel a knot in your stomach watching all those beautiful guns being lifted by the magnetic crane and cut up on the chop saws.

One idea I read elsewhere was to print up two letters when you write your representatives and give the spare to a "non-active" hunting buddy. Ask him to fill in his name, sign it and send it. If he does, next time give it to him with his name and address already on it. Eventually, maybe, he'll take up doing it himself.

I think that motivating even one person a year to get involved is a worthwhile effort. My goal is to get my first buddy to register to vote, and then vote. (Not for Gore, though.)


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RKBA!
"The people have the right to bear arms for their defense and security"
Ohio Constitution, Article I, Section 4 Concealed Carry is illegal in Ohio.
Ohioans for Concealed Carry Website
 
Bam Bam, that video is called "Banned," and it's available from the NRA store. Cost is under $10. I almost cried when I watched it.
If I can get the $$, I want to buy one of those "14 TV's with a built-in VCR and leave it at gun shows with that video running. One thing I've noticed about gun owners at shows is that they either won't take literature, or will take it and throw it away. But put a TV on a table with a tape playing--even if it's a tape about some kind of metal polish--and they'll stand there enraptured for twenty minutes.

Dick
Want to send Bush a message? Sign the petition at http://www.petitiononline.com/monk/petition.html and forward the link to every gun owner you know.
 
Bluesman, you and I both know that person #2 is a lost cause in all respects ;-)

I'm just curious as to who person #1 is for sure.



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"There are roads that must not be followed, and battles that must not be fought.." --Sun Tzu
 
So far, this is all I can find. Even Google doesn't come up with much. date of article is unknown.
http://www.webnexus.com/users/pactive/GunShot/archives/gs15.htm#lsas

This article is reprinted from the Lawyers Second Amendment Societys newsletter The Liberty Pole.

Update: Hickman Petitions the Supreme Court

In the last edition of The Liberty Pole, we wrote about the recent Ninth Circuit Hickman v. Block decision in which a three-judge panel ruled the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution does not give individual citizens standing to enforce the right to keep and bear arms. The Ninth Circuit instead held the Amendment merely gave states the right to maintain militias.

That's correct. The Ninth Circuit held the word "people" used in the phrase, "the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed" does not mean citizens. Somehow, they concluded the Framers of the Constitution were so clumsy they used the word "people," when they really meant "state." (Of course, "people" meant "people" in the First, Fourth and Ninth Amendments, and the Framers had no trouble distinguishing "people" and "states" in the 10th Amendment).

Buy "Banned" at the next gun show or from the NRA.

THEN, next time you hit a flea market, etc. check out video tapes people have for sale. Every so often you'll find someone dumping a lot of 15-30 min VHS tapes for a song.
I found four in my house that came from stuff like "Here's your new car" and
"Instructions for Breadmaking", etc. You may have some of these dogs lying around.

I have a copy of "Banned", and while it may not be Kosher, I copied it to the short term
tapes and handed then out at places like the
Hunter's safety courses or at get togethers
of hunters or other fence-sitters.

A cheap way of getting the word out.



[This message has been edited by Oatka (edited July 13, 2000).]
 
Falconer - Maybe person #1 is you. ;)

You and I have shared our share of campfires together and you know person #2 would be on our side in a heartbeat when push came to shove. It's good to know that someone like that is in the military.

That is the whole point to this thread, though. How to convert those that are already mostly on our side, before push comes to shove. (aka WTSHTF) Everyone here knows that if that happens, we'll have a TON of converts overnight. The problem is that by then, we've all lost. We need to motivate those that aren't easily motivated to action - NOW; before it is too late.


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RKBA!
"The people have the right to bear arms for their defense and security"
Ohio Constitution, Article I, Section 4 Concealed Carry is illegal in Ohio.
Ohioans for Concealed Carry Website
 
Well, TheBluesMan, your question has been well answered ... I agree, it is a question of ignorance, really.

I've had luck in a speaking engagement by citing law after law proposed and / or enacted recently. I point out laws banning certain firearms features, banning certain firearms, requiring confiscation of specific firearms, banning certain sizes of ammo, requiring more restrictive purchases of ammo, banning ammunition sales altogether, banning firearms in certain locales, requiring certain methods of carry, licensing and registration and so on, and so on.

When I get done with this (documented) litany, I ask 'at what point has this right been infringed'? If it is regulated to such a point that citizens are only left with single-shot, bolt action .22 rifles, is that all that was meant by this fundamental right? Of course not. And, usually, if people have any sensitivity to this right at all, they become worried and nearly sick to their stomach after you relate the fifth or sixth law to them ... laws that they never heard of and never realized were a threat to them.

Ignorance is a real killer, and it's the villain in this situation. We owe it to our fellow gun owners to help them understand the breadth of what is currently happening.

Regards from AZ

[This message has been edited by Jeff Thomas (edited July 13, 2000).]
 
www.thefiringline.com:8080/forums/showthread.php?threadid=27956

Pretty motivational.

IMNSHO, those that waste the freedom of voting are those that would carry the coal, used in the forge, where the chains of slavery are smelted. Vote, or carry coal or forge chains. If you think it's inconvienient to get up a half hour early on election day, think of the fun you'll have watching your family sold to the highest bidder.

If you think slavery is dead, you really, really, really need to expand your horizons a bit. Chattle slavery, the real deal, not just some poor slob working for a pittance, is rearing it's ugly head world wide. Take a bit of time and search the internet using slavery as a search word. It's downright scary. All that stands between you and slavery is your vote.
 
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