What better way to celebrate the birthday of the Prince of Peace?
‘Tis the season to send colorful holiday cards of the family with shit-eating grins and semi-autos. The New York Times Editorial Board this morning laments the country’s “toxic gun culture.” Exhibits A and B: cards sent last year by the families of Reps. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) and Lauren Boebert (R-Co.). What could be more American than celebrating the birthday of the Prince of Peace than with an all-in-the-family display of military-style firepower?
Make your family’s season bright this year with gleaming, black AR-15s. Or bring a tear to your little patriot’s eye on Christmas morning with a red, white and blue one tricked-out with a close-combat holographic sight:
These weapons, lightweight and endlessly customizable, aren’t often used in the way their devotees imagine — to defend themselves and their families. (In a recent comprehensive survey, only 13 percent of all defensive use of guns involved any type of rifle.) Nevertheless, in the 18 years since the end of the federal assault weapons ban, the country has been flooded with an estimated 25 million AR-15-style semiautomatic rifles, making them one of the most popular in the United States. When used in mass shootings, the AR-15 makes those acts of violence far more deadly. It has become the gun of choice for mass killers, from Las Vegas to Uvalde, Sandy Hook to Buffalo.
“What’s wrong with these people?”
One imagines the card former Missouri governor Eric Greitens might send of his family (wait, he’s twice divorced and currently unmarried, per Wikipedia). Improvising, the former Navy SEAL might invade Santa’s privacy with a mercenary assault team in ugly Christmas sweaters.
In his recent book “Gunfight: My Battle Against the Industry That Radicalized America,” Ryan Busse, a former firearms company executive, described attending a Black Lives Matter rally with his son in Montana in 2020. At the rally, dozens of armed men, some of them wearing insignia from two paramilitary groups — the 3 Percenters and the Oath Keepers — appeared, carrying assault rifles. After one of the armed men assaulted his 12-year-old son, Mr. Busse had his epiphany.
“For years prior to this protest, advertising executives in the gun industry had been encouraging the ‘tactical lifestyle,’” Mr. Busse wrote. The gun industry created a culture that “glorified weapons of war and encouraged followers to ‘own the libs.’”
The formula is a simple one: More rage, more fear, more gun sales.
A portion of those proceeds are then funneled back into politics through millions of dollars in direct contributions, lobbying and spending on outside groups, most often in support of Republicans.
All told, gun rights groups spent a record $15.8 million on lobbying in 2021 and $2 million in the first quarter of 2022, the transparency group OpenSecrets reported. “From 1989 to 2022, gun rights groups contributed $50.5 million to federal candidates and party committees,” the group found. “Of that, 99 percent of direct contributions went to Republicans.”
The toxic atmosphere in this country and spate of gunfire attacks on electical infrastructure had me this weekend catching up on a couple of films I’d missed over the years: Mississippi Burning (1988) and Hotel Rwanda (2004). Man’s inhumanity to man, Jack Frost shooting off your nose, and all that. The line I can’t get out of my head is from Willem Dafoe in the former, the FBI agent cradling a young black man they’d rescued from lynching: “What’s wrong with these people?“
Being the New York Times, the Board felt the need to soften the criticism with “armed right-wing extremists and those who fetishize AR-15s do not represent typical American gun owners or their beliefs,” etc., while calling for stricter regulations on guns and marketing.
Anything stronger might muzzle-brake the holiday spirit.