I’ll not rejoice if your delusions come crashing down. I’ll not celebrate the day you discover that evil comes in many forms and will use any tool available. I hope that day never comes. Truly, I hope you live out all of your days in blissful ignorance and die peacefully in your old age.
Jennifer – I’ll Not Rejoice
January 21st, 2013
[Honestly go read her post, it is something that many of us on this side of the debate have encountered all too often recently. We all know that anti-rights cultists are violent and down right despicable in what they say and how they act. If you’re on the other side of the debate, think long and hard about the actions and words of your fellow supporters.
It is the only way they can debate and appear to be winning. Be so down right mean and vicious that the people on the other end want nothing to do with them. I haven’t been as active on the twitter front lately because honestly, the crap gets old, and most of them have absolutely no interest in an actual conversation. They want to lecture us.
I did however have a nice conversation with a friend from high-school recently on Facebook and my patience was continued mainly because of the ties she had with my family growing up. Honestly though I think it’s those ties more than anything that helped facilitate a civil discussion and a willingness to listen to the other side of the debate. That’s the biggest issue right now, no one really wants to listen, they have their preconceived answers and are not even willing to be polite and listen to the other side.
The thing is, one side of this debate is listening and responding, for the most part there are some who aren’t, the problem is the response more often than not is the opposite of what those on the other side want to hear. As Joe said, we need an accurate problem statement. No one though has even bothered to try to create one, instead they throw out solutions, solutions that in many cases don’t actually solve any problems relating to what the proponents claim. When people rebuke their solution they are played down, diminished, called names, and have violence wished upon them for a differing of opinion.
It does not help your position to behave in such a manner and to the many watching it indicates a lack of maturity and inability to support your position. I am flattered by the comments that Garand Gal made about Linoge, Sean, Erin, and me. But please don’t feel like you have to support us. Is it nice, you bet, fire support is a wonderful thing, especially when viciousness like that starts getting thrown around. It’s good to see a friendly face and it does give you that extra sense of, yes this is worth it. But, and this is a big but, often it is emotionally draining and tiring. In the end it ends up being nothing more than wrestling with a pig, sure you may think you win but the pig just wanted you covered in mud.
If you feel it’s worth it to spend time discussing with someone, by all means do so, and if you see a reasonable discussion going on, by all means chip in, just don’t be a dick, let them do it on their own if they’re going to. The time spent with chatting with my family friend paid off, she’s no longer focused on the tool and can see from this side of the debate. There’s a few other things still to work out but it’s a start and a good one at that. Sadly she’s not physically close otherwise I could go more easily hands on. It ends up there were some people who made very poor decisions regarding firearms around her while in college and it has provided a very negative view of gun owners.
Pick and choose your battles and work where you think you can gain the most ground if you’re going to spend a lot of time on it. Last week a particular individual kept wasting my time and kept running in circles. I kept trying to escape out of the conversation but she kept dragging me back. Finally after calling me an extremist for not wanting to be lectured I asked to be dropped from the conversation. She did, for about 30 minutes and then mentioned me in another tweet. I went off, ripped apart her argument again, and then said leave me the hell alone. She then tweeted me again, this time it wasn’t falsehoods or lies just a general antagonism so ignored it, yesterday morning her account was evidently suspended.
Let me say right here right now, I had nothing to do with it. I didn’t report her, I didn’t even block her. I do however have a strong feeling with her behavior that she went down the same road as the individual debating with Jennifer. In so doing I’m reasonably sure she used some not so nice words and possibly made threats towards someone’s safety. Honestly, that woman wasn’t worth my time at all beyond illustrating to the world how dumb her idea was for “smart guns”. Pick and choose your battles wisely and do your best not to get sucked in because you have to constantly fight their lies, because that’s what they do, spout lies and drivel so you come back with facts. Some times it’s just not worth it. Overall though in the grand scheme, this fight is most definitely worth it and the effort of debate is a small price to pay. -B]
TMM is the owner, editor, and principal author at The Minuteman, a competitive shooter, and staff member for Boomershoot. Even in his free time he’s merging his love and knowledge of computers and technology with his love of firearms.
Many know his private name and information however due to the current political climate, many are distancing themselves due to the abandonment of Due Process.