Rallying Is An Empty Exercise

Kid@Heart · Sep 13, 2016

I know I have posted this before, but it seems like a good time to repeat myself.

Rallying is an empty exercise. It rates right up there with writing letters to Jim McDermott or Patty Murray about gun control legislation. They don't care about 100 people showing up at the Capitol. It is meaningless.

The only way to stop this stuff is to become an activist. You have to become a single issue voter and work to get someone elected to take their place.

Do it on a local level. City and County Councils, County Sheriffs, State Representatives, Judicial elections- That's where the fight will be won or lost.

Don't bother with the folks currently in office if they are part of the opposition. It doesn't matter what party they represent. If they support your Constitutional rights, support them. Talk to your neighbors. Talk to the folks at work, church, the grocery store, anywhere...

MOST PEOPLE DON'T CARE and will vote for whatever name sounds like one they heard of before or has a (D) or an (R) by it. Be the person that makes it important to them.

If you want to have a rally to inspire the base and get folks energized to become organizers, count me in. Just don't assume the people in power are going to change their vote because a few people stand in front of a building holding signs.

I was at the Restoring Honor rally in Washington DC (Glenn Beck) along with 600,000 of my closest friends. It made no difference whatsoever. Obamacare was still signed into law, Nancy Pelosi still pranced across the Capitol with her gavel and the news media either didn't report the gathering or lied about it.

WE HAVE TO GET ORGANIZED!

Run for office.
Support candidates who have demonstrated support for the Constitution and the 2nd Amendment.
Donate time.
Canvas your neighborhood.
Be a positive example.

Be willing to plan for the "long game". Progressives have infiltrated the school systems and have been churning out mindless liberal drones for years. Someone smarter than I needs to come up with a plan to reverse the indoctrination and begin to claw back the education of our youth or none of this is going to matter in a few years. It won't even be in the history books (they write them).

I'm a little sorry for the rant. (Not much, just a little.)

tiggers97 · Sep 13, 2016

I agree. I would like to see these rallys be not just to make noise and get excited, but to network and offer training on what to do with that energy.

IheartSig · Sep 14, 2016

Not only is rallying for this issue an empty exercise, more often than not, the average crowd that frequent publicized rallies in Oregon are NOT who we want as poster children.

Nick Burkhardt · Sep 14, 2016

Well, the rest of us presentable folks usually have 8 to 5 jobs.

Andy54Hawken · Sep 14, 2016

Iheartsig ... Touched on the main sticking point for "rallying" for me.
It seems like the media will focus only on the more extreme folks who show up.
Not folks who care about guns and gun rights and are able to spout off more than a well used soundbite or slogan.
Andy

HuckleberryFun · Sep 14, 2016

AndyinEverson said:
Iheartsig ... Touched on the main sticking point for "rallying" for me.
It seems like the media will focus only on the more extreme folks who show up.
Not folks who care about guns and gun rights and are able to spout off more than a well used soundbite or slogan.
Andy

Coverage of 2A protests are like coverage of gay pride parades.
Media won't show pics of representative members of either group. They'll show the most out there outrageous seeming people: the AR slinging white supremacist camo guy and the over the top drag queen. Both images feed people's pre-conceived notions and are an easy out for lazy journalists.

Andy54Hawken · Sep 14, 2016

In addition to what the OP suggested , I would like to see a return to the "I'm the NRA" ads that were out during the 80's.
Showing non gun people that we are not scary or dangerous.
Just people who happen to own guns .... for many different reasons and from many different walks of life.

This may be a better approach , than a mass rally with "big scary guys with scary guns."
(not that I think that any gun is scary , but many others do)
I feel that kind of "up front and in your face" tactic can backfire on us and do more harm than good.

Also many non gun people consider the media stereotype as the "norm".
Something that is important to think of when you as a gun owner are doing anything.
We as a whole need to be "better" that stereotype.

For the record I think we as a whole are better than the stereotype.
But if how you "sell" your idea is using the wrong approach , then you will never "sell" your idea , no matter how good it might be.
Andy
*Edit for pre coffee typing and final thought.

Kid@Heart · Sep 14, 2016

Some of you folks might have missed the point.

YOU need to get out and talk about your issues with the public. Talk to your neighbors, people at the grocery store, the guy putting gas in his car next to you, ANYONE!
Most voters in today's world are low information types who have views shaped by the herd mentality in their peer group. You can make a difference. Just stop being the silent majority.

Hawaiian · Sep 14, 2016

Kid@Heart said:
Rallying is an empty exercise. It rates right up there with writing letters to Jim McDermott or Patty Murray about gun control legislation. They don't care about 100 people showing up at the Capitol. It is meaningless.

That is because it is the wrong 100 people. A bunch of guys in camo's with AR's. If the gun rights organizations had their act together they could make a difference. Imagine a couple hundred women, no men, no AR's, only women, rallying at the capitol with signs saying, I have a right to defend myself and my children. This would gain national media attention in a positive manner. The anti's are playing the women and children card, but the gun rights groups keep playing the same old tired song and no one is listening anymore.

v0lcom13sn0w · Sep 14, 2016

sorry, just readin the title i thought this was about rallyin the dirt/gravel roads in the ol' 90s ford pickup.

etrain16 · Sep 14, 2016

Hawaiian said:
That is because it is the wrong 100 people. A bunch of guys in camo's with AR's. If the gun rights organizations had their act together they could make a difference. Imagine a couple hundred women, no men, no AR's, only women, rallying at the capitol with signs saying, I have a right to defend myself and my children. This would gain national media attention in a positive manner. The anti's are playing the women and children card, but the gun rights groups keep playing the same old tired song and no one is listening anymore.

How about a couple hundred+ folks from the "Pink Pistols" - it would be really hard for the anti-gun politicians to ignore one of their most coveted groups. Add a women's group in with them and you'd really have something that would have to grab their attention. Maybe throw in a few minority groups as well? I don't say that to be sarcastic, but to simply use the same tactic they like - minority groups and women get attention - white guys don't.

Kid@Heart · Sep 14, 2016

If you don't do something to defeat the incumbent anti Second Amemdment politicians, nothing will get better. They don't care about your opinion. Forget rallying. I don't know how to make it more clear. Don't expect anyone else to do it for you. Get active.

PaulB47 · Sep 15, 2016

I wouldn't say rallys don't work. They work when socialists get out and rally, because the Ministry of Propaganda gives them favorable treatment. They just don't work for us.

For what it's worth, back when I was political, I helped someone run for the legislature. She did a lot of door-to-door. She said she constantly got asked about two specific issues, RKBA and abortion. There are a lot more single issue voters on these two subjects than you may imagine.

CamoDeafie · Sep 16, 2016

I'm too young to remember the 60s, but my own father... from what he has said... well.

Remember the original Black Panthers? They marched, they rallied, they openly carried AR15s and the like.... and bam, the NRA helped the government with the CGA of 1968, in no small part because of the "evil black people with guns!" hysteria..... Given that at the time most of the BP supporters were also ex-convicts and felons and the like...this became cause for making a list of prohibited persons and a reason to end mail order gun sales as it was understood at the time, the JFK assassination also helped put the CGA 1968 forward too.. and creating a new class of citizens and introduced background checks...... and I believe at that time too, more states pushed for conceal carry permits, and by the 80s, it was in a fever pitch that the NRA helped craft the requirements of conceal carry permits and such, pushing for using the NRA_certified instructors for some states' requirements.... Understand that at that time, the NRA was mainly all about hunting and rifle collections, and very much anti- self defense until the 90s.

At the least from my father's perspective, up til the 60s-80s, a man could serve time in hard labor camps, or in prison, and when his time was served, he could go and regain full rights. Of course at that time too, a violent offender either died or stayed in prison for the rest of his life.