Freedom from Fear

by: David Sirota

Mon Aug 24, 2009 at 09:15


The First Amendment ethos guarantees citizens the right to participate in their democracy without fear of physical retribution. If there is any one foundational right in America, this is it -- it is the right that so many of us, fleeing from oppressive societies/regimes, originally came to this country specifically seeking. But as my new syndicated newspaper column shows, that First Amendment right is now being threatened by, of all things, the Second Amendment.

The rise of gun-toting protesters at congressional and presidential town hall meetings has put citizens' right to bear arms in direct conflict with citizens right to attend public political meetings without fear of physical retribution. Indeed, in bringing loaded weapons -- as opposed to a sign portraying a gun, for instance -- to these meetings, protesters are quite deliberately aiming to intimidate others. They are, in effect, asserting that their Second Amendment rights to bear arms should come before everyone else's First Amendment rights.

Having lived in Montana and now living in Colorado, and having reported extensively on the Minuteman movement for my most recent book, I have a solid firsthand sense of gun culture. And I sincerely believe this isn't about the old debates about gun ownership. You can be adamantly for the right to bear arms, and also believe that it's unacceptable to brandish loaded weapons at public political meetings.

So, how to resolve the constitutional conflict? Well first, I'd suggest remembering the sequence of the Bill of Rights. The First Amendment's place before the Second Amendment may have been the result of 19th century legislative wrangling/negotiation, but it's primary position only reinforces the fact that it is the most sacred principle in a democracy.

Practically, that means making public political meetings gun-free zones, just like stadiums and schools. In doing that, we can circumvent the tired old debate about gun ownership rights and simply protect everyone's right to engage in their democracy free of fear.

Read the whole column here.

The column relies on grassroots support -- and because of that support, it is getting wider and wider circulation (a big thank you to all who have helped with that). So if you'd like to see my column regularly in your local paper, use this directory to find the contact info for your local editorial page editors. Get get in touch with them and point them to my Creators Syndicate site. Thanks, as always, for your ongoing readership and help contacting local editors. This column couldn't be what it is without your help.    
David Sirota :: Freedom from Fear

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Freedom from Fear | 12 comments
These gets back to a discussion going on in the earlier thread. (4.00 / 1)
Is it better to use violence to get your way or nonviolence?

The Right always relies on violence, because it's all they know. But we don't have to. We have more tools than that in our toolbox, such as shunning, strikes and boycotts.

There are several advantages to the nonviolent approach, such as: it can be done by anyone (not just the testosterone addled), it can be done repeatedly, it can  be done for long periods of time. The changes brought into place by nonviolence tend to be more enduring, too, because they cut oppression off at its root -- social power.

Nonviolence lends itself very well to a situation like the one we face today, in which a violent and vocal minority is attempting to dominate the majority. Shunning, strikes and boycotts play to the strength of the majority. The Right occasionally tries to use these techniques too, but they never get very far because they are the minority (how's that Disney boycott working for ya, James Dobson?)

Montani semper liberi

Nonviolence works in two ways (0.00 / 0)
It either presents a target and provokes a disproportionately violent response that makes would-be oppressors look bad or it shows that the bullies have no teeth and are unwilling to actually use their weapons when someone chooses not to be afraid.

If the left wanted to organize massive nationwide demonstrations in support of health care on a scale that would put the tea parties to shame, I would be willing to show up.  And if these gun-toting lunatics want to counter-protest then I dare them, I double-dog dare them, to point their weapons at me.  

Of course, they'd be gambling that I would only shoot them with my camera and not a gun of my own.  Thomas Jefferson said that the tree of liberty needs to be refreshed from time to time, but he mentioned the blood of both patriots and tyrants.  I am not innately horrified by the idea of conservative tyrants making an involuntary contribution.

Things You Don't Talk About in Polite Company: Religion, Politics, the Occasional Intersection of Both

[ Parent ]
So, not quartering soldiers is the third most sacred principle? (4.00 / 1)
The sequence argument is quite awful and should not be pursued. I certainly agree that people shouldn't be brandishing weapons at public meetings, but I'm not sure that legislation is the way to deal with this. The fact that we ban weapons at schools and stadiums is an easy illustration of the ability to have site specific bans that don't violate the 2nd amendment. But you ignore that these bans came about in response to people actually using weapons in those settings. If you know gun culture as well as you claim, then you know gun owners don't appreciate being pre-emptively labeled criminals.

I think you're trying to reframe this issue in a way that people can approach it more constructively, but I also think you've failed and that this reframing will generate the same unproductive back and forth. I suspect that the best way to deal with the disturbing trend of people openly carrying weapons to these public forum events is with old fashioned enforcement of social norms. I take the message being sent by these thugs very seriously, but I think we're better off treating them like guys who showed up in their underwear smeared in their own feces. It's disruptive, inappropriate, and something decent people won't support.

first things first (4.00 / 2)
I have always believed the first amendment gained that position based on recognized importance. And that the main reason the second amendment is in it's place is (among others) to protect the first. Seriously doubt this sequence came about accidently. David is correct, use of the second amendment to twart the first is not legitmate, and is really abuse of the second, not use. Everyone recognizes the town hall screemers only purpose is to fill the air with noise to prevent conversation, even them. Threats and displayed wepons are props to that effert. Aren't these meetings held in places where it is illegal to distrube the peace, and intimadate? Why hasen't law inforcement been called to restore order? Bush didn't need a new law to run his meetings with an iron hand, we should be able to get the mob to act civilized by just calling the police.

Government by organized money is no better than government by organized mob..... FDR
[ Parent ]
Exactly (4.00 / 2)
This kind of behavior would not be tolerated if those bringing loaded guns to the meetings were from the left wing.

When I went to the RNC last year (in St. Paul, MN) the police, all dressed in their finest body armor, confiscated my video camera. What do you think they would have done if I were carrying a loaded rifle?  
Called CNN and helped line-up an interview?

"It sounds wrong...
     ...but its right."

[ Parent ]
I guess I don't understand (4.00 / 1)
why people are allowed to bring guns to these events in the first place.  It's an obvious matter of public safety that results in stadiums and schools being free from guns, which apparently does not violate the Second Amendment.  At Bush event people were routinely thrown out just for having t-shirts or bumper stickers that seemed unfriendly to the administration.  Obama gets several times the number of death threats that Bush did, yet he has to speak in front of groups with hostile opponents carrying loaded guns??  All sorts of places, from airports to state capitol buildings, prohibit firearms and screen people with metal detectors.  How can the Secret Service do their job if they have to allow people with guns into sensitive political events?

"The lightning whelk is strong, attractive, capable of growing to be one of the largest shells on the beach--and it opens to the left."
I agree that bringing the guns is a bad idea (0.00 / 0)
and it makes some on the right look like thugs.

Since you have spoken out correctly and forcefully against such intimidation, I'm awaiting your column urging AG Holder to prosecute the Black Panthers at the voting booth case.  

"some?" (0.00 / 0)
Try all. If the shoe fits, wear it.

Montani semper liberi
[ Parent ]
So you think the Panthers at a voting booth (4.00 / 1)
is comparable in breadth and depth to a gun movement that is making Dred Scott-type arguments to justify preempting local laws so that people can carry concealed weapons nationwide?

And what documentation is there, aside from people who felt intimidated and called the cops, that the Panthers actually did anything?

I'm not saying private groups should be allowed to patrol voting places - although they sure as used to when I lived in Chicago's Ukrainian Village (and they where always white people) - but your comparison given the level of the abuse of the 2nd Amendment is unsupportable and insipid.  

[ Parent ]
Look what the NRA has accomplished (0.00 / 0)
with very little popular support for its most extreme - yet doggedly pursued - positions.

I'd like to know more about their model so we can emulate it.  But I'm curious if the NRA's association with "sportsmen" more generally allows it to achieve the most radical of policy preferences, making it an exceptional case.  


It's the money. (0.00 / 0)
The NRA exists to launder money from the gun makers and dealers lobby.

Gun maker and dealers make obscene profits selling guns to criminals, who then frighten other people into buying guns themselves. They need accomplices in government to keep this whole thing going, to keep easy gun laws in place.

The "sportsmen" are just a useful PR front for the whole thing, and a declining group at that.

We will never have that kind of money, or that lack of basic regard for human life, either.

Montani semper liberi

[ Parent ]
I didn't know about money laundering (0.00 / 0)
but would like to find out more.
[ Parent ]
Freedom from Fear | 12 comments
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