Black Caucus extorts legislature over gun control (PA)

[Owen Sparks]

Maybe what is needed is for one brave PA gun dealer to come forward and anounce that as an act of solidarity with the PA black caucus, he will NO LONGER SELL GUNS TO BLACKS. and that they are no longer allowed in his store.

 

[ArmedBear]

has traditionally been oppressed by the government in this country.

More like used to be oppressed.

As in, I'm 41 and this government oppression has not existed in my memory. In my life experience, "affirmative action" programs, college admission set-asides, hiring quotas, and the like, are the only government actions where race defined how people were treated.

So why not the Irish Caucus? When does something become history? When a 40-year-old man can't remember something, is it not history by then? Was WW II not history, by the 1980s? The Civil War by the turn of the 20th Century?

That doesn't mean we should ever forget, nor does it by any means demean the struggles of the oppressed any time or anywhere, but this "oppression by the government" rhetoric is a bunch of BS when applied to the present, as in, I think that the strategy is, if you repeat it often enough, people will just assume it's true.

And when do you start questioning whether a group defined by race is actually working towards a colorblind society where everyone is a part of the same nation and "on the same team"?

 

[Autolycus]

I am not necessarily for an Irish Caucus or a Black caucus. However I understadn the need. No group has been as discriminated against as blacks in this country. Many people still suffer from subconscious racism and overt racism has become covert racism in this country.

Please post links to the laws that require hiring quotas. And some links about the college set-asides. And please explain affirmative action and what is wrong with it.

Thanks.

 

[Robert Hairless]

The United States of America needs all the caucuses it can get. Every group in this country should be separated from every other so that each group can caucus for its own special interests and demand reparations for the ills it has suffered while planning for the evils it can impose on others. In disunity there is strength.

While these caucuses meet and debate what each should demand, I'm willing to run the country for a reasonable salary, a nifty car, wild adulation wherever I appear, and unsupervised access to the treasury.

Here are some caucuses to start the ball rolling. My list is intended to be suggestive, not exhaustive, so please feel free to add your own caucus. If you or any of your ancestors have ever been slighted, now is your opportunity to caucus with others who have suffered too.

• Black caucus.
• Caucasian caucus.
• Redneck caucus.
• Asian caucus.
• Hispanic caucus.
• Latino caucus.
• Native American caucus.
• Indo-American caucus.
• Indo-European caucus.
• Eastern European caucus.
• Western European caucus.
• Irish caucus.
• Swedish caucus.
• Norwegian caucus.
• Turkish caucus.
• Asian caucus.
• Middle-European caucus.
• Anglo-American caucus.
• Serbo-Croation caucus.
• Scottish caucus.
• Welsh caucus.
• Armenian caucus.
• Protestant caucus.
• Catholic caucus.
• Jewish caucus.
• Muslim caucus.
• Women's caucus.
• Men's caucus.
• Gay and Lesbian Caucus.
• Transvestite caucus.
• Liberal caucus.
• Conservative caucus.
• Neo-conservative caucus.
• Libertarian caucus.
• Vegetarian caucus.
• Vegan caucus.
• Carnivorous caucus.
• Marxist caucus.
• Trotskyite caucus.
• Stalinist caucus.
• Nazi caucus.
• Fascist caucus.
• Neo-fascist caucus.
• Circus performer caucus.
• Hermaphrodite caucus.
• Monorchid caucus.
• Fans of Wayne Newton caucus.
• Little people caucus.
• Giant caucus.
• My grievance is more important than yours caucus.
• Nobody invited me to caucus caucus.

Remember: If you have a grudge, no one else can carry it for you as well as you can.

 

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

I'm sorry Tecumseh, I just don't agree with a single thing you just posted. With all due respect, that seemed like something I would read in some liberal University newspaper defending social reeducation camps for white students. I know this isn't gun related...but wow. I never though I would see someone promoting the "people are racist and don't even know it" talking point on a staunchly libertarian/conservative forum like THR.

 

[Elza]

taurusowner: For a group of people who talk a big talk about equality, identifying themselves as a special and separate group using their skin color seems like an awfully strange way to promote said equality.

Not strange at all. It isn’t a matter of equality. It is what ever serves their purpose best for the moment. If I say that all blacks look alike I’m a racist. But it is fine for them to use this as a trial defense.

 

[ArmedBear]

Tecumseh, get your own links.

First, you said "oppressed by the government", not "subject to some sort of covert racism". But since you changed the subject, I figure you acknowledge what I said. The only racially-defined laws I've experienced in my lifetime of 41 years have FAVORED African-Americans. That is, of course, its own sort of racism, but be that as it may, it's hardly oppression!

Now as to your new post, I've worked in academia. I know what I've experienced. There are piles of literature on it all over the place. If you have never read any of it, you're clearly not really interested.

For that matter, the "covert racism" works the other way, too, in some sectors of the working world.

What's wrong with "affirmative action" (euphemism for mandated racial quotas in hiring and school admissions)?

Let's start with the statement it makes. At this point in history, it says that African-Americans, even after a couple of generations, can't make it on their own in school or at work. They can't get jobs if they have to compete on merit. Do you believe that's true?

Then, let's go for the real consequences, as in when U C Berkeley makes it more difficult for a minority group, many of whose parents have a difficult time with English, to get into the college, since they're "overrepresented." Affirmative action for whites. Finally, the voters of California voted to eliminate these quotas, but universities resisted and continue to resist. Again, if you have never heard of this bit of history, and U of M's court battles, you have little standing to even discuss it. Go read. Find your own damn links.

Now WRT your statements about "covert racism", well, grow up. People look at me and size me up, based on all sorts of things, every day. It's up to me to prove myself, pick my battles, etc. And yes, there are prejudices, particularly against young adults who dress and make it a point to talk like they're rappers, who, of course, are known for glorifying criminal violence and other ills. There are also prejudices against certain accents that white people have, certain modes of dress from "redneck" to "hippie", whatever. Again, anyone who doesn't recognize that first impressions matter needs to grow up. That doesn't mean that I like to conform to whatever norm will get me ahead in the company, no matter how much I hate it. I don't; however, I'm willing to take the consequences like a man.

If you think that there are a bunch of white people out to get you, not just the Klan or some fringe group we all know to be racists, but just about EVERY white person, and they don't even know it, then who is the racist here?!?

When "racism" is defined down to just about any feeling anyone has about any other person, then I figure we don't have much real racism left. There is no ethnic majority in California. Therefore, there's a high probability that someone I "size up" in my daily life will be non-white. I'm going to have some good and some bad impressions of people who are not caucasian. And they will about me. Oh well.

 

[Beatnik]

No group has been as discriminated against as blacks in this country. Many people still suffer from subconscious racism and overt racism has become covert racism in this country.

I'm about as WASP as you get. I'm also in the minority at work.
I'm about to hang out after work and play PS2 with an object lesson in diversity - me, a black guy, an Indian, a Pakistani, and a Canadian.

They're all well dressed and spoken, and I am at ease around them.

When I see a gang banger on the street, who dresses and speaks a certain way, my defenses go up. I've felt what it's like to have finger-bling pounded into my skull, so anyone who dresses and speaks like those guys is guilty by association.

It happened to me in reverse when I had long hair and a drawer full of Metallica T-shirts. I didn't think it was fair, but since I'm an adult now, I understand.

I suggest everyone else who thinks it's not fair should grow up as well.

 

[Hardware]

No group has been as discriminated against as blacks in this country.

Wow, I bet the Native Americans will be glad to hear that! I think warfare against a people based on their ethnicity might just qualify as discrimination.

Seriously folks, this isn't about race. This is about politicians trying to steal the democratic process.

 

[Robert Hairless]

No group has been as discriminated against as blacks in this country. Many people still suffer from subconscious racism and overt racism has become covert racism in this country.

If that's what you were taught in your sociology classes you might consider turning off your ears and turning on your mind.

Almost every class of people who could be defined by race, religion, or national origin has been subject to fierce discrimination in this country. I don't know where you got your scale for measuring degree of discrimination but it just doesn't work and you should know it.

The group that obviously suffered more discrimination than black people are American Indians or, as the politically correct say, Native-Americans. Those who were allowed to live were forced to do it on reservations and there still are laws that separate them from others.

Japanese--both Issei and Nisei--were deprived of their rights and property and were forced into internment camps. Jews were--and continue to be--subjected to overt and covert discrimination. Italians for generations were treated the same.

I'm working at random here. Name the group, and if it is possible to define them in any way other than as white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestants it was discriminated against fiercely. Some still are. All of them felt pain.

At their worst, Americans are and always have been equal opportunity bigots. Unlike you, I was born and raised during times when this was considered the cards one was dealt and we either played with them or we retreated into a corner to die whimpering. And unlike you, I was there during the time we changed much of that. We couldn't change all of it because it's never possible to remove the stupid, ignorant, and bigoted genes that people inherit and transmit.

 

[crazed_ss]

Given the history of African-Americans in the United States, one would think that Blacks would walk out of a legislature that was not considering making firearms ownership mandatory.

It is a tragic shame that African-Americans have bought into the notion that government helps people. A notion foisted on them by white socialist poltroons who seek power over African-Americans

from my perspective as a Black American, the gun community doesnt seem very tolerant or accepting of others. Guns are a political issue and you cant be around gun people with having to deal with a bunch of people telling you the rodney king beating was justified, the South were the good guys in the civil war, Nazi gear at the gunshow is good to go, and how everything was so much better back in the 60's or whenever. Obviously stuff like this wont be agreeable to most Blacks.

 

[strat81]

Not necessarily hypocritical, taurusowner. Its kind of a watchdog group that protects the minority which has traditionally been oppressed by the government in this country.

Protects the minority? How do you protect someone by disarming them?

 

[mordechaianiliewicz]

Two things:

One. Robert Hairless and me are in total agreement (and you made me shoot Coca Cola out of my nose).

Two:

This is rediculous. Blacks in Philly unfortunately kill each other at rediculous rates, and therefore want to tell rural Pennsylvannia whites (and urban ones, and blacks that simply disagree, and well... everyone that isn't on the same page as them) how to live their lives.

All the while, they ignore the fact that a man who is willing to commit robbery, rape, murder, etc. doesn't give two sh*&s in the wind about any gun laws.

Doesn't matter though. They want action, now!!!

Even if the actions violates the rights of others.

Even if the action won't work.

Even if it's stupid and devisive.


Worst of all, yes, it fights everything in black history. And stands against good sense inasmuch that if you are a minority, you have more cause to be armed than anyone.


PS

crazed_ss:

While much of what you said is true, blacks don't have a real gun culture per se in many areas. Therefore, the cultural difference. Oh, and I wonder why that is? Maybe, folks like ourselves should try to carve one up. You don't like the white models, fine. But atleast they have a gun culture.

I won't be happy until people like these jackasses would be pushed out of power in elections just for thinking this way.

 

[Mike128]

No group has been as discriminated against as blacks in this country. Many people still suffer from subconscious racism and overt racism has become covert racism in this country.

I have to disagree and say that is a very narrow, self serving, and self pitying view. Not that blacks in this country have not been discriminated against, but so have many other minorities. And much more recently. An example is that UCLA set a LIMIT on the number of Asians ACCEPTED. On the other side of it, a black male gained more admission points than a perfect SAT score because of being a black. This was only in the 90's.

Let's not forget the first part of this century there were NO Asians allowed to enter the United States. Asians (especially the females) were sold as property during this time. This was after the slaves were free and allowed to own land. Asians weren't. Violence against Asians was just as bad if not worse during this time.

Japanese Americans during WWII in detention camps. Even now, currently, with the unrest towards China.

However, Asians in general like their firearms and see the need for them. Except the ones that have been brainwashed by California.

The problem in Philly isn't a race issue as people try to make it out to be. It's a cultural, social, and more importantly an economic issue. A population in the same area, with the same influences acting on similiar ideals. Place anyone, regardless of race, into that area and they will generally act the same. Unfortunatly, the black leaders propogate the idea of victimization, instead of self reliance.

 

[Pilgrim]

It's sort of amusing to see a 'victim' class demand to be disarmed.

It's sort of like the elk and deer forming a caucus and demanding to be hamstrung so the wolves will leave them alone.

Pilgrim

 

[ArmedBear]

However, Asians in general like their firearms and see the need for them. Except the ones that have been brainwashed by California.

You ought to come to a gun range here, if you think that.

It doesn't seem too many Asians are brainwashed, I'll tell you that much. Gun ownership, particularly among the younger generations of Asian, seems VERY common here.

 

[scout26]

It's a cultural, social, and more importantly an economic issue.

Yes, Yes and [BUZZ] WRONG.

It's a cultural and social issue if it's defined as "Parents not being Parents".

I didn't do illegal things when I was growing up because I feared what my parents would do to me more then the police. I also did not want to to disappoint them. They were active is my childhood, involved with my schoolwork and other activities. My dad never coached a team, but he made it to just about every game. My mom wasn't a "PTA Supermom", but she checked my homework and and went to every parent teacher conference. They knew my friends were, where I was at (roughly/mostly), and I knew when to be home (before the sun went down).

Was I the perfect little angel ???. Not even close. I did dumb things, (like setting the backyard on fire......twice, once with gunpwder and leaves the other time with gasoline and plastic army men.....) I got my backside "tanned" ("Extreme Sunburn" woudl be a better description) when I got caught being dumb in a no stupid zone. I rarely made the same mistake twice and learned what the standards and expectations of civilized, reasonsible behavior from my parents.

It took quite a bit of effort on their part, but I think I, my four brothers and two sisters all turned out pretty good. Not one of us have ever been in trouble with the law (excluding traffic tickets), only one divorce, we all have good jobs/careers, and are raising/have raised families. My parents are rightfully proud of all of us.

Martin Luther King got it right. It's not the color of the skin, but the content of their character. If no one teaches you character, then you are/will be nothing.

 

[granuale]

I think it's ridiculous to liken the treatment other groups have had in this country to the treatment of blacks. Slavery and it's legacy including Jim Crow, deed restrictions and all sorts of de-humanizing treatment enshrined into law leave Blacks as the clear winners in the been done wrong race. One would hope that Blacks would be the first to be skeptical of and oppose all attempts by government to classify people by race for different treatment.

Tecumseh, the laws that require hiring quotas are the civil judgements that the EEOC and private attorneys extort from businesses every day. This has produced a situation where medium to large companies are bullied into "affirmative action" policies which grant preferential treatment to blacks and others who can use the threat of litigation to not compete on thier merits. Additionally we have a situation where companies are afraid to fire any black or "minority" person for fear of litigation. This breeds resentment and hate by others who get the short end of the stick.

The same is true with higher education. I think the hardest hit victim in today's world is the black guy/girl who actually would have earned his spot at Harvard or Yale on the merits. As it stands he is now thought of as lesser simply because of these programs - it is assumed he is there because of race. Of course the schools' good intentions also make victims of the intended beneficiaries. Black drop out rates are much higher in all these programs because the affimative action students are not qualified academically. It is no favor to give a black kid who might have thrived at a decent state U a spot at an Ivy where he won't make it.

 

[Intune]

Black drop out rates are much higher in all these programs because the affimative action students are not qualified academically. It is no favor to give a black kid who might have thrived at a decent state U a spot at an Ivy where he won't make it.

Then give it to someone who actually EARNED the spot... COLORBLIND. What a concept. "...favor..., ...give..." Should be alarms.

Those councilmen should be, Mr. Jones, representing District 2. Ms. Appleton, representing District 12. Mr. Smith, representing District 8. Black caucus . If I'm any other race in your district, you just boned me. :banghead:

Robert H. Just wanted to let you know that Grey Goose through the nose is a new experience. Thank you, Sir. May I have another?

 

[armedandsafe]

from my perspective as a Black American, the gun community doesnt seem very tolerant or accepting of others. Guns are a political issue and you cant be around gun people with having to deal with a bunch of people telling you the rodney king beating was justified, the South were the good guys in the civil war, Nazi gear at the gunshow is good to go, and how everything was so much better back in the 60's or whenever.

You sure aren't hanging around the shooters and activists I knew in San Diego. You definitely are not hanging around those of us who went north and hung around on store rooftops after the Kingthing with people we had never met.

My thought is that you can make your same statement, substituting any interest group you wish, and it will be as true as the one you made about "gun people."

Pops

 

[Robert Hairless]

Crazed SS:

from my perspective as a Black American, the gun community doesnt seem very tolerant or accepting of others. Guns are a political issue and you cant be around gun people with having to deal with a bunch of people telling you the rodney king beating was justified, the South were the good guys in the civil war, Nazi gear at the gunshow is good to go, and how everything was so much better back in the 60's or whenever. Obviously stuff like this wont be agreeable to most Blacks.

I can well understand why black people would be offended by the insensitivity of others who deny, overlook, or are ignorant of the Black experience. It must be painful and hard to bear. I feel for you.

Perhaps, then, you might be able to understand the equally real pain felt by both Jews and non-Jews whose families and friends were murdered by the S.S.--Nazi Germany's Schutz-Staffel, the murderers who slaughtered American prisoners and executed innumerable civilian men, women, and children--when they encounter someone online who is so callous that he adopts the screen name of "Crazed SS."

What you call "the gun community" is a fiction and, the way you use that term, it is a stereotype of with no value. A great many different kinds of people own guns and shoot them for a great many different reasons. They have different backgrounds, education, sophistication, sensitivity, and attitudes. Look around you and read enough messages in this one forum, The High Road, and you should see that there are a great many different kinds of people here and that they often have little in common except firearms ownership.

I'm curious. Is it reasonable to talk about everyone who owns and drives a car as members of "the car community"? Are people who listen to hip hop, classic rock, country, chamber music, opera, symphonies, Segovia, Gershwin, or Nazi marches are all part of "the music community"?

Are Black people who own guns not members of "the gun community" but only Black people who own guns? And, perhaps the most interesting question of all, are all Black people the same or should non Blacks treat each member of "the Black community" as an individual?

 

[Atticus]

Another example of politicians trying to cure a symptom and not the disease.
The person(s) pulling the triggers are to blame. The murder rate could probably be cut by 50% if they just enforced curfew laws for juveniles. But then...that requires parent participation...which ain't gonna happen...and is the root cause anyway.

 

[geekWithA.45]

[moderatorHat]

"Holier than thou", and it's 21st century descendant, "more oppressed than thou" has very little place here.

The issue here is the people's right of arms.

Directly connected to that is the issue of more and less effective means of controlling crime, which is the stated reason to suppress the people's right of arms.

I understand that there is complex and potentially incindiary social and political phenomena related to all that.

Keeping it civil will go a long way towards keeping the discussion substantive.


[moderatorHat]

 

[ArmedBear]

Crazed SS is a pretty sane, reasonable guy.

And SS refers to "Super Sport", as in Chevy with big throbbing V8.

That said, I'm not sure what we can/should do about a few idiots at gun shows, whatever their political bent. Most gunnies I meet are pretty normal people, not neo-nazis, people who want to own slaves, etc. I sure do know that people of all ethnicities and whatever other categories you can think of are welcome at my range.

I don't think the whole game of "whose group got the shaft more than the others" is all that productive, though. My grandparents got the shaft pretty hard, actually (see Robert's second paragraph). But I didn't get the shaft. I can't claim that I was oppressed, rounded up, or whatever, by the Nazis, because I wasn't alive.

We are all individuals. We are not "members of the X community" because of our skin color. We might be smart or dumb, our lives might have been hard or easy, we might have really suffered. But our grandparents, or their grandparents, are not us. I don't hate all Germans for what their grandparents did to my grandparents. That would be stupid. Nor do I insist that I am "oppressed"; actually I'm reminded that I have really been blessed, by the comparison!

See, slavery is one of the worst forms of oppression. One might argue that mass slaughter is worse, but whatever. But I don't know of anyone alive today who was a slave before 1865. They're all dead.

We mustn't forget that history, but nobody I encounter can legitimately claim that he or she was a slave under the pre-Lincoln American system. Nor can I claim that I was oppressed by the Hitler regime, because I wasn't alive. It would be silly to say that I'm a "member of the community that Hitler oppressed", and that therefore I am oppressed, despite my having had a pretty good life, and good opportunities -- even though my parents certainly still bear scars from their childhood, and this did impact me to an extent.

 

[Owen Sparks]

Just out of curiosity, do you know many black shooters? I live in a part of the country where every third person is black and I can't think of one. When the gun show comes to town there will be several hundred people there and usually not one black face in the crowd. On the rare occasion that a black guy is there, he is always off duty law enforcement. It's the same at shooting sport events like IDPA or IPSC. I only know one black hunter and I asked him once why that was and he could not figure it out either. None of his buddies were even remotly interested in hunting. Is it just this way in the South? Or black people just not interested in general?