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Mark Zuckerbeg (courtesy nytimes.com)

“Facebook is banning private sales of guns on its flagship social network and its Instagram photo-sharing service,” nytimes.com reports, “a move meant to clamp down on unlicensed gun transactions.” Such as . . . ? Never mind. Our friends at gunbroker.com must be over the moon, as Mark Zuckerberg’s minions once again act on the boss’s anti-gun rights agenda. Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America note: “Facebook said it would rely on its vast network of users to report any violations of the new rules, and would remove any post that violated the policy.” Here’s some gloating the antis prepared earlier . . .

New York’s attorney general, Eric T. Schneiderman, who has pressed for restrictions on illegal gun sales on Facebook and other sites, praised the company’s move.

“Today’s announcement is another positive step toward our shared goal of stopping illegal online gun sales once and for all,” he said in a statement on Friday.

Oh wait! There is an — one — example of an illegal gun sale via Facebook:

Everytown for Gun Safety presented Facebook with research connecting unlicensed gun sales on the site to gun violence. For example, Ms. Watts said, in December 2014, an Ohio man, Brian Harleman, shot and wounded his ex-girlfriend and killed her 10-year-old daughter before killing himself. Although prohibited from buying firearms because of a felony conviction, he was able to buy the weapon in an unlicensed sale on Facebook.

“We were saying, ‘Please stop the unfettered access to guns on Facebook,’ ” Ms. Watts, a mother of five in Colorado, said in an interview.

Anyway, Facebook’s website, Facebook’s rules. The question is: how long before they ban other types of firearms pages or content from the site?

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120 COMMENTS

    • Other than loaning a gun to my sister-in-law and selling her a Bersa 22, after I got my My Ruger SR 22.
      Otherwise, anything else went to a gun shop for sale on consignment.
      Not really into selling a handgun to a complete stanger.
      I do have a Face Book account, nothing ever posted, just use to keep up with friends/family who use it.
      Be that as it is, just another liberal snot, doing something that makes him feel good about himself!

        • Not only will I buy and sell to a complete stranger I have done so for decades. I do exactly what is required by Texas law during these transactions. No more, no less. After the move to shut down the bulk of home FFL holders it became the best option for me to try out a wide variety of firearms.

    • Don’t have one either. I’m just a middle-aged brown fat guy. 😉

      Ironically, the people who looked down on me because I didn’t have a FB login have been bailing out of FB in hurry for the last 3 years. Ha!

    • Giving up facebook because of this policy is not a good way to protest. Facebook is the best way to share the pro-gun message with others. Until there’s a viable competitor to Facebook, keep on facebooking. Social media is how we’ve finally been able to turn the tides of public opinion from anti-gun rights to pro-gun rights. Traditional media won’t run our stories, but social media will and it’s how we’ve finally convinced a majority that guns make people safer.

        • The NSA already knows we are all pro-gun as it is. I spend more than 10 grand a year on guns ammo, and range fees. I bet some guy at the IRS is like “Damn! This guy had a lot of guns and ammo!”. Your 4473 form, if you’ve ever filled one out, has eyes and ears.

          Why hide being pro-gun and pro-freedom? The very least you can do is to annoy liberal progressives with your pro-gun posts.

    • As a handy euphemism along the lines of WTF and STFU, I suggest using EXDEL in the future to save RF’s time and editing requirements. Everyone knows what it means and your point is made concisely.

      • There appears to have been a fairly recent policy change and we are free to talk like adults now.

        But maybe there is some weird filter I’m unaware of.

        • Mostly true, sir, but there is still the problem of being rude (ad hominem) to a particular person that is deemed inappropriate, being generally considered not only to lack logical consistency, but also to provide fodder for the anti-Second Amendment press/Interweb.

          In those cases a nice EXDEL serves the purpose, cannot be quoted by opposition press, and leaves RF free to do other things than delete the comment. Win-win.

  1. THIS is all over the fb gun sites right now. Zuck’s site -Zuck’s rules… There’s always Armslist…yeah I guess internet sites like GB and GunAuction are pretty happy. BTW HOW are they going to police who has an FFL? Gun narcs? ATF spies? Stasi? NSA?

    • Zuck’s site? Last I heard Fakebook is a publicly held company.
      The censorship policy thus becomes an issue for the Board of Directors, who report to the shareholders.

      If a baker can be sued for denying selling gay wedding decorations, why cant FakeBook be sued for denying legal commerce, around 2A civil rights?

      Seems to me there should be some prominent pro-freedom organizations that would be interested. Electronic Frontier Foundation? ACLU?

      Not that I personally give a hoot- I dont use FakeBook and never will, but there are others who have invested consderable effort in their business, and from whom FakeBook derives a benefit, who might consider this a breach of contract, and rightfully so, by self appointed censors like MDA, the faux mommies and apparently now stool pigeons for Bloomberg anti-gun campaign.

    • For kicks, do it encrypted. That oughta give Zuckerberg, Obama, and their crew a perfect “oh shit” unintended consequences moment.

  2. How long? Not very given gun control is now the cultural jihad of the progressives.

    In the long run for private sales, this means very little. Not only is gunbroker probably doing cartwheels, but Armslist is likely just as thrilled.

    It’s the perfect progressive situation. Appear to do something so you get credit for your good intentions, but do little or nothing to change the situation you profess to care about.

    Another plus, when FB and Instawhatever drop the hammer on young people for even posting anything positive and gun related, many will get a hard lesson in progressive tolerance and totalitarianism. It’ll be quite the eye opener.

  3. Do you want to make yourself a robbery target?
    Post your guns on Facebook then “check in” to a restaurant out of town or on vacation

    • I post lots of gun pics and gun related stuff on my page… And never post my location or schedule online. Plus theres always a car parked outside my house. So yes Mr burgler, I do have guns…. Wanna roll the dice and see if I’m home right now?

        • No tasers, but I have the guns, dogs, video and audio surveillance, automatic lighting, secure storage and CS Tear gas.
          My attitude, I don’t give a sh–, come roll the dice.

  4. I’m done with Facebook and this is why. Guns, in the United States, are not illegal. Gun owners are, statistically speaking, not criminals. Facebook is a private company and has every right to ban whatever they like from their site. I have the right to not use their service. That’s it. they have a problem with my perfectly legal hobby, and they have the right to not support it. I have the right not to support them.

    • Facebook is a public, not private, company.

      You can go to your brokerage account and buy a share right now if you like.

      And you can then go to the FB annual shareholder’s meeting and complain about the policy. If you like.

  5. First, i don’t have my face, err, face space, uuuhhh, u know what I mean, so who gives a flip what a private company n a virtual world does. Secondly, did the individual who sold said firearm to felon get charged and convicted of a crime. If not what r we talking about.

  6. I am staying on Facebook. I use it for work and personally, and frankly, if I had as much coin as Zuck and FB, my lawyers would advise me to do the same. If one person buys a gun he saw on FB, even legally, and commits a crime, guess who gets sued? Ten points if you don’t guess the penniless family of the criminal.

    So all of y’all go brag about how you hate FB or are now boycotting it. TTAG will still be there, and so will hundreds of other firearms pages. In fact, I need to go update my friend’s store page — gun store, in case I didn’t mention.

    • Yeah. I’ll keep mine too. Course it’s not in my real name.
      I noticed most of the gun related pages I belong to change their names from “bingo county gun sales and trades” to “bingo county firearms discussion group”.

    • I don’t use it at all. I use Twitter grudgingly, along with LinkedIn, because they’re a necessary evil for my business.

      Big Armslist fan, though. It’s been great for me, both before and after Colorado’s useless universal background check law.

  7. My next non-gun related FB posting – “I am NOT looking for a extremely clean, high quality 1911 in 45ACP like a Wilson Combat in a Commander model. Please DO NOT contact me at ###-###-#### nor by Email at …………. Thank you for your cooperation”

    • I just checked the local gun groups I’m a member of. There are plenty of new posts from today and yesterday. I wouldn’t be surprised if this was bullshit, like mark Zuckerberg is gonna give away a million dollars if you click like and this baby’s cancer will be cured and your pecked will be longer if you click share.

  8. My Facebook policy is a simple one. If you don’t already know what I am doing it is because you are not part of it or don’t need to know, therefor; ladies and gentleman, I don’t mess with Facebook. If I have not talked to you in years and you have no idea where I am it is because I don’t care about you, I don’t mess with Facebook. If you have no idea what I ate for lunch or how good sex was last night it is because you were not part of either one, I don’t mess with Facebook. No offense intended for anyone who may feel as though all of us need to know about your headache, limp dick, busted car, leaking faucets, cheating wife, slut daughter, idiot son, annoying neighbor, lost dog, dead cat, floating goldfish, and mysterious stain on your couch.

  9. So FB screws their users for the 999th time… (this is my shocked face 😀 ) How is this news?

    Frankly, I couldn’t care less. Known from the start that the imbecility that is the book-of-face was a privacy nightmare, among other things. People who joined and shared their souls will get no sympathy.

    • He’s a billionaire and a hunter – yes. I’m sure he’s not concerned with other people of his social status having guns, either. It’s the riff raff like you and me he’s concerned about.

  10. Never had a FacePalm account, and never will. Screw that arrogant little totalitarian; he doesn’t get any data or ad revenue from me.

    • Let’s be fair – the Jews are 100% not innocent. I’m opposed to Islam by a mile, but the fact is that Israel uses crazy settlers, and religious fiction as a real-estate proof of ownership, and that ain’t right.

      You have owned land for hundreds of years. Regardless of the government, this is your house, farm, hotel, whatever. These new overseers come in, and suddenly their religion gives them domain over your rightfully held property.

      Do tell how you would react in the USA were this to happen? I know there would be a whole lotta mess, and no matter who is was claiming their bullshit religion gives them my property, I guarantee my answer would be in lead and IEDs.

      • You have owned land for hundreds of years. Regardless of the government, this is your house, farm, hotel, whatever. These new overseers come in, and suddenly their religion gives them domain over your rightfully held property.

        Do tell how you would react in the USA were this to happen?

        Wait, I am confused. Are you talking about the Bundy ranch in Nevada, the Hammond ranch in Oregon, or the Palestinians and Israelis?

        • Just to put this to rest, the Palestinians are not a real thing and never were – they are a created fictional ethnic group. The Jews have lived in/owned/fought and died for the area now known as Israel for many thousands of years before the word Palestinian was even created. England, by force of arms, was the supposed “owner” of Israel/Palestine and it is they who decided to create the current state of Israel into which Jews from all over the world could immigrate. The fact that the Jews took advantage of this opportunity and the local Muslim population objected is hardly some deep conspiracy by Jews, ethnic or secular.

          As a matter of fact, the Jews in Israel are perfectly willing to share their country and its bounty with Arabs and Palestinians if they would only stop blowing themselves and others up or pulling knives on innocent people.

          And finally, how is what England did to/for Israel different from what we did to the Native American Indians?

        • Cliff, I’d like to see some unbiased citations for your fabulist version of the history of the Middle East. Palestine deniers are of the same stripe as Holocaust deniers. There is a reason that the Soviets used to say that Zionism was fascism.

        • Cliff, this is not about some amorphous idea, this is about physically taking your real property. Where do you think these ‘settlements’ get built? On someone else’s land. The modern state of Israel was founded by a bunch of terrorists who used car bombs in public markets to scare off the locals. That they are now used against them is rather a bit of irony.

          Regardless, the Israelis take land from people who own it, giving them little, to no compensation for doing so. They do it because they can, and if you think that won’t breed hatred and resentment, I don’t know what to tell you. That they do it in the name of their crackpot Abrahamic cult is just as bad as when the Muslims do it in the name of their crackpot Abrahamic cult.

          If you think Israel is somehow our friend or ally, you have absolutely no clue how they spy on us, attack our ships, and do whatever else they want when it suits them. These are at best frenemies and at worst, a duplicitous bunch of snakes.

        • Pg2 said:
          @cliff, your post has some serious revisionist history in it.

          Until the Zionists started settling Israel, there was hardly anyone living there. Mark Twain wrote about it in INNOCENTS ABROAD. The first sentence of chapter XLVII reads:
          “We traversed some miles of desolate country whose soil is rich enough, but is given over wholly to weeds—a silent, mournful expanse, wherein we saw only three persons—Arabs…” The “Palestinians” started arriving later, partly because of the increased economy brought by Zionists, and partly because the Ottoman Turks settled them there to provide a counter balance to the Zionists settling there. Here’s a free copy to read:

          http://www.gutenberg.org/files/3176/3176-h/3176-h.htm

          “Palestinians” are a people made up of whole cloth in order to fight Israel by means other than war.

      • Time for your history lesson. The “Palestinian Nation” was created by the KGB in 1964. Before that the non-Jewish residents were referred to as Arabs. The British reserved the term Palestinian for the Jews residing in the region.

        The name Palestine was coined by the Romans for the Roman Imperial provinces of Judea, which is where the term Jew comes from, and Samaria after the Jewish revolt was put down. There were few Arabs living there at the time. The only modern people who have the right to be called Palestinians today are the Jews and any Romanians who might live there.

        Hamas is part of the Muslim Brotherhood which was founded by Hassan al Banna in the 1920s. Al Hanna was an admirer of Adolph Hitler before he was Channcelor. The Brotherhood and its regional branch Hamas can rightly be called the Arab Nazi Party. So it is fair to label anybody who sympathizes with it a Nazi or Nazi sympathizer.

        • We’re talking about real property, leave aside all the state stuff, it’s a distraction to what really drives the conflict.

          Imagine the US government for whatever reason dissolves. The Japanese come in and take over. Do you still own your house, apartment, farm? What if they decide they will take it from you and (maybe) pay you 10 cents on the dollar, in the name of Shinto Buddhism? Because they have a mysterious book of nonsense that says that they are god’s chosen people? How’s that make you feel? Are you just going to roll over and take that?

          That’s what happens. That’s where the real animus is derived from.

        • Man, I will never get why Israel drives folks nuts. Grew up in the northeast. First real gf was a Jewish chick. Still think about her now an then. Jews are Ok, really. They got their piece of land now and not letting go. That is the way of the der Welt. Nothing is truly owned in fee simple. Everyone’s warranty deed, if you look back far enough, is written in blood.

          So, the Shumash tribe (sic) gotta raw deal; get over it. (Gratuitous Buffy reference).

          That being said the US seems to slavishly support the Israeli state. I just don’t get it. They can stand on their own. They are a strong tribe.

          It pisses me of you get jews like Zuck and Bloomberg who want to disarm us and are completely down with the immivasion and live in their high castle whilst I gotta go strapped to the damn gas station. RF should call them and tell em to get their g*d damn heads outta their asses.

          I mean, I get it. The plan, I guess, was to water down native stock to prevent shoah 2.0 (hence – 1965 immigration reform). But now we are flooded with a bunch of folks who aren’t wallowing in white guilt and ethnic loathing. (Seriously – have a talk with the cool dude at the local Wang Palace about, say, blacks; it’s bloody hilarious – they aren’t buying what the the Elites are selling. They’re moving their tribe in and could care less, c.f. replacement of Blacks in Compton by Hispanics.). Frankfurt school long march has left elites unable to think clearly about the weather and, unless things change, Goyim are, alas, over in done. Stale, pale and male as RF would say. NYT recently did a story on the “white death” (worth looking up on the Vaul-Tec term). Bottom line, gents, white working class offing ourselves with booze and painkillers.

          That being said – lots places other than FB to sell guns – for now at least.

          SO, really, Zuck, Bloomy – How do you think its gonna work out for the average rank an file member of the tribe? Why the hell do you think the Jews are getting out of Paris and heading back to Zion?

  11. Bans posts about private gun sales, but does nothing with the beheading posts made by ISIS and it’s followers.

    Screw ZuckerJew.

  12. Everybody seemed to have more interesting lives than me, so that’s mainly why I quit Facebook.

    “If you invited me to Cancun, I would have said yes.”

    • Regional groups when people in you area post what they have for sale.
      Not just guns. Cars, trucks, ATVs, tools, jewlery, and more.

      Finding local stuff on Armslist/gunbroker is harder and many potential sellers don’t even know about them.

      Newspapers used to be the goto place, but not many even publish classified now.

  13. Now if only they would take a stand against actual illegal behavior….. pfffft Facebook because creepy vans with free kittens are sooooo 1990

  14. I honestly don’t care. Facebook is a business, they have a right to dictate what gets posted via the services they provide.

  15. “Although prohibited from buying firearms because of a felony conviction, he was able to buy the weapon in an unlicensed sale on Facebook.”

    Huh, I must have missed the payment and shipping options for firearms on facebook.

    • One would have to assume it was a local and face-to-face transaction which did not require shipping or the crossing of state lines. As there is not, in most jurisdictions, any law against such transactions this is hardly and illegal sale or an illegal gun, even though there is NOTHING in the Second Amendment that would give any government entity the authority to designate the transfer of firearms or the purchaser of firearms as “illegal”.

      “…shall not be infringed.”

      If such transactions cannot be propagated through FaceBook then sellers/buyers will simply find another medium. I hardly think this will have much of an effect on supposed illegal and non-NICS transfers.

      • It is illegal forbthst buyerbto receive a firearm.
        It is also illegal to knowingly transfer one ti a prohibited person.

        In that case, the criminal commited another crime. That mages the transaction illegal.

        Should the seller have known the buyer was prohibited? Ifbso, then he is culpable too.

  16. Local groups who use FB to trade are already working out creative ways to continue to do so without violating any of FB’s policies.

  17. I guess I’m really glad that I’m not so sophisticated to want a social media page. Instagram and Facebook Can both take a big long kiss my white ass! Anti gun anti freedom anti constitutional pieces of garbage.

  18. Meh, don’t do FascistBook. Zuckerberg doesn’t care as long as you’re continuing to be the cattle he can serve his ads up to and extract personal information from. Don’t forget, YOU are the product if they’re not selling you anything.

  19. These days, it seems anybody can dig up information on whoever they want, with minimal effort. Very few people in this world are looking out for your best interests. Anything you post on bookface is there forever. It’s the equivalent of handing out free ammunition to anybody that wants it. Nothing against it, but not for me…

  20. So, I see tough guy Bundy is now whining and complaining about wanting to home to the wife and kids and the people remaining in the refuge want to be released without charges. So much for dying for the cause. When push came to shove they all caved except Finicum who was an idiot.

  21. Gonna go post a fictitious gun for sale on FB and see how many little commies snitch me off. Those are the real enemies.

  22. Seems to me transactions will still be taking place as long as we are in touch with our feelings. From a posting on a gun selling group I belong to:

    We no longer have the “sell” option. This is now a show and tell group. From now on post a picture, how much it is worth, and location.

    Tell the public how you feel about your firearms. How much you feel it’s worth, how you feel at your location, and how you feel about the condition of your firearm.

    Take that shit on the down low. Dealing with feelings and emotions and shit isn’t a strong point of mine.

    Serious, this is now like a messenger notification page. You will be notified of an incoming feeling message from another person that feels an emotion for your firearm too.

    Have a rainbow day sprinkled with unicorn farts! Feel jolly rockin an M4 and beta mag or AK-47 with a 75 round drum freshly lubricated with liberal tears of sorrow that we have the 2nd Amendment. Spread the sunshine fresh smell of burnt powder and hear the brass metallic cartridges ping off of the gravel.

    That’s right. I fucking said it.

  23. Everyone hates FB and your so cool for not having one, we get it. However without Facebook I wouldn’t have found the H&K SL8 I’m on my way to buy right now. Or my SIG 556, or the 627 Performance center with a 2.5 inch barrel.
    If you’re a Glock and AR guy FB is probably useless but if you are looking for something unusual it’ll show up on FB eventually.

  24. You want a good way to protest this? There steps.

    1. Buy a share of Facebook stock.
    2. Attend Facebook annual meeting.
    3. Protest!

    Facebook is a public – not private – company. So to those who say it’s MZ’s site so he can do what he wants with it: no. He sold it, it’s not his anymore. He ultimately answers to the shareholders, and there’s a mechanism for them having a say if they’re unhappy.

    (And yes, I know, board of directors, special shares, controlling interests, etc. All true. But the company isn’t solely his anymore. )

    • I have a barely functioning knowledge of economics, but maybe buying shares, waiting for them to increase in value, selling them off for profit, and then using that money to buy firearms/ammo would be even better. If that’s how this sort of thing works.

  25. “Facebook said it would rely on its vast network of users to report any violations of the new rules, and would remove any post that violated the policy.”

    Political speech, “hate” speech, guns……the list will continue to grow.

  26. Well, having never used any FB gun groups, I’ve managed to limp along with calguns.net when I was behind enemy lines, and now Texas Gun Trader and Reddits /r/gunsforsale, which makes FB look pennyante in comparison.

    I’ve found many good deals on all of the above, and also perusing the used/consignment counters at my local Cabelas and other gun shops.

    I do have a FB account, under one of the names of David Ryder (look that phrase up on youtube), and applied for some of the local, private gun groups, but haven’t been accepted into the clique, so effem.

  27. In my dealings with Facebook for a NPO, I’ve learned that they have no interest in privacy or the security of information, regardless of what their hype claims. So another irrational sketchy policy doesn’t surprise me in the least.

  28. Just another public figure becoming a sheeple and making it harder for law abiding citizens to buy sell and trade firearms. Government BITCH!!!!!!!

  29. So, here’s the three things…

    1 – Zuck, having made his pile, is now looking for affirmation for other reasons, in this case by having the right opinions. This does not do great stuff for the people who work building or operating the org he built, or the people building or operating the many things that org depends on. But, he has his. So, time for some Thorstein Veblen.(*)

    2 – Zuck is smart enough, but the primary skill of the one-shot moguls is noticing the main chance. They find a seam in the world, created by the work of others. Then, they jump on that seam. You gotta be smart to get into, and graduate from Harvard. BUT their main skill, differentiating quality, is a preternatural sensitivity to the main chance. Which is what gets them into Harvard.

    3 – Economically, what is the value of Facebook, as virtue signaling by the Face-y overlords drives actual transactions out of that sample? Zuck pockets some virtue signaling, and doubtless a lighter touch from the over-overlords that regulate commerce and so on. There’s a reason that all the tech companies opened massive lobbying organizations once they got big.

    Is Zuck’s driving commerce away from the platform in line with his fiduciary responsibility to the investors? folks who work there? customers and business partners?

    Bonus – How do we know? This has all happened before, and it will all happen again.

    (*) Conspicious consumption as a kind of wealth signaling, developed as an economic theory by Thorstein Veblen, most famously in his “Theory of the Leisure Class.” These days they use the terms “positional goods” and “virtue signaling.”

    Consider Bloomie & the clueless anti’s position as a kind of positional-good, virtue-signaling. So, Zuck’s on board, to make sure he keeps getting invited to Davos.

    (BTW, I thought money in politics was bad. So, along with the Bloomie trying to buy legislation and referenda in places he does not live, Zuck is only doing social engineering once emboldened by the safety of his wealth. Money in politics. In this case hs using his position to de-legitimize guns, gun activity and so on. Remove it from the cultural mindshare. As someone said, “Politics is downstream of culture.” Can’t have sane, rational, regular FaceGram users calmly, responsibly selling and using guns. That’ll contradict the foaming troll caricature behind the prohibitions. Can’t have that.)

    Place this in the context of class distinctions between mainly urban, cognitive workers even if not rich, and folks in “flyover country” who regularly interact with what we call the real world. One might have a different notion for how much of reality is culturally determined, from those experiences. Also, a different take on personal responsibility, and the management of risk in the world. Using “bitterly clinging” and guns as the example, discuss how this contrast in POV might impact policy notions. Bonus points for non-standard application of “othering.”

    Frakking everybody in a first-world life should get their behinds out into their own yard, manage a kitchen garden, and maybe a small woodlot, to stay connected to the reality of what holds up their big notions, floating in air. The urban / vertical farming movement will be in for a surprise in about a generation. On the one hand, once it works, “access” to sun & etc. becomes a property right for all those warren-dwellers, giving them some sympatico to those besotted rural folk who more nearly live off the land directly. On another, stuff just won’t be talked into growing, giving them a direct experience with hands-on reality.

    They might also have something worth stealing, outside their locked doors, so might experience why rule of law is useful.

  30. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that “fettering” facebook sales of guns will do exactly nothing to prevent crime. It’s a nice dream, though.

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