A new anti-gun group from the Land of Hope and Glory has pinged TTAG’s radar: Action on Armed Violence. Yesterday I received a press release from AOV that directed me to an article by Armeghan Taheri, a self-described Afghan German | Women/Human Rights Activist | Social Justice Advocate | Lawyer | Intersectional Feminist. The American Exception: US responses to mass shootings takes exception to America’s failure to enact more gun control legislation in the aftermath of mass shootings. In it, Ms. Taheri occasionally bumps into what Mr. Gore called inconvenient truth . . .
The shift towards other control mechanisms such as background checks might not be ideal from a mass shooting prevention standpoint, but it does have a potentially salutary effect by making it more difficult for those with criminal backgrounds to acquire firearms.
So universal background checks aren’t ideal and might – might – make it more difficult for criminals to acquire firearms. I’d buy that for a dollar! I mean, pound. Aside from this sop to common sense, Ms. Taheri doesn’t have an original idea in her head on gun control. Her dietribe [sic] concludes by repeating ye olde “easy access to guns” creates crime meme.
There is one commonality between mass shootings and that type of gun violence, and that is the easy availability of weapons. Until that is addressed, both types of violence will likely remain a regular feature in U.S. headlines.
So all we have to do to reduce “gun violence” is restrict access to guns to law-abiding citizens. Sigh. Anyway, I answered AOV’s TTAG-tweaking Tweet (also sent to dozens of other pro-gun Twitterers) thusly:
