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The 2014 Gallup poll on gun ownership reveals that 54 percent of American gun owners are either black or non-white. While I love me some OWFG gun owners – they believe in individual liberty for all Americans regardless of race, color or creed – you can’t say that Old Fat White Guys represent firearms ownership in America. What’s more, as our “I am a gun owner” Facebook gallery proved, gun owners are not old, stupid, fat, ignorant, paranoid Southern racists. Someone should tell that to Mark Morford . . .

After portraying the last sales surge as a racist reaction to the election of an African-American president, the sfgate.com blogger fingers Ferguson as the “secret” motivation for record Black Friday firearms sales. Morford’s anti-ballistic biles flows freely . . .

So. Want to try and unpack this creepy factoid [the record number of NICS checks over the Black Friday weekend]? Break it down a little? It’s not difficult:

You’re a scared white person, almost certainly male. You do not live in a major city, or near a university or intellectual hub of any note, nor have you ever traveled very far from your home town, much less out of state or anywhere further than, say, Mexico. Once. And that was enough.

You do not read complicated books. You do not like new or weird things. You watch lots of TV, mostly Fox News, which rejoices in showing you endless images of angry foreigners and minorities in pain: tear gas explosions, fights in the streets, looting, this time involving sad, small-town black people in Ferguson, all of them protesting the acquittal of that murderous white cop.

“But it’s not only Missouri!” squeal a number of crudely pink-faced blondes on Fox News. “Angry black people – and white liberals too! – are protesting everywhere, from Oakland to Chicago to New York, perhaps even somewhere within, say, 200 miles of where you live!” Too close for comfort, that’s for sure.

I forgot to mention that Morford bases his puddle of consciousness anti-gun owner rant on “at least one shop owner” who said “a large percentage of gun buyers mentioned one singular event as a motivating factor for their purchase.” The thing of it is . . .

I agree! I reckon the rioting in Ferguson did drive much of the Black Friday ballistic bonanza. The event showed millions of Americans that the police (and the National Guard) will let lawless thugs burn and pillage a city without lifting a finger to protect life or property. When push comes to shove, we law-abiding [well-travelled book reading non-racist] Americans must defend ourselves. By force of arms.

The fact that firearms prices have cratered since the last sales surge, when demand outstripped supply by a wide margin, was also a contributing factor. Never underestimate the general public’s ability to sniff out a bargain, and their desire to capitalize on one when they see it. Anyway, Mark, tell us how you really feel . . .

There is, to date, no obvious fact, no impossible-to-deny piece of data that will convince the scared, paranoid gun fetishists of America that firearms are not merely dangerous, but also savage and cruel, tools of hate that invite not only more violence and suffering, but their own inevitable destruction.

We know guns do not make you safer. They do not prevent crime. They do not protect families. The NRA cannot trot out a single stat that proves guns improve society in any conceivable or measurable way; in fact, it’s just the opposite. Every piece of data we have proves guns are spiritual, moral and social poison.

How about this, then [via wikipedia]?

Estimates over the number of defensive gun uses vary, depending on the study’s population, criteria, time-period studied, and other factors. Higher end estimates by Kleck and Gertz show between 1 to 2.5 million DGUs in the United States each year. Low end estimates cited by Hemenway show approximately 55,000-80,000 such uses each year. Middle estimates have estimated approximately 1 million DGU incidents in the United States.

Morford’s rant relies on the Big Lie propaganda technique. Civilian gun ownership is bad. Period. Those stories of Americans saving lives with guns? They don’t exist! Well, not if you close your eyes, plug your ears and say “nananananana!” I mean, Morford really is that childish. Only a lot more mean-spirited.

The more scared you are, the more isolated, the less educated and the less traveled and the less exposed to unfamiliar ideas, to different modes of life, to the Other, to the staggering and effervescent variety of human existence, the more you will see a gun as an obvious and necessary choice.

But here’s the surreal catch: it’s not for protection, per se. It’s not about the childish fantasy of how the gun defends against the rapist, or the drug dealer, or the Russian mafia kingpin who kidnapped your daughter for the second time, and this time it’s personal.

The gun is uncomplicated, primitive defense against something far more terrifying and murky: everything you do not know. Guns provide an illusion of security, a violent, make-believe defense against a world that’s too complex, with injustices too prodigious, rage too tempting and calm, peaceful acts of love far too difficult to locate. They make you feel, in short, like you might have a chance.

But as the Ferguson/Michael Brown tragedy proved (for the 10,000th time), despite all that savage promise, the gun fails. Like it always has. Like it always will. Every. Single. Time.

Morford’s underlying theme is the same one we encounter every single time gun control advocates get their dander up. Gun owners are emotionally immature, intellectually ignorant provincials. Gun control advocates are smarter, wiser, more sophisticated and emotionally stable. Therefore the anti-gun elite must force gun owners to do the right thing: give up their guns. For their own good. And that of society as a whole.

With certain low-price exceptions, the gun doesn’t fail. It does what it’s designed to do. Americans use guns – if only as a deterrent – to protect themselves, their families and their communities from criminals, crazies, killer cops and tyrannical governments. They use guns to put food on the table. They use guns for fun. As for Morford, I refer him to Mark Twain. “It’s better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than open it and remove all doubt.”

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107 COMMENTS

  1. It’s a shame that people will read his article and be duped by his fear of inanimate objects. People like him just don’t get it…

    • I didn’t bother to read it. I couldn’t get past the picture. No offense to gay people, but even they have to admit…that is such a gay picture. He looks like Craig Kilborn with AIDS.

    • “But as the Ferguson/Michael Brown tragedy proved…” Not really getting what he means here. I do not think “the gun” failed when Wilson was charged at.

  2. Huh, just a day ago TTAG posted a video about a ten year old female who shoots guns and loves it and is more mature and articulate than most gun grabbers. Mr. Colion Noir is not white last I checked. I have traveled the world, live right next to NYC in NJ (trying to move to PA) and live near many universities (Rutgers, Kean, FDU) though I wouldn’t call them intellectual hubs… at all. I have read some of the most complex books. I doubt Mr. Blogger here would understand much by Murray Rothbard.

    With all that said, there is nothing wrong with the person he tried to paint as a “bad” person. He is just being sexist, racist, and ageist.

    • Ok, while I agree with you Rothbard isn’t very complicated and his entire concept of anarcho-capitalism is a contradiction seeing that under anarchy property rights can’t exist which kind of makes capitalism, a Marxist term at that, impossible. It takes a collective entity known as the government to enforce the contracts that make property rights possible.

      • I do not intend to argue this here, but just because you disagree with something does not make it simplistic, though I don’t think Rothbard is unnecessarily complicated anyway. Think about the argument we could get into, about property rights and whether they need government to enforce and then by extension whether any rights can exist with or without government etc. Sounds complicated. If you want to argue you it go to reddit.com/r/anarcho_capitalism

      • “It takes a collective entity known as the government to enforce the contracts that make property rights possible.”

        Your understanding of “property rights” and “land ownership” is very ethnocentric.

        Tell “you must have contracts” to the Yolngu, for example, or any other indigenous people that existed in a region prior the arrival of Roman legal influences.

        Human interactions can be far more complex and subtle than our seemingly one-dimensional “here’s how you have to do it” education would suggest…

        • And we have the typical misinterpretation and application of what goes on in a primitive culture to an advanced, and by advanced I mean in social organization not technology, societies. Primitive nomadic tribes are not without a governing body but that rule of law doesn’t extend beyond the group. Your little village may be a perfect utopia but the village just up river that controls your water supply might not care about it. Tell me how do you work out your differences and who enforces the decision?

        • Okay, so lets say something different: “In order to have an advanced economy (and by this we mean a universally accepted currency, capital markets [banking, investments, loans, etc], and enforceable property rights to both real estate and goods), you have to have contracts. Any civilization that doesn’t develop something akin to contracts and contract law can never progress past a certain point economically.”

          And what the fuck does that have to do with ethnicity? The Chinese figured out something like contracts without ever having any meaningful contact with the Romans. The Jews had something akin to contracts and even property rights (the Biblical story of Jacob, IIRC, gives the religious justification for land ownership, and was expanded upon by John Locke) long before the rise of Rome.

        • “Tell me how do you work out your differences and who enforces the decision?”

          Ask the Yolgnu and other indigenous people of that continent. Their culture has existed about 60,000 years…far longer than the system of centralized control you seem to salivate over.

          Their way of life seemed to work pretty well…even though you disparage them with terms like “primitive” and with perfect ethnocentric predictability refer to your own system as “advanced.”

          I don’t expect you to agree or even fully grasp what I’m saying. But, their system DID work well for tens of thousands of years…until some outsiders showed up and started saying “There is only one right way, and we have it. Here’s how you SHOULD be doing things.”

          There is no rational data to support your model of “government” is objectively better. No system of organized laws and contracts and all you claim HAS to exist has existed anywhere near the time their culture not only survived, but thrived.

          Government did to them the only thing it does well…subjugate free people. Defend that position all you want, and make silly extrapolations like I love anarchy (not true, by the way…but you will undoubtedly cling to your false dichotomy if past comments are any indication), but government is what it is.

          Government seeks to govern, and that extends far beyond mere “dispute resolution.” Nice try, though; I’ll admit that.

        • Government to enforce contracts is needed if any society is to advance to any sort of modern technology.

  3. I’ll give the author credit for one thing: that may be the single most offensive, hate-filled, condescending article regarding firearms that I have read in a long time. Congratulations!

    • And, he’s also completely wrong.

      I did not buy a gun on Black Friday, but that’s because I don’t “participate” in Black Friday sales stuff.

      Still, though, let’s break down his screed applying it to ‘gun owner stereotype.’

      “You do not live … near a university

      Wrong

      or intellectual hub of any note,

      Nice “Begging the Question” tautology, there. Logic fail, which is kinda funny to me for someone so pompous to make such a failure with an assertion about ‘living near an intellectual hub.’

      nor have you ever traveled very far from your home town,

      Wrong

      much less out of state or anywhere further than, say, Mexico.

      Swatting aside your adolescent condescension, again…wrong.

      Once.

      Wrong

      And that was enough.

      What the hell does that even mean? Aside from being, again, WRONG, is it up to YOU to decide who travels when and how often as some measure of human worth?

      Words cannot begin to describe the level of a$$holishness you display, Mr. Morford.

      You do not read complicated books.

      Again, so wrong. You simply have no idea. I’ve WRITTEN complicated books as well as read them.

      You do not like new or weird things.

      Wrong.

      You watch lots of TV

      Wrong. Don’t even own a TV.

      mostly Fox News

      Wrong. When I watch anything at all on TV, it’s not “news” on any channel.

      So, basically, Mr. Morford, your entire bit here is nothing more than fantasy pulled out of your own rear-end. It must be nice to live life so deluded that you think you have the first clue how the rest of the world, ie, those of us that apparently don’t meet your criteria for “acceptable intelligence” by living in a major (polluted and overcrowded) city or near some elitist “intellectual hub of any note,” live.

      You, sir, are an absolute disgrace; you epitomize everything that is wrong with contemporary American education and the pseudo-intellectual movement it has spawned – the self serving elitism, the pompous arrogance and the most important, the blatant stupidity that arises from not looking inward at your own ignorance and how you might improve yourself by correcting it.

      • Here here. Could not have said it better myself. Your last paragraph was quite spot on. It’s unbelievable to me that his piece was actually approved by an editor. You can literally feel the condescension dripping from his words.

      • His basic argument is that if you are not him, or just like him, you are some sort of imbecile. I do have a TV, I really enjoy “The Voice” and “Jeopardy”. Never watch Fox. To watch is my decision, nobody else’s.
        The wife and I run in to plenty of his ilk when we are attending events downtown, we are donors for the Opera House, and enjoy opera and ballet. Of course, we see a lot of rock and roll in the summer as well, the local amphitheater is a short motorcycle ride away.
        It is ironic to watch one of those who oppose “stereotyping”, racial profiling, etc….doing exactly that, smugly.

    • Nice stereotyping.

      I have a Bachelor’s in Biochemistry, and support laser-based cell analysis instrumentation for my company’s customers. I am fluent in English, Spanish, and can get by in French with a couple of weeks of immersion. Italian would take me a few months. While I am aging (not quite old), white, and have a bit of a belly, I do travel (three continents) extensively; I’ve read the King James Bible, The Iliad, Homer’s Odyssey, Dumas, a whole laundry list of (idiotic) existentialist “intellectuals,” routinely teach Ph.D.’s and M.D.’s at universities, and have forgotten more about ballistics than you know about gun owners.

      I enjoy sunsets, playful kittens, spicy food, and walks on the beach while contemplating whirled peas.

      To Morford: I struggle to love the sinner while hating the sin, so your article challenges me. However, I will teach my kids not to despise people like you for trying to make their lives worse. I teach them that the Constitution is the highest law of the land because it is consistent with God’s law, and that to step on one of its acknowledged rights is to invalidate them all. Your freedom of speech is no less valuable than my freedom to arm myself against villains and tyrants.

  4. Wow, what Morford wrote was the most ignorant, uneducated, and racist thing I’ve ever had the displeasure to read.

    Oh and apparently because I bought a gun on black friday I’m considered “white” now? Be careful Mr. Monford, your ignorance is showing.

  5. Looks like another entry in a “how many hopelessly shopworn clichés can you pack into an article” contest, anti-gun division. If Morford thinks that such terminally insufferable liberal smugness will persuade anybody who isn’t already firmly on the plantation to switch to his side, he’s even more stupid than this rant indicates.

  6. Except that gun owners have bettered educated and have more money than non-gun owners, guns being expensive toys and all that. Gun owners are probably better traveled than non-gun owners as well since many have been in the military. Gun owners just travel to different places. Oh and by the way Mr. Morford, people who watch Fox News didn’t get fooled by Jonathan Gruber the way readers of the NYT did.

  7. Funny, the more educated and traveled I get, the more it confirms what a joke liberal nanny statism is, and what gift the Right to Keep and Bear Arms truly is.

  8. Just another “Denounce, Demonize, Marginalize, Neutralize” progression of propaganda from a pajama boy armchair activist. Against whom the most appropriate response is “Derision, Fisking, Raucous Laughter”.

    • +1. Morford is just another progtard pundit desperate for attention and eyeballs in the shrinking demographic known as the Kos Kids Kool Klub, where SJWs and the beta males abused by them go for quips to post on twitter over their double macchiato starbux.

      Mock Them.™
      And
      Punch Back Twice As Hard™ with the facts.

      Here is a spot-on insight about the sociopathic narcissim of hate-speecb coming from Morford, by a shrink w/ 30 yrs experience:

      (tldr: scroll down to second gray shaded paragraph)

      http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2014/12/black_crime_claims_life_of_apologist_for_black_crime.html

      ( h/t from the comment section at sfgate) linking to an article by Colin Flaherty, author of “White Girl Bleed A Lot”

  9. to answer this moron: I am half Mexican graduated high school with a 4.2, have lived in china, (really hammers home the need for 2a) currently am top of my class at UNR, i have an iq of 151 and am more well read than many of my professors and a CCed handgun has saved my sister from being raped. SF and places like it churn out idiots like this faster than would seem to be possible.

    • Not to dispute your claim, but capitalization, punctuation, and diction can really go a long way to support your claim to an I.Q. of 151.

      • I would disagree. I have a friend who I would consider borderline genius. He can design electrical circuits better than I can draw a stick figure, is designing and building his own 3D printer without any plans, and he has an incredibly sharp mind for physics and aerospace engineering, yet he can’t even spell the word “media” properly.

      • “Not to dispute your claim, but capitalization, punctuation, and diction can really go a long way to support your claim to an I.Q. of 151.”

        Nope. Some of the really brilliant ones couldn’t give a sh!t what others think of them.

        They simply operate at a level that is completely alien to the ‘normals’ out there.

  10. What a snobby elitist! You can tell he can’t stand anyone that does anything (including guns) he doesn’t personally approve. He delves immediately into ad hominem attacks, calling folks stupid, uneducated, and unsophisticated. This is the definition of emotional lashing out and a bit of projection. As someone who has a Master’s degree and has traveled the US, my purchase isn’t influence by fear or paranoia, but after reading an emotional screed like this, maybe we need to be extremely wary of folks like the author who cannot control their emotions and exist with a deep rage and hatred in their heart for anyone different from them.

    • “… maybe we need to be extremely wary of folks like the author who cannot control their emotions and exist with a deep rage and hatred in their heart for anyone different from them.”

      Nailed it! This makes a very good case for wanting to be armed … so we can defend ourselves should people like Mr. Morford ever direct law and policy in our nation.

  11. I lived 4 out of the 7 years of my adult life outside of America, I currently study at U of I in Champaign/Urbana, and my favorite food in the world is mutton curry with naan. But I am a white, male, gun owner so I apparently am exactly the same as all the other American gun owners. How can someone pretend to be against racism but then broadly stereotype over a hundred million people?

  12. I read the original article. This guy is a pussy (i.e. SF-metrosexual) with no idea of anyone outside his circle of like-minded libs. BTW: I have a graduate degree, have traveled the world and do watch FOX news.

    I bought ammo on black Friday, because Rural King has a sale.

  13. You do not live in a major city, or near a university or intellectual hub of any note, nor have you ever traveled very far from your home town, much less out of state or anywhere further than, say, Mexico.
    I graduated with an Honors Engineering Degree. and many colleges have satellite schools. I have been to numerous locations within the USA. I travel to Canada and forget Mexico.
    You do not read complicated books… I read numerous technical and historical books and magazines.
    You do not like new or weird things… I utilize fairly new and complicated technology.
    You watch lots of TV, …no I do not.
    mostly Fox News…yes, and Breitbart on the Internet.,
    which rejoices in showing you endless images of angry foreigners and minorities in pain: tear gas explosions, fights in the streets, looting, this time involving sad, small-town black people in Ferguson, all of them protesting the acquittal of that murderous white cop…no, I watch images of stupid foreigners and minorities commit crimes resulting in explosions, mindless riots in the street, looting and stealing, involving zombie animals in Ferguson, some of them rioting over anything that pops in their heads but pretending to have outrage over the acquittal of the cop who defended his life against the “Gentle Giant”.
    “But it’s not only Missouri!” squeal a number of crudely pink-faced blondes on Fox News. “Angry black people – and white liberals too! – are protesting everywhere, from Oakland to Chicago to New York, perhaps even somewhere within, say, 200 miles of where you live!” Too many mindless morons for comfort, that’s for sure.
    Fixed it for you!

  14. I’m a white guy, kinda old, but I’m not afraid. I own guns.

    Oh, and I’ve been to 7 countries (none of them Mexico), live near Atlanta, and I’m pretty sure my B.S. degree is better than Morford’s degree in pantywaist limpwristing.

    • A B.S. degree in actual BS would be better than Morford’s degree in pantywaist limpwristing…the art of BS actually often takes some semblance of creative intelligence to do (convincingly or with humor), a trait Morford demonstrates he clearly lacks.

  15. Don’t fall into the liberal trap of trying to justify who you are just to appease Mr. Morford’s ignorance. From the best I could tell, Mr. Morford is an “intellectual” without a secondary education. At best, he’s a hack yoga teacher with a blog. It comforts him to believe that gun owners don’t run in his social circles. That they’re “country folk” who live hundreds, if not thousands of miles away. Well, I hate to break the news to you, Mr. Morford. Chances are, there’s a gun owner living on your block. Yes, even in your precious San Francisco. He/She frequents the stores you shop at and the coffee house you blog from. You may have even…*gasp*…had a conversation with one (or several). So, next time you attempt to “degrade and destroy” (see what I did there) those decent people who live among you, you might want to take a look in the mirror. Certainly a gay man in today’s society can appreciate a particular group’s desire to exercise their rights and be left alone.

    • I’ll bet they even use the same drinking fountains he does. I’ll bet he thinks something oughta be done about that.

  16. I didn’t buy a gun this black Friday, mostly because I didn’t see anything I wanted on sale. But I did buy ammo, and a Sig hat.

    Lets see I have two Universities within 15 miles of my house and a smattering of both public and private colleges.

    I don’t know what an intellectual center is. I would think a University would qualify, but that wouldn’t make sense.

    I’ve been out of my state pretty regularly, as I travel several times a year for shooting matches. I’ve also been to Mexico, Canada, and Europe. I will be taking another trip to Europe in 2016 for the NRA AP World Shoot if my finances align.

    I love books, and read well over a hundred a year, the last book I read I finished yesterday, The Martian (which is quite good, and on sale). I don’t mind complicated things, depends on my mood. My guns are pretty complicated too.

    I don’t watch TV per say, I do buy some shows on Amazon and watch them along with some Hulu viewing.

    So I am not sure how I fit in his stereotype.

  17. But as the Ferguson/Michael Brown tragedy proved (for the 10,000th time), despite all that savage promise, the gun fails. Like it always has. Like it always will. Every. Single. Time. Soooo…those people defending the gas station with AR-15s failed? The orientals who defended their stores during the riots in LA failed?

  18. “The more scared you are, the more isolated, the less educated and the less traveled and the less exposed to unfamiliar ideas, to different modes of life, to the Other, to the staggering and effervescent variety of human existence, the more you will see a gun as an obvious and necessary choice.”

    You know that’s funny, because about half the gun owners I know have advanced degrees running the gammut from doctors and lawyers to engineers and scientists, and have travelled all over the world for pleasure, business, and charity. None of them are close-minded, and almost all are willing to have lively discussions on religion, politics, and any other subject you care to bring up. So remind me again, Mr. Morford, who here is the bigot?

  19. His article is nothing more than the ramblings of a madman. My parents came to America (legally!) from South Korea in the 1970’s. Most Koreans I know, myself included, are gun owners, whether to protect our businesses, our families, for recreation or because we serve on police departments or the military. He clearly has an axe to grind and is a very angry person, I just can’t take him seriously.

    • My folks came here legally in 72. Asian gun owner who bought a Sig on Black Friday. The moron who wrote that piece got three strikes with his first three assertions.

  20. Just a bit of errata, I don’t think that study says that 54% of gun owners are non-white, black. Most of the categories don’t add up to 100%. Some are way more. OTOH it would mean that 22% of gun owners are neither male nor female…

    I believe what the study says is that 44% of “whites” own guns, 27% of “non-whites” and 27% of “blacks”

  21. On another note about polls, look at the percentages over time, and see if you still believe the numbers are at all representative. For example, From 2002 to 2003, the number of gun owners in this country (at least according to Gallup) jumped 9%. Think about that. That means that over the course of a single year, there were approximately 30 million NEW gun owners. I think not. Then compare 2003 and 2004, where the numbers go from 43% to 38%. Apparently over that year, about 15 million gun owners vanished into thin air. Polls are a terrible way to collect data.

  22. I’ve been all over the country, and out several times. I attend school for Political Science and Arabic. I live within ten minutes of my university, and not only do I own a firearm, I carry frequently (whenever I can depending on where I go as allowed by law. I have several friends who are black, asian, latino and almost all own firearms and carry habitually. So where, oh where, do we fit into this little bubble that Mark Morford puts us in so neatly when we go out for Black Friday?

    As an aside, I went to rural North Carolina for Thanksgiving to see my folks. Naturally, on Black Friday I figured I’d cruise the local gun shops. In a rural area outside of Durham, it was a neat 50/50 split on race of the people buying firearms. Who’s the racist here? Certainly not the wide variety of people who chose to exercise their 2nd Amendment right on the back of a sweet Black Friday deal.

  23. I was expecting this to be from Raw Story, or maybe MJ, given the all too familiar superiority complex tone and language that itself has become a hallmark of the abject failure of progressivism and critical race-theory that is discredited anywhere but inside the increasingly closed loop of fantasy thinking in academia in the diversity and gender studies majors.

    But since its sfgate, I understand there is an old, foolish and self-hating population of drama-queens that still pays for ads, for leather chaps, on the Castro, etc…and sfgate has to have “meat to throw to the dogs”, as the marketers say.

    And without pretending to speak the entire LGBT community, its obvious to the long time news reader, that Morford is also not representative of that community, if only evidenced by comparison to the calm rationality of Pink Pistols.

  24. good one. he reminds me of the weenies that we’d hindy grindy in public school. probably one of the ones who enjoyed that discomfort. definite ear snap recipient.
    i made no purchase friday other than beer.
    i think there are a few accredited schools around here. i sure didn’t attend any of them.
    intellectual hub? my van does not have abs.
    five weeks hiking the annapurna range in the himalaya’s was pretty far from home.
    i’ve only been to central mexico: queretero and san miguel de allende, but that was for work. twice. it was beautiful and i long to return.
    my favorite book is “go dog go!” i also like goon comics. and nothing more complicated than “the master and margarita” or “one hundred years of solitude.”
    i’m a big fan of “news of the weird.” i lament its passing from the “reader.”
    i watch “jeopardy” at the tavern after work over a pbr.
    my tv news intake consists entirely of jumping channels to catch the different weather broads.
    to that i would add, beat it, nerd.
    and ask, why do you have a tattoo of a sandusky roller coaster on your arm?

  25. moneyed white liberials( personified by almost all of the media) live in a world of cartoon infantilism. In their mind they inbody heroic godlike goodness and intelect. They are usualy athiest , of course, because their godlike self image don’t cotton no competition.
    They use housing cost to isolate themselves from the “opressed ” they care soooo much for and live in “intelectual centers” so they never have to meet anyone unlike themselves or who holds diffrent views.
    So if you’ re god, then you need a devil to fight. This is the basis of their need to have a cartoon devil to
    ” fight”. Without us , the fantasy of their omnipitence has no basis .
    I would never bother to try to tell them about myself to prove their bias wrong , that would dignify the accusation . I don’t give a flip what they think of me. They aren’t going to change their thinking anyway.
    their fantasy self image depends on it and no ammounbt of facts will ever change it.
    My IQ is Pi and I have never ventured outside the house I was born in except to get ammo and pop tarts at the 7-11. I am not bothered by this fools writing.
    I have known for a long time that gun controls has nothing to do with guns, It’s us that they hate. If we turned in every gun in the world and every round of ammo tomorrow, they would still need us to play the role of villian in their little fantasy. remeber that we are destroying the world with the co2 we exhale, so there will always be a reason to crusade against us.

  26. lol – clickbait at it’s finest (the referenced article). I honestly don’t believe anyone is that ignorant. I mean, it seems like a complete fabrication. Utter fiction. If he toned it back some, it would probably be believable, not just a pure target for page hits.

  27. This has to be the silliest thing I’ve read all day. Racists don’t participate in Black Friday.

    Because it’s black.

    On a far more serious note, all of the people who went out on Black Friday to buy guns can’t be racist, it’s just statistically improbable. This isn’t Japan, where immigrants who have lived in the islands for hundreds of years are systemically discriminated against. This is America, where racism in public is one step short of a stoning offense. You can practically see the cavernous disconnect between the world that Mr. Morford perceives, and the world that the rest of us live in. It seems to, if possible, be growing wider.

  28. One last comment: I think there is an interesseting article to be written about “who bought guns on Black Friday”, but it would depend upon access to the NICS data, by region, age, etc. Dunno how fine that info is, since we lowly citizens dont have access, and apparently, its not that accurate….

    (remember…its BigGov…an oxymoron with transparent or true.)r

    But maybe someone with wide industry insight, later, whhen sales data is collated, can speak to trends…

    My impreesion of Black Friday shoppers is that they are mostly smart, patient buyers who have done their homework on high $/ high quality items. And that would not be the “Ferguson panic buyer”…the timing is off.
    For first time buyers that was all done two months ago, after the first big blowups, or a month ago, while the WH and its race-baiting allies were stoking fears in the second round, per stories from LGS’s.

    My guess is these are first gun for women, in a family, of already responsible gun-owners, or careful first or second gun buys by singles, of all demographics, who have been considering it over time, been store-shopping, taken some lessons, tried some on at the range to find best fit and fel, and are paying for quality at best price.

    In other words, the silent majority that dont pay much attention to nitwits like Morford, or Slate, or HuffPo, or NYT, CNN, MSNBC, to tell them what to think, or do.

    And these folks are more steady expansion of long-term POTG, that is just another proof of the sea change underway about 2A rights, which of course has progtards in a complete panty-twisting tizzy, as more leave the plantaation. Thus the desperation in the attempts like Morfords to change the Narrative.

    Keep Calm and Carry On…

  29. Didn’t realize he was homosexual. Is he trying to look coyly seductive in that pic? At any rate, I have concluded that he didn’t write this article at all. No one did–someone just went to the Acme Liberal Cliche’ Factory and picked it up. Somewhere on the drive back to the office the one about undersized sexual organs fell out of the box, apparently.

  30. “They make you feel, in short, like you might have a chance.”
    Damn straight! At 62, bad knees, and over weight, I heartily agree with this statement.

    “Every piece of data we have proves guns are spiritual, moral and social poison.”
    Quite a sever case of projection, me thinks…

    Oh, and as a technical instructor, I’ve read *and* written very complicated books.

  31. “nor have you ever traveled very far from your home town, much less out of state”

    I find that people in those “backwater” Midwestern and southern states drive through other states on a regular basis.

    Personally, as YFWG I travel non stop for work. One might argue that traveling fir work doesn’t count, but I disagree. You do not experience another culture by sitting at a resort, no matter how exotic the location. You get more real local culture by sitting at the bar with the locals after work.

    Quite frankly, in my experience more of the country basically agrees with our pro gun stance (and prevailing conservative lean), even if they aren’t Total absolutists or think it needs to be a personal crusade.

    • Ever seen one of those upper crust tourists coming to a “Quaint” little town to observe the culture and muse at it? That’s probably what he means. Oh, look at the natives going about their business, how ~fascinating!~.

      They act like they’re at a zoo.

      I hope to go overseas to see friends next year, not coo-coo over their amusing foibles and ways. I’m sure this guy views foreigners the same way he’d view a discovery channel special on the mating habits of exotic birds.

  32. “You’re a scared white person, almost certainly male. You do not live in a major city, or near a university or intellectual hub of any note, nor have you ever traveled very far from your home town, much less out of state or anywhere further than, say, Mexico. Once. And that was enough.”

    – I am not scared, and I have been to England, Mexico, and Australia. So there (raspberry).

    “You do not read complicated books.”

    – Oh boy this guy is *a bunch* smarter than me. But yeah I have/do read books. With small print and everything. Non-fiction centered on Science or Medical issues, process improvement, hell even Tolkien and Dickens.

    “You do not like new or weird things.”

    – I eat sushi and own a smartwatch! I am going to a same-sex wedding in January! None of that is weird, but I’ll be damned if they aren’t recent developments.

    “You watch lots of TV, mostly Fox News”

    – Don’t have the time for it really. If I watch news on tv it will be Fox News. This can be up to several hours per month.

    – Unfortunately I am a white guy so none of that matters one little bit.

    • “Complicated books” — I’m sure he doesn’t mean scientific or medical journals, I’m sure he means navelgazing circular philosophical pseudo-intellectual-cerebro-masturbatorial tomes.

      • I’m guessing by ‘complicated’ he means the kind of stuff one might find at HuPo or MJ…echo chamber issued pseudo-intellectualism masquerading as real thought.

  33. Be wary the man who denounces you as a small minded, ignorant, racist using small minded, ignorant, racist speech.

    I hear about this thing called “projection” in psychology circles (perhaps I read a book)…careful Morford, your mask is slipping.

  34. Hey, the stereotype game, great! I wanna play!

    Okay, let me see…

    You’re an gun control advocate. You are white, upper-middle class, well-to-do, and have lots of white guilt, but still think you have a pulse on the poor community.

    You live in a cramped city in some cramped apt where you overpay for everything, which you think makes you “trendy.”

    And, you have a degree from a university, but likely in something useless, like Philosophy. Which you believe makes you “educated.”

    You drive a Subaru because for some reason, which seems to escape me, hipsters think they’re cool. Though you probably couldn’t work on it to save your life because one) you don’t want to get your hands dirty and two) you probably don’t know anything about cars.

    You are effeminate, you wear effeminate clothes, you carry yourself in an effeminate manner, and as an extension of this, you act like b*tch.

    You’re self important, entitled, and you’ve never done for yourself. Also, you think people give a sh*t about your opinion and you think the world owes you.

    Oh, and you are skinny and physically weak, likely because of a strictly vegan diet and sissy genetics.

    How’d I do?

    • Bravo! I was waiting for someone to do that (not clever enough to do it myself). I might, however, add an alternate version: So, you are a “gun safety” advocate:

      You’re female (or you feel guilty about being male but you try to make up for it by being “sensitive”).
      You live in an upper-middle-class suburb, and the only minorities you ever actually have contact with are the gardeners and the housemaids.
      You have a vague knowledge that there are other folks out there who don’t live quite as idyllic life as you do, but they don’t really “count”, or even register.
      You have offspring that were raised in the day-care center, or by the governess, and are now grown up and living on their own. But you still call yourself a “mom”.
      You literally don’t know one end of a gun from the other, but you know you are scared of them and that makes you qualified to lead the nation on firearms-policy issues.
      You read “Fifty Shades of Grey”, but only when everyone else is out of the house.
      You don’t watch Fox or any other news program, except maybe the morning fluff and The View.
      You consider yourself broad-minded and empathetic. You are also active in the Homeowner’s Association, making sure no one’s Christmas decorations are too tacky.
      You drive an SUV to the Whole foods market, where you bought a tote bag to carry the groceries in so you can save the environment.

      Am I doin’ OK?

      • Looks great from here.

        But, that SUV comment kind of stung a little bit. I love my Yukon XL.

        I like full-size SUVs, as long as they are the body on frame truck style ones. Not that crossover BS.

        But, in all fairness, I drive my 3/4 ton pick up most days and when I’m not playing kid taxi.

  35. Never been to Mexico, but I’ve got a BA, in a STEM field no less (I’m a surveyor working on my license). and I’ve been to 3 European countries. I used to speak German so well that the tourists asked me for directions (thinking I was a local), and the locals didn’t believe I was a foreigner at first. And I used to speak French so well that I used to read French novels (I’m very out of practice).
    Both of my siblings are college grads, as is my father, and both of my parents are or have been small business owners. Half of the rest of my family are college grads and/or small business owners. Most of my friends are college grads, and one even went to an ultra-liberal college (he was probably the only person in attendance those 4 years with a hunting license).
    I don’t watch TV. I unplugged mine 3 months ago, and I haven’t missed it.
    I read more books in the average year than this man has read in his life. I’ve given away (to charity) probably around 2000 books, and my room is still packed wall-to-wall and floor-to-ceiling with them.
    I also consume more news than this man, I think. In a week/in a year ratio, I think.
    I was even a liberal once. Once. And that was enough.

  36. Pity Mr. Morford, don’t hate him. He may be widely traveled, but he’s never taken the time to expose himself to people who are genuinely different than him. He is actually the rube and bumpkin that he portrays in his screed.

    That, and, why is this elite liberal lecturing me about how Ferguson isn’t a real risk to me and mine? I’ll bet you anything that he doesn’t live anywhere that a race riot is a serious consideration.

    • Exactly. He’s exposed himself to “prescribed, safe” diversity – not people who actually hold different beliefs. I’d bet that if he found someone outside of this pigeonholed demo who was pro gun, his wall would go right up since it wouldn’t embiggen his current worldview.

  37. This Mr. Morford said:
    “The more scared you are, the more isolated, the less educated and the less traveled and the less exposed to unfamiliar ideas, to different modes of life, to the Other, to the staggering and effervescent variety of human existence, the more you will see a gun as an obvious and necessary choice.”
    Take that last clause out of the paragraph, and he’s talking about himself, vis-a-vis gun owners. This fellow has painted us up as his demonized opponent, his “Other.” You have to wonder who, if anyone, he’s ever talked to on the other side of this issue. In the absence of anyone else’s genuine perspective, he seems to have concocted a bogeyman out of shrill sound bites and his own uninformed imagination.
    This guy sounds like a Nazi describing how Jews think, or a Klansman sounding off about what Black folks are like. When you’re not a member of a group you find yourself in opposition to, you simply DO NOT get to speak on their behalf. Any attempt to do so only reveals the depth of your own paranoia.

  38. +1. Morford inhabits that shrinking segment of better-than-you, bitterly-clinging-to-their-anti-religion, hip-to-be-gay, white anti-rascist, that is sooooo…80s. Zzzzzz.

  39. Wow, thanks to Mark Morford, I just learned a few things about myself. I never knew that I was a racist, or that my travels were an illusion, or that over 20 years of education, my law degree and academic honors never happened, or that I’m from a rural area in the South and not New York City. And foolish me, I thought that the only childish fantasies I’ve had related to sultry nights in Bali with Salma Hayek. But noooooo.

    I’m pretty sure that I’m smarter and better educated than Morford. A lot smarter and a lot better educated. Although, judging from his paranoid screed, that’s faint praise indeed. The fact is, I’ve owned cats that are smarter than Morford. And one of the things that most smart people do is STFU when they don’t know sh!t.

    • Ralph, I was about to say everything you just said – except for Salma Hayek. She’s cute but I’d probably go for that sultry Sofia Viagra.

  40. When I read this diatribe it made me mad, then i started laughing, simply because I realized who this guy really is….

    The question (we all know the answer to) is who is the puppeteer with their hand… well you know..

  41. The good news in all of this is that even on a site as left wing crackpot as sfgate.com, the comments are overwhelmingly pro-gun. When this anti gun bigot spews his hatred, it just makes his cause lose credibility.

    • Because his pro-gun “only-demographic”, is wrong, wrong, wrong. Yes, rural white guys (minus the other BS he tacked on) are a strong contingent. But to say it’s “only this type of person” shows how in outer-space he is in regards to the reality of the situation on the ground.

      My “shooting group” is made up of pro-gun rednecks, gays, lesbians, good ol’ boys, Asians, blacks, cowboys, engineers, muslims, Mormons, hunters, vegetarians and even a doctor. They all do just fine. I’ve already forwarded many of them this article today and getting plenty of “wat.” responses.

  42. Well damn. I have just the solution to Morfords percieved dilemma. A version of bussing. Let’s take all the white guys that are gun owners and send them on .gov paid for trips to Paris, Rome, Amsterdam, Tokyo…….

    Make sure their hotels are near universities. Let them revel in the atmosphere of divesity and soak up the smarts. 🙂

  43. (laughs) this is really funny. I’m not O (yet), F (yet) W or a G, and I guess if experimenting with lasers and tesla coils aren’t “liking new or weird things”, I don’t know what is. I’ve got a college degree, graduated Cum Laude, I’m an engineer, and live 20 minutes from the city. (No, I don’t think that automatically makes me an authority on anything except maybe… waveform processing.)

    I’ve been all over the North American continent at least, every one of the lower 48 + Canada + Mexico, and the only reason I haven’t gone overseas is because of money.

    And guess-f’ing-what. I have more guns than most OFWGs I know. I build them, I shoot them, I mess with optics, I anodize ’em, upgrade them; everything from five seven to 50BMG.

    I’d like to meet this guy and give him a tour of my day. The fun thing is, I’m not the only person completely out of his prescribed demographic that is this pro-gun. The closed mindedness… if they even *knew*…

  44. I for one have never left Texas. Why would I? It’s already Heaven! And I wonder why I never see these little pansies outside of the big cities here, what with them being so well traveled and all. For all of their boasting it’s pretty obvious they’re sticking to the main roads.

  45. There is zero difference between anti gunners and racists. They both think they know all others, making broad sweeping generalizations about a group of people.

  46. We as gun owners don’t have to justify ourselves to an ignorant, yammering twit like this.

    Whether we watch Fox news or 5 hours of other TV a night is no reflection on our intelligence or moral or ethical development. Travel only reinforces what a great place the USA is, even at it’s worst. By the way, I’ve been to Mexico once, and it was enough, at least until they get their shit together down there. University is great for specific learning, but it delays progressing into real life (sometimes forever). Valuing the known and traditional is as important as valuing the new and weird. It isn’t the rioters 200 miles away I worry about, it is the people of questionable character that live within walking distance. I keep my guns and carry them because of criminal thugs and statists like the author of the original rant.

  47. What, no Freudian reference to genital overcompensation? Your “Stereotypical Anti-gun BINGO” card is missing a space.

  48. You can help a stupid person, but there’s no helping a stupid person who’s convinced he’s the smartest person in the room.

  49. How perfectly San Francisco. Morford fancies he’s an intellectual, and possessed of a deep and broad knowledge of the world. He’s quite sure we gun owners are backwoods hicks isolated from the wonderful world of knowledge.

    Give me a break. Morford has what? A BA degree in English Lit. He was Summa and Phi Beta Kappa, but that’s not so difficult to achieve if you take nothing but math-free courses graded by cumulative PC class discussion points awarded. Grad school? Nada. STEM? Nada. Work? He’s been prancing around in tights leading Yoga classes for fifteen years. He probably has a profound knowledge of the Backward Leaning Dog position. Period.

    I graduated S.c.L., was elected to Phi Beta Kappa, majored in Russian Language, have graduate degrees in Law, Accounting, and Finance, lived in Vietnam for a year, Brezhnev’s Russia for a month, and have houses in three countries on two continents. Morford’s an ass. Probably often a sore ass.

  50. seriously, whyTF do every single one of these pansy hoplophobes precisely ‘look’ the part?

    Trendies, hipsters, metrosexuals, asexuals, emasculated non-sexuals, and just confused-uals.

    xD

  51. Here’s your stereotype Mr Morford:

    I currently live overseas. This is my fourth time living overseas and my fourth continent (Africa, Europe, South and North America). I’ve never lived in the countryside but I do hunt and fish on several ranches belonging to my friends. I was a Marine rifleman and graduated university with honors – Political Science and Pre-Law.

    I don’t watch sports and get my news from BBC, Skynews, Al-Jezeera, WSJ and FT. I have subscribed to the Economist and Foreign Policy for the past 10 years. I haven’t tuned into Fox since the election of 2008.

    I speak English, French, Portugese and German (some better than others depending on my BAC).

    I am not scared – I live in a state of suspicious paranoia because after being a policeman and LEO for 20 years, fighting in a war, working in three Central African civil war zones (CAR, DRC and Sudan) and living working in critical crime and terrorism cities all over the world, I know what evil lurks out there. If you not at least concerned, you’re a fool and destined to become a victim.

    I am however white, Southern and most certainly a rabid 2A supporter. There is no “but” in the 2A. I am Christian too but haven’t been to church in 10 years.

    I do vote Republican because the alternatives are to vote Democrat or throw my vote away on an independant. However, I am a social liberal. So I don’t care if he’s gay and marries another man (my sister is a lesbian and lives with another woman).

    At last count – I have 27 firearms.

    How does that stack up with your stereotypes?

    Truth is Mr. HuffPro has no idea who a gun owner is and this probably scares him more that he wants to admit. So he stereotypes us as a way to make him feel better. Sad really.

  52. The author read those statistics completely wrong. The study shows percentage of people of each race who own a gun, NOT percentage of total gun owners by race.

    Pretty sad to lead out an article with such an embarrassing mistake and then dedicate a paragraph to it.

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