Pink Pistols: Can Guns Protect Gays?
Just over two years ago, Jacob Robida, a troubled 18-year-old who lived in a room filled with weapons, Nazi flags, and anti-Semitic writings, walked into Puzzles Lounge, a gay bar in New Bedford, Massachusetts. After presenting a fake ID to the bartender and finishing off a drink, he asked if it was a gay bar.
Upon learning that it was, he ordered a second drink. Then he went to the back of the bar and started swinging a hatchet at bar patrons, striking two. When others tried to wrestle him to the ground, he pulled out a gun and shot one person in the face, another in the head (twice), and a third person in the abdomen.
After fleeing the scene, he was cornered by police in Arkansas, where he shot and killed a policeman and his 33-year-old girlfriend before being shot and critically wounded by officers. He died later at a Missouri hospital.
The situation might have turned out differently had the bartender or a patron brought a handgun to the bar that night. Let’s say that in response to an increase in anti-gay violence, gay groups and individuals like the Puzzles Lounge bartender had joined the Pink Pistols, a group which advocates “gun ownership and training in the proper use of firearms by gay people.” Imagine that after participating in the program offering instruction from the National Rifle Association in the defensive use of firearms, this particular bartender decided to keep a handgun hidden behind the bar. Instead of two people dying and three suffering serious wounds that night, the only person to die might have been Robida. As soon as the bartender realized Robida was up to no good, he could have pulled out his gun and said, “You may think gay people are just pansies who sing showtunes, but unless you drop your weapons, this Colt here will teach you a whole new meaning of ‘Hello, Dolly.’”
It’s not just the line that makes this scenario seem a bit far-fetched. I would daresay that few gay bartenders are trained in the use of firearms. And Pink Pistols appears to be the only gay group which encourages gay people to use firearms for self-defense against hate crimes.
The national gay groups, never eager to be out of sync with the agenda of the American left, would likely not be willing to promote the responsible use of firearms, an issue associated with conservatives and the GOP. I could find no reference to gun rights on the website of the Human Rights Campaign (HRC). In 2004, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force “expressed concern” that Vice President Cheney was delivering the keynote address at the annual meeting of the National Rifle Association (NRA). Their release included quotes from several groups critical of the NRA and firearms.
These groups didn’t consider the fact that gay people use firearms to defend themselves against hate crimes. Instead of addressing the firearms issue, HRC President Joe Solmonese claimed the attack in New Beford was a reminder of the need for a federal hate crimes law. What he didn’t mention was that Massachusetts, the state where the attack occurred, already has hate crimes legislation on the books.
Indeed, according to the Massachusetts Department of Education, “Hate Violence Should Be Charged Under At Least 3 Statutes,” with the state’s Hate Crimes Penalties Act providing penalties for those who assault a person because of his sexual orientation (among other qualifiers). If those laws didn’t deter Robida, it’s highly unlikely that a federal law would have. But he might have been more hesitant to attack the bar had he known he would have faced a bartender or patron with a firearm.
However, given Massachusetts’s strict control laws, it’s less likely that a law-abiding citizen would possess a firearm. In 1998, the Bay State enacted a law which the Gun Owners’ Action League, a firearms association in Massachusetts, called the “worst in the nation.” (Meanwhile, the Brady Center to Prevent Handgun Violence, a group which advocates gun control, sees that state as “implementing the nation’s strongest gun-safety regulations.”)
The problem with such laws is that they only deter law-abiding citizens from owning firearms. Just as Massachusetts hate crime statutes didn’t prevent Robida from singling out a gay bar for attack, gun laws didn’t stop Robida from acquiring a weapon and using it there.
Massachusetts isn’t the only jurisdiction with strict gun control laws. The District of Columbia also has “an unusually strict gun control law.” That law is currently under review in the Supreme Court in the case, District of Columbia v. Heller.
In its brief in that case, the Pink Pistols notes “the long history of hate crimes and violence directed at the LGBT community” and contends that “for certain LGBT individuals, the possession of firearms in the home is essential for a sense of personal security.” And not just gay people. Countless Americans own firearms so they can feel more secure in their homes.
With studies showing lower crime rates in states that allow individuals to obtain permits to possess concealed weapons, it’s clear that giving law-abiding citizens greater freedom to own firearms means increased opportunities for self-protection. And that’s true for gay people as much as it is for society at large.
To repeat: Gun control laws in Massachusetts did not prevent Jacob Robida from acquiring a gun, and hate crime laws did not deter him from entering a gay bar in New Bedford and shooting several patrons.
Just as citizens of other states have used firearms to protect themselves from attack (particularly in their homes), gay people could use firearms to protect themselves. Indeed, greater respect for gun rights might better protect gay people than hate crimes laws.
There is no evidence that hate crime statutes prevent hate crimes. At the same time, there is evidence that increased levels of gun ownership reduces crime.
If gay activists see hate crimes as a pressing problem in our community, they might better be served not by laws which single out gay people for protection, but by laws which benefit all citizens.
Restrictive gun laws, like the statute at issue in D.C. v. Heller, prevent all law-abiding citizens, including gay men and lesbians, from protecting themselves in their own homes. For the sake of gay Americans — and all Americans — it’s time to repeal restrictive gun control laws and adopt ones which allow citizens to own firearms and use them responsibly.
B. Daniel Blatt blogs at GayPatriot.
Blatt is on to something intuitively right here. Law-abiding citizens have the right to protect themselves from unwarranted attacks; the vast majority of gay citizens are law-abiding and more prone than average to unwarranted attack. The responsible, well-trained individual with a handgun is an asset to civic security and a deterrent to crime.
Here in Jerusalem, a terrorist murderer was stopped by a reserve soldier and an off-duty soldier who responded quickly and accurately. The reservist shot the terrorist twice in the head with his handgun, and the soldier heard gunfire from his nearby home and finished the job with his army weapon.
Responsible gun ownership and well-trained gun owners save lives.
All this article does is preach to the choir. If liberals & socialists were capable of sound reasoning, we wouldn’t have most of the social problems we have in the USA, if not even other parts of the world, today.
Gun control does not work! Look at all the shootings that have happen in gun free zones. A person who wants to kill and make the headline knows that law abiding citizens will not be armed in those locations. Did the school shooting in Israel make the headlines? No because it was stopped by a student that was legally armed and he shot guy that planned on killing a lot of people.
I’d just tell a gay person what I tell anyone else: when you decide that protecting your home, property and loved ones is important, go get training and buy a weapon that feels comfortable.
Use it frequently at approved firing ranges. Keep it close but in a safe place.
Gays are still Americans, and they are covered by the 2nd Amendment. There is no reason why they should not protect themselves.
the facts are in, its the conclusions that are ignored.
by and large, women do not rape or kill men, except in court. by and large gays, blacks, Mexicans, Pakis, trans genders and anyother popular campus minority of the week do not assault, rape or murder straight white men.
the issues are not racism, classism, gayism, whichisitism. the issue is the basic rule of law. republicans can triangulate and gain on this issue.
it is fair and would be voter popular to stand and say, i do not give a da## what color you are, what your genitalia is or who you sleep with, if you are a victim of violent crime, the perp needs to go away for a long time, and if the perp is someone so vile that it was not even revenge, fear, personal gain like cash for his criminal act, but his violence was because of hatred or the ease of the prey any judge in the USA should up that jerks sentence to the max. all crimes are not equal. when a persons motive is vile judges have the discretion, right and duty to smoke that jerk and protect anyone and everyone from that sort of criminal hate. we need not a written word of gender, race, or sexual distinction in written law to make this very clear as a society. violent criminal acts with no cause but sickness will have our support of maximum consequence. there is no conflict with this and the FACT that gender, race, sexual distinction as words have no place in good written law.
protecting the targeted is a right wing issue. division of people into stratas of favor is a left wing issue and has nothing to do with civil rights.
This is brilliant. I know a lot of people think gays are the scum of the earth; personally, I don’t care what someone wants to do with his own life. The fact remains that it’s his life and he has as much a right to defend it as a straight person — and there’s the minor detail of the Second Amendment, which guarantees said right to all Americans.. I wonder how many gays will actually catch on to the idea, though?
Make a statement in leather – gun leather.
The one freedom that permits all other freedoms.
Finally, people are starting to realize that the rights enshrined in the Constitution were made to protect us all. There can be little doubt that creeping socialism, discredited every time it is tried, is starting to awaken people to protect their own individual rights. We have to have ingenuity and reciprocity to move forward! Yes, WE can!!!
Let’s play “Fill in the blank” with this Ted Kennedy quote.
Senator Edward M. Kennedy called the attack a “sad reminder” of why Congress should pass a bill that would ______________.
(A) restore to all law-abiding Americans, regardless of race, gender, religion, or sexual orientation, their God-given right to defend themselves, their families, and their communities from senseless attacks at the hands of violent, maniacal thugs everywhere.
(B) restore the death penalty on a nationwide basis, so that scum like this can be readily removed from society – forever – and our neighborhoods can be made safer for our children to play in.
(C) extend the federal law on hate crimes to cover offenses targeting people because of sexual orientation.
:source:
I agree with your overall thesis. However, the bar example is not the best to use, as virtually all jurisdictions that permit firearms carry, either open or concealed, bar the carrying of firearms into bars, for reasons that shoud be obvious, even if perhaps they are not the best reasons. One or two states are considering modifying their laws to change the situation, but passage is far from certain.
Hate crime laws do little or nothing to deter the very crimes at which they are directed, and the abuse of such laws by some organizations will, in my view, lead to discrimination against the very groups that the laws were originally designed to protect. Judges can always ‘throw the book’ at particularly heinous crimes, anyway.
Finally, many such hate crimes, particularly against homosexuals, seem to be directed at people in the age range 16-21: people in this age range are not permitted to purchase handguns, so they need to consider other means of defense, especially in view of the relatively new practice of beating such people with [aluminum] baseball bats, which is clearly an attempt to kill.
Any gun in a bar is a very bad idea. Unless you’re going in there not to drink and then what’s the point? Learn how to defend yourself first. Then see what a whole room full of sissies can do against …. 1 person. The queer part of this has nothing to do with it. Everyone should be able to protect themselves with whatever is handy. The constitution is about standing up to a corrupt government, not butt pirates needing pastel shaded Glocks. People whose life style puts them in harms way should be more concerned with a black belt first than a holster. At least you won’t have to explain your special concealment compartment …
I know you won’t publish this but please consider a few snips here and there to get the point across, the idea is sound. Thanks DH
gcblues:
The vast majority of so-called hate crimes in the U.S. are committed by black people against “straight white men”, although whether the men are straight or not probably has little to do with it. The press ignores the issue, but the crimes stats are very persuasive. You are correct, though, in that judges should be the ones to impose sentences based upon the type of crime. That is, after all, why they are judges.
I agree wholeheartedly with your thesis. One odd thing did leap out at me, though — 18 years old with a 33-year-old girlfriend? I have to wonder what was going on there.
No rule against them. Carry in a bar if you want. Guns in MA have to be concealed, so no one is going to see yours and get the vapors anyway. Guns are not magical conflict-causing totems, they will not CAUSE fights in bars. And the bartender is in the bar to work, not to drink.
Organization like the Pink Pistols have it right: the best way to defend your rights is to defend yourself, your family, and innocent third parties. You cannot wait on the State to do the job for you.
Furthermore, the firearm is the only weapon that will give a single person a change against a group and especially if members of the group are armed. Karate is useless in those situations, even for the young and athletic. Improvised weapons, even with training, are little better. Armed combat beats unarmed combat any day.
Those in doubt need to look at the role of firearms in defending the rights of freed slaves after the Civil War, the role of gun control in trying to prevent freed slaves from defending themselves, and the role that firearms played in defending people during the Civil Rights era.
Concerning bars: while using a firearm while intoxicated is a very bad idea, all patrons should be throughly sobered up at the end of the night, else they could be arrested for DUI or public intoxication. The designated driver is also the designated body guard. My state allows firearms in bars because the Law demands that people be responsible for their actions. And it prevents patrons from getting attacked on the way home. What is interesting is to observe bar fights with armed patrons. They fight with fists and chairs – not guns. You can’t pull a gun in a bar where too many other people are armed. If you do, your going to get shot.
I always take the “guns have no place in a bar” argument as more a sign of ignorance concerning most CCW holders. The sort of person who is prone to go into a bar, get drunk and get into a fight is precisely not the sort of person who would have the discipline to go complete the required training, pass the background check and pay the fees for a CCW. Right now many are deterred from carrying weapons into bars by laws not only prohibiting having a gun in a bar but also by laws prohibiting conceled carry by a non-CCW person. Removing the former does not affect the latter.
To graph it out, consider three sorts of patrons:
1. The person currently undeterred by the law today may carry his gun illegally into a bar. This will not change.
2. The person currently deterred by the law today will not carry a gun illegally into a bar. This will not change, either.
3. The CCW holder currently deterred by the law today may choose to carry a gun legally into a bar. This is the only sort of patron that may change their behavior.
As a prior gun owner in Massachusetts (with a concealed carry permit) I should point out that bars (along with federal and municipal buildings, schools and stadium events) are places where it is illegal to carry a gun under any circumstances, even if permitted to do so elsewhere in the state.
For a funny take on this, check out the Colbert report:
http://www.comedycentral.com/colbertreport/
scroll down to “Difference Makers: Doug Jackson” and watch a topical clip from last night’s episode where a Tn. state senator is trying to legalize guns in bars.
Other than that, agree with what you wrote…
Indiana has never had laws against carrying in bars, and neither has Pennsylvania. No gunfights, no blood in the streets.
What really bothers me about hate crimes is that you have to be a total victim before you get any benefit of the law. If you aren’t beaten to the point of spending a long time in the hospital or killed, then it doesn’t seem to be a hate crime. How nice that you can enjoy at leisure as you recuperate, if you do, the thought that the little schmuck that tried to kill you was punished more severely because it was a hate crime /snark.
Love this article. If more people would learn to and be capable of defending themselves, then the little perps would be a lot less likely to inflict the damage they do. All hate crimes do is increase the penalty and in most cases they are plea bargained away. Useless laws except to the liberals who can pat themselves on the backs that they are doing so much for this or that minority – and that is something that I as a gay man am more than sick of. If they were truly interested in the gay community they would be trying to figure out a way to get rid of DADT without damaging either side of the issue. It didn’t bother me that I DADT the whole time I was a sergeant in the Army and with a security clearance to boot but not all are able to subliminate that part. I wish I had not had to but it was the law and I worked within it. I have yet to see any of our liberal lawmakers actually do anything to solve the issue although they tell us every election they will, but what else is new.
What really bothers me about hate crimes is that you have to be a total victim before you get any benefit of the law. If you aren’t beaten to the point of spending a long time in the hospital or killed, then it doesn’t seem to be a hate crime. How nice that you can enjoy at leisure as you recuperate, if you do, the thought that the little schmuck that tried to kill you was punished more severely because it was a hate crime /snark.
Love this article. If more people would learn to and be capable of defending themselves, then the little perps would be a lot less likely to inflict the damage they do. All hate crimes do is increase the penalty and in most cases they are plea bargained away. Useless laws except to the liberals who can pat themselves on the backs that they are doing so much for this or that minority – and that is something that I as a gay man am more than sick of. If they were truly interested in the gay community they would be trying to figure out a way to get rid of DADT without damaging either side of the issue. It didn’t bother me that I DADT the whole time I was a sergeant in the Army and with a security clearance to boot but not all are able to subliminate that part. I wish I had not had to but it was the law and I worked within it. I have yet to see any of our liberal lawmakers actually do anything to solve the issue although they tell us every election they will, but what else is new.
We just had a case in Temecula, CA where an off-duty police officer was having dinner with his family. He felt a little ill and went outside for some fresh air. He was struck in the back of the head with an object(later required 9 stitches) Witnesses said there was no provocation, he I.D.’d himself as a police officer, but the three individuals kept attacking him. He shot and killed the main attacker, then shot the friend in the leg. Later the main attacker was found to have been convicted more than once of smashing a beer bottle into someone’s face during an argument with little or no reason.
Almost makes you believe in Darwin.
In NH it is legal to carry in bars and last April in Manchester there was a legit self defense shooting in a bar. An armed patron probably saved the lives of the owner, a bouncer, and possibly others. I know of no problems with conceal carry firearms in bars here. The initial part of the article is available on line but the paper charges to download the full text of older articles: http://www.unionleader.com/article.aspx?headline=Gunfight+at+bar+leaves+one+wounded%2c+another+in+custody&articleId=858db55b-f7c2-4dd2-ba58-5f99976fee2b
…for now. There’s ALWAYS folks that look for EVERY toehold, “for your safty”. Hence, eternal vigilance.
Hate crime law does nothing that existing laws don’t, except apply more draconian punishment via progressive “thought crimes” . One doesn’t need to be a “total victim”, persons entitled to special considerations merely need claim “personal offense”. VAWA should demonstrate that plainly.
a la:bars guns in MA (I think)-
And no, a bartender might consider having a firearm ON THEIR PERSON, in THEIR control, chambered, safety on, NOT “somewhere behind the bar” and perhaps those famous last words “But, I didn’t KNOW if it was loaded!”
I’ll be happy to endorse “homosexual 2nd advocates” when they grow out of the idea of homosexual 2nd advocates and mature into 2nd advocates.
*sheesh*
It would be much safer if we all not only had our own gun but were educated at the primary school level about the responsible use of such and with each succeeding year. Especially for the female population as they are more preyed upon and murdered than straight-gay murder.
Is there a hate-crime statute for girls/women? If not, there should be. With the rise each year of violent crimes against young college women, we should be asking ourselves this question.
This is the most ridiculous argument for no gun control that I have ever heard..With a registered gun the barkeeper could have responded in kind. If the jerkoff who did the killing had been properly identified and registered then he wouldn’t have had a gun in the first place. And if he’d been reared properly even earlier, he would have been comfortable with himself and not hysterical about gay people!
Celeste,
So how would they have “properly identified and registered” the jerkoff before he did anything illegal? Are you suggesting the police do house-to-house searches to see if anyone has Nazi paraphernalia or anything else that’s considered dubious so they can then be “identified and registered”? Just what would that entail, putting an electronic tracker on him? How much suspicious stuff does someone have to own, after they’ve been subjected to these unreasonable searches and seizures, before they can be stripped of their constitutional rights, like the right to bear arms?
As for being “properly reared”, are you saying that we should outlaw bad child rearing so that we can also outlaw guns? Just how is such a law going to be passed? Who will decide what “rearing properly” consists of? Obviously, a significant percentage of Americans – like myself and the OP – will say that rearing properly means teaching your kids that they have the right, when they grow up, to own guns, whereas you will likely say that it means teaching your children that they have no right to arm and defend themselves. Many will think that rearing properly means telling their children that homosexuality is a sin, others that it’s fine for those who are born to it, and still others that it’s nifty to experiment with while you’re in college.
Just how are we going to ensure that everyone is “reared properly” enough that there won’t be anymore violent crime? Send the police, or social workers, regularly to every house with children in it to grill the parents over whether their strategies are the ones considered “proper” at that moment? What happens when fashionable thought changes and those in power decide that something entirely different is the “proper” way to rear children? And you do realize, don’t you, that there has never been a time in human history when everybody was “properly reared” enough that there was no violent crime? There is no reason to think such a thing is even possible.
As far as I can see, Celeste, all you’re suggesting is expanding the government even more, giving it even more power to interfere in our personal lives, on the basis of an unproven strategy, and on the assumption that *your* idea of “proper rearing” will be the one adopted. If the rest of your plan is adopted but they accept *my* idea of proper rearing instead, I don’t think you’re going to be very happy with the outcome, Celeste.
As a female, a bisexual, a 19-year-old, and a college student, the issue of restricting gun permits is extremely important and relevant to me. There were some gay teenagers attacked last summer in my city just for walking down the street, and of course we’ve all heard about the campus shootings in “gun-free zones.” Those shootings made me decide to obtain a concealed carry permit, purchase a handgun, and learn how to use it. I don’t really fancy being a sitting duck in the middle of lecture. I was pleased to learn that my college allows carry of legal handguns, but then I looked up New York’s concealed carry laws…
And NOBODY under the age of 21 is even ALLOWED TO OWN a handgun. I thought I became a legal adult when I turned 18? On what basis are they saying, “Well yes, 18-year-olds can be drafted and have to pay taxes and are responsible enough to vote, etc.” but then say that the second amendment doesn’t apply? This is a violation of my rights as a woman–to feel safe walking the streets alone at night–and my rights as a human being. How perversely unjust is it that any person, no matter what age, can walk into one of my classrooms with a gun, where all of the students are trapped, and just start picking people off one by one, but I am not legally allowed to own a gun that would enable me to save my life and the lives of others? I can’t adequately express my rage in text.
I feel like I’ve grown much more patient with political stupidity of late, but it’s things like this that make me &*%$ing hate liberals.
I’m gay, and do carry a firearm everywhere except on duty. While I do understand fears that the left wing has about gun ownership, I’m inclined to agree with the the fact that gun control only affects law abiding citizens. As for the specific issue of gays carrying firearms, it depends on how people intend to use it. I’ve seen some interviews where people were called various names and they have claimed that showing a weapon stopped the insults. i DON’T support firearms used like this. If somebody calls me a faggot, shake it off, you can’t cure stupid. However, if somebody actually attempts to HARM me or mine, I can assure you that they’ll get a suprise they won’t enjoy.