BY Herschel Smith
6 years, 9 months ago
From several readers, Dave Holmes writing at Esquire:
Anyway, I just wanted to drop you a line and let you know that I now actually do want to take your guns.
All of your guns.
Right now.
I’m concerned about a great many things in life, but not this. Dave Holmes is going to take my guns? Really? This Dave Holmes?
Oh, and it looks like several folks have responded to poor Dave.
You cannot trust everyone to read past a punchy headline. That’s why plenty of people—plenty—ran right to their keyboards to say: “You’re taking my guns? You’ll get them bullets first.” I would also accept—and did, oh my God, so many times:
- “Go ahead and try, the streets will be awash in blood.”
- “Good luck confiscating all those guns yourself, really hope you don’t get murdered by law abiding citizens lol.”
- “Molon Labe.” (I’d never heard this one before, and it appears to be the gun lobby’s version of “Bazinga.”)
- Lots of memed-up screenshots from Tombstone and Deadwood, which, if you’re trying to convince me that 2018 America is not the Wild West, are less than encouraging.
This is not a problem that’s endemic to one side of one issue, by the way. Plenty of people of all political persuasions will get worked up over a headline and develop an opinion instead of reading the piece. But in my experience, only gun-rights activists will do this and then add that they’re going to shoot you.
Welcome to thunderdome, boy. Hey, you’re the one who wanted to run with the big dogs.
