The national news polls suggest that the majority of Americans support more gun control.
You wouldn't know it from the mail I get.
Whenever I write about the plague of gun violence, I get a huge blowback from the gun lovers of America.
The rabid response of the gun lobby is damning but impressive. They out-gun, out-email gun control advocates by more than 20 to one. Their ability to organize a rapid response is exactly the opposite of FEMA's.
The gun army—largely white men from suburban and rural areas—is loaded for bear. It beats its drums on websites from Keepandbeararms.com in Washington State to alphecca.com in Vermont. Every time a plea for gun restrictions surfaces on the Internet, it posts hundreds of missives in homage to the Second Amendment. By organizing, bombarding the Internet and plunking down plenty of cold hard cash, the gun lobby has proven it is ready for prime time, while opponents languish in the wee hours of late-night local cable.
After last spring's massacre at Virginia Tech, ABC News polled adults nationwide and asked: "Do you favor or oppose stricter gun control laws in this country?" Sixty-one percent favored them. That majority is represented by well-meaning citizen groups, like the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, and graying civil rights stalwarts like the Rev. Jesse L. Jackson and his Rainbow/PUSH. Their tactic is to organize anti-gun marches and rallies to push for stricter gun laws and penalties.
But here's a news flash: marches may generate publicity, but don't influence decision makers. If we are going to keep pistols and assault rifles away from playlots, shopping malls and colleges and universities, progressives must "bare" their arms.
The lethal success of the gun lobby is rooted in its ability to sway both Democratic and Republican legislators. Democratic deer hunters in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan and Ohio are susceptible to NRA dictates, which forces many faint-of-heart national Democratic candidates to eschew gun control.
Gun control activists: start playing the other side's game by embracing technology, and aim it at Democratic and independent voters. Piggyback on the success of online activist groups like MoveOn.org and MeetUp.com. Marches and protests are fine, but it is imperative to devise a response that is sophisticated and symmetrical to the gun lobby's tactics.
The NRA has built a juggernaut of a website that networks gun advocates from hither to yon. A modest investment and some digital ingenuity could create digital networks in black churches, sororities and other civic groups in black urban America to fight back. Women and the African-American church—get them behind the keyboard and you'll unleash a thunderous counterpunch to the gun lovers' one-two.
According to a recent report by the U.S. Justice Department, nearly half the people murdered in the United States in 2005 were black. Most lived in cities and were felled by guns. The Rev. Michael Pfleger knows the numbers. Pfleger, pastor of St. Sabina's, an African-American Catholic church on Chicago's South Side, has been crusading for stricter regulation of gun shops and manufacturers. He is in agony over the 34 school-age children in Chicago killed by gun violence in the first six months of 2007.
St. Sabina's congregation is 70 percent female. Pfleger is recruiting the pastors at neighboring churches to get into the fight. "The church should be leading the path," he says. "Women are much more vocal, I believe partly because of their sensitivity to the murder of children. Historically, women are much more progressive. That's why churches are so vital, because women make up the main membership." Amen, father.?
