From: PA146008@utkvm1.utk.edu (David Veal)
Subject: Re: The NRA has an image problem with gays
Organization: The University of Tennessee, Knoxville
Date: Sat, 9 Jan 1993 06:45:45 GMT

(You know, I really had intended to stay out of this discussion.  Really
I did...)

In article <1il3orINN480@flash.pax.tpa.com.au>
anon.526@pax.tpa.com.au writes:

       Isn't this one of those alt hiearchy anonymous services to allow
people to post to "sensitive" groups (like asb)?

       Now, I'm the last person to suggest you don't have a right to
anonymity, but it really is only polite when you're making insulting
accusations to show your face.  Sniping from the shadows is *really*
bad form.

>It looks as if my advice (to give up) wasn't needed, because it seems
>that people here are so comtemptuously unconcered with whether there is
>homophobia in the NRA leadership that they basically have given up.

       Contemptously unconcerned, so they have given up.  I had to read
this a couple of times to be sure I had it down straight.
       I've seen some denial, but little to indicate people were
unconcerned.

>All the sudden it's up to me to prove my position that it's there and
>it might cause the NRA problems.  I won't do it.  I gave it as my
>opinion and there it is.  I will only prove that it's what I think.  I
>hereby declare that it is.

        Carve it in a stone, climb a mountain, and give it to somebody.
Dogmatism'll only get you so far, especially when you refuse to
even pretend to back it up.

>If the NRA actually cared about showing that it isn't right-wing,
>which it doesn't, then it would be just as concerned about attracting
>gays to it as it is about attracting women and minorities.

        No, I'm sorry, but not having an active program to recruit
something doesn't equate to discrimination and/or hate toward that
group.  To the best of my knowledge the NRA doesn't actively court
left-handers, either, and that doesn't make me consider they are
unwelcome.

>I've
>already seen a spate of "I wish I hope I pray there were more women
>in the NRA" in talk.politics.guns.

      So?

>Most gays, fanatic pseudo-libertarians excepted, have good reason to be
>steamed with the NRA, because the NRA supports William Dannemeyer.

      The NRA, certainly, can be accused of being single-minded in it's
lobbying.  As long as a politician is pro-gun they pretty much don't
care what else they are.  In this they are neither alone, nor unusual.

>When a buck goes into Dannemeyer's campaign chest, it isn't earmarked
>for "pro-gun efforts".  Dannemeyer can use that dollar for anything he
>wants pertaining to his re-election, including writing anti-gay slurs
>into the Congressional Record, although that particular act of his was
>free.  And Dannemeyer isn't the only A-grade NRA Congresscritter who
>hates gays enough to shackle them with the law.

       Gee, we've got slime in the Congress.  I am so surprised.

>So it would be good for the NRA to officially announce that they aren't
>like the Boy Scouts, for example, where gays just aren't welcome.
>But I seriously doubt they can get themselves to do it.  I doubt there
>exists a single sentence of NRA literature that denies discrimination
>on the basis of sexual orientation.  I could be wrong, of course.
>If I am I'll gladly eat my words.

       So, in order to not be discriminate on the basis of sexual
orientation, one must shout at the top on one's lungs and hang big
signs proclaiming you don't?

>On the subject of Jeff Cooper:  I don't want to libel anyone by
>claiming he is an NRA director when he isn't.

       Suggesting that someone is an NRA director when he isn't isn't
libel.  Although suggesting he discriminates and/or hates homosexuals
probably is.
       However, if you really are from Australia (and it's unlikely,
considering the anonymous source) whether you commit libel is not a
particularly big legal problem.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
David Veal     Division of Continuing Education Information Services Group
               University of Tennessee, Knoxville
               PA146008@utkvm1.utk.edu
Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns