Ignorant and bigoted individuals are not the issue. The reification of language in this and other areas of social life justifies and excuses the abuses statists want to commit. Reliance upon this description eliminates not only the moral responsibility of those criminals who threaten or harm their victims using guns. That, of course, pleases the enemies of freedom to no end. The Penumbra of Political Manipulation Language is a tool for delineating just those distinctions the anti-gun autocrats hope to obscure.
Hazy language leads to hazy thinking.
The wider the penumbra of confusion, the more room that exists for the manipulators to confuse the fundamental issues involved in this struggle. It makes all the difference in the world whether one is being extreme in defending liberty or in undermining it. They desperately want their listeners not to think but to feel . Understanding context is essential for establishing the truth of a proposition or an argument. One must be aware of what things are similar and which differ in essential and important ways.