Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
Editorials & Other Articles
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
Heres Why the NRAs Plan to Make People Fear the Violent Left May Backfire
With his latest round of morning tweets, Donald Trump continued his days-long streak of unrepentant comments about Charlottesville. He has continued to claim that the “alt left,” in his words, shared blame for bloodshed that left one woman dead and dozens injured, an assertion that is contradicted by extensive video evidence that shows white nationalists repeatedly attacking counter protesters.
This framing of the left as a violent force — and a more pressing threat than the far right — was trotted out by the National Rifle Association soon after Trump’s inauguration. The gun group has since pushed that narrative hard in a slew of videos, including spokeswoman Dana Loesch’s infamous “Clenched Fist of Truth” ad demonizing the Women’s March. With no Clinton or Obama in power to rail against, the NRA appears to have determined that leftist protesters pose the greatest threat to gun-owners, and indeed all Americans.
The gun group and the president have both sought to use fear to their political advantage. For the NRA, at least, this approach could backfire in a big way, political scientist Alexandra Filindra says. Filindra has run a slew of experiments on how people’s feelings about race, crime, and violence influence their positions on gun laws. In a study she published last year, she found that racial resentment strongly influenced white people to oppose gun control.
But, according to her latest research, escalating racial tensions don’t lead to retrenchment of hard-line attitudes against gun laws. Fear of social violence, Filindra says, can drown out worries about racial identity. In an as-yet unpublished experiment, she found that if white people are prompted with descriptions of violent protests or street brawls, they are more likely to support gun control.
https://www.thetrace.org/2017/08/nra-violent-left-backfire/
This framing of the left as a violent force — and a more pressing threat than the far right — was trotted out by the National Rifle Association soon after Trump’s inauguration. The gun group has since pushed that narrative hard in a slew of videos, including spokeswoman Dana Loesch’s infamous “Clenched Fist of Truth” ad demonizing the Women’s March. With no Clinton or Obama in power to rail against, the NRA appears to have determined that leftist protesters pose the greatest threat to gun-owners, and indeed all Americans.
The gun group and the president have both sought to use fear to their political advantage. For the NRA, at least, this approach could backfire in a big way, political scientist Alexandra Filindra says. Filindra has run a slew of experiments on how people’s feelings about race, crime, and violence influence their positions on gun laws. In a study she published last year, she found that racial resentment strongly influenced white people to oppose gun control.
But, according to her latest research, escalating racial tensions don’t lead to retrenchment of hard-line attitudes against gun laws. Fear of social violence, Filindra says, can drown out worries about racial identity. In an as-yet unpublished experiment, she found that if white people are prompted with descriptions of violent protests or street brawls, they are more likely to support gun control.
https://www.thetrace.org/2017/08/nra-violent-left-backfire/
The right-wing gun lobby and the Orange Anus are using the same deceitful tactics, and it is not working on the majority of more intelligent Americans who see the criminals for what they really are: armed and dangerous White Supremacist hateful racist scum.
They are helping communities see the need for reasonable and rational gun control every time they don their hoods and display that pathetic loser's Confederate flag.