The great thing about X, formerly Twitter, is that it's a conduit right to the people. Now that Elon Musk owns it and does a much better job of protecting free speech, it means that it does that job so much better.
But sometimes, some entities--some individuals and some organizations of various kinds--use their X accounts to put on an exhibit of stupidity. That's what Everytown for Gun Safety did on Monday.
“These weapons and accessories of war have absolutely no place on our streets or in the hands of civilians. Not only are laws prohibiting them constitutional, they are effective—and they save lives. We look forward to supporting Illinois in appealing this extreme and unfounded…
— Everytown (@Everytown) November 11, 2024
What's impressive here is how they managed to get so much wrong in this one passage. Let's look at it point by point, shall we?
These weapons and accessories of war have absolutely no place on our streets or in the hands of civilians.
First, they're not weapons of war. They might look like weapons of war, but they're not. They're semi-automatic firearms that are functionally little different from the typical firearms used for hunting.
Moreover, even if they were, look at the Second Amendment for a moment. While people like those at Everytown love to look at the militia clause and soil themselves over the possibility that it justifies gun control, the fact that "A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state" tells us the Founding Fathers wanted us able to wage war. It's just that simple.
And what the heck is an "accessory of war" anyway?
I'm going to assume they mean so-called high-capacity magazines, but that's just them trying to spin things. Those magazines are the standard magazines that these weapons come with in the first place. If so, this is just scaremongering at its worse. And to think, I didn't believe Everytown could get more vile. (For more on this, check out our sister site Bearing Arms where Cam Edwards has a field day with this one.)
Not only are laws prohibiting them constitutional, they are effective—and they save lives.
Except, they're not constitutional--that whole "shall not be infringed" alone negates that, but then we have the Bruen decision that demands a historical analog, and you're not going to find one for banning the most popular firearm model in America.
They're also not effective. That's not just my opinion, either. That's from a Department of Justice study that found that the previous assault weapon ban had no impact on violent crime. All you have even hinted at otherwise is the differences in mass public shootings, but those changed several years after the previous ban sunset. They had no impact on the homicide rate, which was dropping before the ban was passed and continued on for years afterward.
We look forward to supporting Illinois in appealing this extreme and unfounded decision to the Seventh Circuit.
Isn't it funny how keeping the status quo is "extreme" simply because a group trying to overturn our long-established rights thinks it is? Kind of like how it's amusing that a decision completely in line with Supreme Court precedence is an "unfounded decision."
I mean, we have three sentences here that are filled with wrong information. It's genuinely impressive how much they could get wrong in such a short statement for X, but they managed to do it.
I guess I should send them a trophy or something because getting that much wrong deserves some recognition.