People who play with guns have all sorts of reasons for not joining the NRA. I forgot. My dog ate my computer. My dog peed on my computer. I am a member – I sent them $10 27 years ago. I bought a used gun, so I’m automatically a member. Isn’t it part of my AARP membership? I have my voter registration card, so I’m a member. I watch Top Shot on TV – doesn’t that make me a member? I got my membership in a box of Lucky Charms.
We’ve heard all the excuses. With that said, here’s our Top 13 list of reasons NOT to join the NRA…
- If more people join the NRA, then Hugo Chavez will have no chance of getting nominated to the United States Supreme Court. Be compassionate people! What’s a despot dictator to do in his retirement years?
- Operation Fast and Furious may be less fast and less furious with too much NRA oversight. If our government is going to export guns to Mexican drug lords, let’s do it with style and plenty of volume – that’s the American way!
- I am married to: (fill in the blank) Eric Holder, Michael Bloomberg, Wayne LaPierre, or Vladimir Putin
- If the NRA gets any more clout, those crazy Fast and Furious testimonies on CSPAN may come to a premature end. And everything else on daytime TV stinks now that All My Children is off the air.
- Being part of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy is so 1990’s
- I’ve built my own intercontinental ballistic missile and the NRA is not fighting for my rights to cap it with a multiple-warhead nuclear bomb. It’s my right!
- I already get my gun rights news from The Huffington Post and New York Times. I’ve got my objective news sources covered already.
- I don’t want to encourage worldwide deforestation by adding my name to the NRA-ILA direct mail list.
- Eddie the Eagle reminds me of clowns. And I have Coulrophobia . That’s fear of clowns.
- I already subscribe to Communist Dictators Quarterly magazine and don’t really want another subscription to American Rifleman. I can only read so much propaganda in a months time.
- What’s a Constitution? Is that like when you eat too much cheese and get all backed up?
- George Soros owns The Freedom Group, which owns all the gun companies, which own the NRA.
- They never serve Chateaubriand at Friends of NRA dinners.
Bu seriously folks. No excuses. If you own a gun, believe in little details like your right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of satellite TV, then you need to join the NRA.
Yeah, they’ve probably done something you disagree with, but so has your spouse/brother/sister/father/mother/child/neighbor. So get over it. Join all the other organizations you like. We do. There are a lot of great ones out there. Just be sure to add a +1 to that 4 million member number that freaks out all those certified politicians in Washington.
Are you kidding? Is this he same NRA happy w/ the status quo? The same NRA that spends its money publishing riduclousl propaganda magazines? THe same one who supported the National Firearms Act. The same one who won’t push to repeal serious gun laws because they are scared of losing? The NRA have turned into a bunch of rich lobbyists.
If you really want to support gun rights, rather go with the Second Amendment Foundation. They just sue the local, state and federal government, oh and they win. Yeah, those two recent supreme court decisions against DC and Chicago. . . the NRA had nothing to do with them, it was all SAF.
You are correct. The SAF is awesome and far more aggressive than the NRA. I am a member. I support SAF!
However, while winning court cases is *critical* and we all need to support that, court case outcomes do not mean jack squat to Joe or Jane Certified Politician who is worried about one thing – re-election. Hence the need to add as much as possible to that 4 million member number. Walking into Joe and Janes offices talking about 5 or 10 million members is what impacts their decision making. Donating lots of money to SAF is a fantastic way to address the battle in the courts. And we should all do that until it hurts.
This is a multi-front war, and we stand by our point in the article that support of all these organizations is critical. Court victories alone will not guarantee our position if congress puts morons on the bench. Congressional victories will not matter if we aren’t aggressive in the courts.
We have to fight on all fronts, and agree or disagree with specific NRA positions, they have 4 million members. And millions of members have meaning on the hill. Even to dim-witted certified politicians.
I do agree with your points, its one of the reasons (that and the nice NRA HQ range) that I am still a member of the NRA (and ACLU as well). Still I wont give them more than the basic membership dues whereas I like to regularly donate to SAF whoa ctually works for change and accomplishes it.
I’ve always wanted to shoot at the NRA HQ range… I have been to the National Firearms Museum, which is *awesome* A must visit place for sure!
The range is very nice however it’s insanely busy. For example, you need to get there 45min – 1hr before it opens in the morning on weekends to even get on a lane. Not enough lanes and no willingness from the corporate folks to expand it despite yera sof pleas for range employees and shooters.
Because the NRA is willing to place “able to carry a firearm” lowest of the lowest of its list of priorities.
If I go to their annual meeting – oh, where I can *VOTE* in the NRA elections – I MUST leave my firearm.
How does that stand up for gun owners?
I happen to be a luekawrm member, for the purpose of entering in the local competitive leagues around where I live, and the emails I get a couple times a week are wonderful sources of both wacky conspiracy-mongering and sleazy appeals to raise as much money as possible. Their Grassroots News Minutes’ in particular get me; I’m reasonably sure a top-down pronouncement of this law is bad and so is this one write your congressman and give us money’ is not exactly grassroots.’ Above all, though, I think they’ve got the technique down for making things as black-and-white, us-vs.-them as well as any group I’ve ever seen. Every law is a gun ban,’ any idea for registration is a scheme,’ irony quotes abound, and every single event profiled is either pro-freedom’ or anti-freedom.’ There is no middle ground of any kind allowed. Any law or bill that would curtail the ability of anyone at any timeto buy as many firearms as they want with no questions asked is a liberal Democratic gun-ban scheme to destroy your Second Amendment freedoms and pave the way to European socialism. There is a reason why I make sure to distance myself from crazies like these when people talk to me about my involvement in shooting sports.
I wish the NRA were more of a gun club in the spirit of what it used to be. They used to support a lot of interesting systematic investigation and dissemination of technical material related to shooting as well as organizing activities to support the fun of shooting. Now they seem to be the spearhead of divisive politics in the United States. The interpretation of the US constitution that they aggressively defend does not match my reading of the document. Guns are fun, and it is better for people like myself who enjoy them if they are legal to own. It is better if we don’t pervert our logical minds by inventing a fantasy world where guns are necessary for our freedom or self-defense. Those needs are best provided by other means anyway.