These aren’t bad videos being produced by the National Shooting Sports Foundation. My only real criticism is that it’s almost a little too “See, our industry is really as American as Apple Pie!” It’s almost too strong a sell, and even comes off being a little more defensive than I think it needs to. That’s probably understandable in an industry that’s unjustly maligned in entertainment, the media, and popular culture, but I think that can interfere with the message. It does get some important points across, though, like the firearms industry being a regulated industry, despite the mad histrionics of the gun control groups, and explaining those regulations to the general public. No doubt absolutists will hate the implications, but this kind of thing is necessary to get the public to accept gun ownership and the firearms industry as being a legitimate part of society.
Part I
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhWq8BVH_ug[/youtube]
Part II
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eppZl_lX8U[/youtube]
They need to redub the narration. The guy sounds creepy and like a parody.
They might also want to see some PSAs made after 1993.
I agree… it has that classroom documentary played on the reel projector feel to it. You almost expect the audio to skip.
Actually, now that I think about it, the direct approach might be the wrong way to go.
What I’d like to see are high-quality clips using minor celebrities (anyone from Firefly would be awesome, for instance) showing some technique or skill. The “twist” is that instead of “Hi, I’m Nathan Fillion, and guns are an American Tradition (TM),” it’d be like “I’m Gina Torres and I’m going to learn how to fire an AR-15 at steel silhouettes!” They’d skip the argument stage and act like shooting is perfectly normal, which of course it is. Have pretty girls doing it and you’ll have guys who watch for the girls and leave with the idea that maybe guns aren’t so bad after all.
The lo-fi home videos on YouTube are okay, but I’ll bet Mythbusters (and especially Kari Byron) have sparked more interest in guns than all of YouTube put together.
Sebastian, At 40 seconds into the second video he said every firearms purchaser must go through a background check every time he buys a firearm.
How can you and your friends be so critical of some of the gun control discrepancies when this kind of thing goes by without a word?
If the makers of this video had any guts, they would have depicted others than just white males engaging in illegal straw-purchase schemes.
MikeB:
Because the video is about the firearms industry, and from the industry’s point of view, that’s true. No firearm leaves their domain without a background check.
What an individual does with it beyond that is subject to other laws, but from the industry’s point of view, that’s not a false statement.
Sebastian, I can’t believe your answered like that. Maybe you need to look at the first 50 seconds of that video again.
I’ll help you out. The proper response is, “yeah, our side has it’s share of spin doctors too.”
He was speaking of manufacturers, distributors, and retailers. In that context, it’s correct to say that every purchaser has to go through a background check to buy a gun every time they purchase one.
What do you want him to do? Mention that there are private sales that have nothing to do with the firearms industry? That’s about us, the gun owner, not about the industry. From the industry’s point of view, they can’t transfer a gun, except to another licensee, without a background check.
And believe me, the industry would probably love to frustrate private sales, because if all transactions get routed through FFLs, they money every time someone does a transfer. So they don’t have much incentive to lie about it. They are speaking about their point of view, retail sales, which private sales have nothing to do with.
Sebastian, Uncle’s right to question why you waste your time with me.
The truth is after four or five listens and two comments I still thought private sales when he said “retail.”
Thanks for the repeated explanation.