Gun Sales Stoke Fears: Marketing Success by the Gun Lobby

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The gun lobby only wants the best for their biases. They don't want their gun taken away so they're going to cheer on, even the most outrageous of bills. Politicians are actually thinking about militarizing schools and the amount of resources you need to do that is not even doable. Join Bill Stierle as he and Tom give their perspective on the tragic event that happened in Texas. Gun laws and policies need to change and it's up to the politics to do that. Exactly 17,199 deaths that have happened this year were through gun shootings. Something needs to change.

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Gun Sales Stoke Fears: Marketing Success by the Gun Lobby

As we are having this session, the nation is in shock and mourning. Shock is the best word for the shooting in Uvalde, Texas. There have been roughly 220 mass shootings in the United States in 2022. We are not even through the end of the month. Twenty-one of those has been school shootings. This is dominating the news cycle and the consciousness of everyone in America. Whether you are pro-gun rights or not, everybody is shocked and horrified. I cannot even begin to put proper context on all that. You and I have been talking about this in preparation for this episode. It is a gigantic topic, but there are some things we can talk about around it that would be meaningful in shows like this.

One of the biggest problems in communication is how we have an honest discussion about our emotions when they come up, and our emotions are activated by our needs. What has happened is how you get the need for protection or safety, as well as the need for choice met regarding the gun owner and the people's belief about what choice looks like. The title of the show is Purchasing Truth, which is using language and communication to get your point across to be able to get something to stick to rise above in marketing and sales, to be rising above in the political discourse so that you can get the thing that you are passionate about to be able to stick inside the mindset of the voter or purchaser.

"Politics is about purchasing votes through the activation of beliefs." That is the best quote I can come up with. You are trying to get somebody to vote by activating their belief or bias, so they become a part of your tribe and vote for you. It is important from the First Amendment place to speak up about the difficulty to allow people to say different points of view, and be able to fight for the thing that is best for the nation versus the thing that is best for the individual.

All of a sudden, it is unsettling because one of the common messages is that we are fiercely independent people who get to choose whatever we want to do and get to say what everyone wants to say. It is important for people to say what they need to say because that is how you can become passionate about something.

Until you become passionate, it is how you can start to heal. It is how you can make sense of things in your mind. 

As soon as you do not talk about things or as soon as you rely too heavily on rules or no talk or no speech, then you got the Russia shutdown thing that takes place where nobody can speak up because you cannot even get the population to say what it needs to say. All of a sudden, the constriction takes place. It is a challenge to balance being passionate about something that equates to the loss of life. Having an assault rifle being available to the choice of every American is not what the Second Amendment was written for. It says it right in there, "Well-regulated militia," that means the rules are well-regulated. We are not well-regulated. We are not living up to the constitution.

A lot of things have been all over the media since the shooting took place. One of the things that have been amplified is how Texas has a law that allows anyone over eighteen years old to be able to carry a firearm openly in public without even being licensed. I was thinking, "That is regulated?" That was not in alignment with my idea of being well-regulated.

As soon as you split the belief and then activate one part of the belief, which is, "I get the freedom to own a gun on an individual basis." That is not the best way to go about things because that is not well-regulated.

You mentioned politics at the top, and I found it ironic. Here is what we see every time there is one of these shootings. You have the people that want more gun regulation amplifying that message saying, "Now is the time. It is way past the time. We should have done this already." You have those that are in favor of gun owner rights or gun rights in general, saying, "Now is not the time to be political about this. Now is not the time for us to play politics with this issue because everybody is in shock, and the emotions are so raw."

I find that statement ironic because of the mere fact that Ted Cruz did it, as did many people on the right side of the aisle, more Conservatives are saying, "Now is not the time to be political about this." The reality is even those elected officials are saying, "Now is not the time to make this political," in fact, is a political statement. They are making it political by saying that. I found that ironic. 

I appreciate what you are saying because that is one way to purchase truth. It is called using shame and guilt as a way to shut down an honest discussion about a policy issue. It's the same as Beto O'Rourke talking to the governor in an open forum and somebody trying to yell at him, "You made this political. You are making this as a political stunt." The answer is that this is a policy problem. It is not a political problem. Politics is about policy. I am talking about policy here as a citizen. If it were a political stunt, then there would be other things going on here, but what is going on here is that this guy up here has a terrible policy that is killing kids.

That is the problem. It is a policy problem. We are talking about a policy problem here, are we not? No, we are trying to mourn the loss of children in this setting and having an open discussion about it. If you are having an open discussion about it, let's talk about changing the policy. Would anybody be willing to stand up here? Can I hear somebody support me on the policy change that none of us here in this room like kids getting killed by assault weapons? Can anybody say, "Vote for this," and the whole room would erupt in applause? The minority holding on to the belief bias that was put in their head by gun advocates go like, "I have been duped too. I do not like this." Anybody that is not applauding now is okay with what just happened here.

We have to admit Beto O'Rourke, at that moment, acts and makes a political stunt out of that because he was clearly out of order for whatever presentation or hearing or meeting was going on there. He disrupted it on purpose to make a point and to get attention. I agree with you, Bill. He could have used certain language that would have purchased that truth away and hijacked that hearing.

He ended up being escorted out by the officers for disrupting the meeting but had the full attention of the media. No longer was the media interested in whatever was going on inside the room. He gave a very impassioned speech answering questions to the media that highlighted how big a problem this was. He accomplished his goal at that moment. He could have done it better.

That would be a different discussion. He purchased the truth about the real discussion. The real discussion is that the people that were mourning while the shooting took place, Beto O'Rourke canceled all of his political events that he had scheduled. He had all this, "I am going to be on this show." He was doing this, and he canceled all of these and flew back to Texas from New York. In contrast, the governor went to a fundraiser the night after. He did not go to the memorial service of the people that got shot. He went to a fundraiser.

You think about the contrast of characters there. It is like, "I am staying on focus with my voters. I am going to go to this fundraising event instead of going where Beto O'Rourke was. I am going to go to the memorial service." The contrast is that, "How does one lead and one govern?" It is a delight to be in a nation where you and I get to have this conversation, and we get to put it out to the world and something that not every nation or every individual gets from the planet. Our nation provides us with this through the First Amendment.

There are going to be people who could be mad about my point on your point of view, but the alternative turns into all kinds of funny memes. You have seen some comedy pieces come up that we are going like, "What are we left with then?" We are left with somebody trying to white-knuckle tragic events instead of facing and making clean policies about how to prevent tragic events.

I mentioned part of it, the unfortunate cliché, upfront of these situations. People who are in alignment with the Second Amendment, unfettered access to guns, tend to say, "Now is not the time to make this political." When one of these shootings happens and then often says, "We need to be giving our thoughts and prayers to the families that have lost loved ones." While certainly, we all need to do that, and the right thing to do is to be thinking about them. On the one hand of that, that is just a portion of what we should be doing personally. On the side and opposition, they keep calling for more gun rights and gun restrictions.

A lot of memes and cartoons come out. There is one in particular from the StarTribune that I saw. I do not know that it is trying to be funny, but it is trying to eliminate something that we may not be amplified enough. It is certainly, if not amusing, at least shocking enough to get attention. The meme says up the top, "Thoughts and prayers." "Thoughts" on the left, "prayers" on the right.

There is a caricature of a representative in our government. He has a briefcase on the floor beside his feet that says GOP on it. It is clearly intended to be a Republican representative. He is standing there with his eyes closed, holding his hands together in prayer. Also, on the ground next to his briefcase is a newspaper with the headline, "School shooting," on it. You understand what this meme is about.

There are two bubbles, one underneath "thoughts" and one underneath "prayers." The bubbles are coming out from each side of his head like this is this representative's thoughts and prayers. The thought is, "Let's see what is the absolute least I can do on this issue?" It is what is implied. The prayer is, "God, let this blow over soon." They are hunkering down, trying not to do anything but appear sympathetic. Thoughts and prayers go out to people which those people need a lot of support, especially if they have lost someone. I cannot even imagine. As a parent, the most horrific thing you could ever experience in life is to lose a child, especially so violently.

Thoughts and prayers are something that people can do at a distance that is safe. I do not have to fly to Texas. I can have a thought and a prayer towards Texas. I can have a thought and a prayer towards a tsunami killing people in Japan. I can have a thought and a prayer about the Uyghurs in China. I can have a thought and a prayer about the people in Ukraine. There are a lot of thoughts and prayers to go around because I am in a bubble in my place. I am helpless and hopeless about dealing with those bigger things. It means that I care, but I cannot take action about it.

When a politician says it and then does not take a protective and a public service action to change policy, that is when the phrase or the idea of hypocrite comes in. You are saying a thought and prayer, but you are the person that is in the position to prevent that thing, the 17,199 deaths that have happened through shooting in 2022. We are halfway there.

That is just in America?

Yes. Regrettably, the way messaging works is all you have to do is purchase the person's belief and bias to agree with you. The person does not want to change their belief. They do not want to change their bias, but what happens if their belief in bias is wrong? A well-regulated militia is where the truth is. The belief and bias are that the Second Amendment means that any person can own any gun. That is not what the Second Amendment says. 

Bill, I am thinking back to some past episodes we have done and discussions we have had. I appreciate what you are saying. You are speaking the truth of what the Second Amendment says. To use your own words, at some point, the facts do not matter here. What message is being amplified is, "Americans, you are going to lose your rights." If you give an inch on the constitution, we are no longer America. It is a slippery slope argument. If we put any regulation on guns, then we are betraying the constitution, and this is not America anymore. I am over-exaggerating this a bit. No one is going to listen to a lesson about what the real intent of the Second Amendment is.

They are not going to listen to the lesson because the emotion and the belief have been hijacked a bit. It does not matter the fact that the Conservative Supreme Court of Justice, Warren Burger, said, "The gun lobby's interpretation of the Second Amendment is one of the greatest frauds." He said, "I repeat the word fraud on the American people by special interest groups that I have ever seen in my lifetime." He is calling the narrative of the Second Amendment. He said, "The real purpose of the Second Amendment was to ensure that the state's Armies and the militia would be maintained for the defense of the state."

The guns are for the defense of the state. The very language of the Second Amendment refutes any argument that it was intended to guarantee every citizen the unfettered right to have any weapon he or she desires. That fact you are reading bounces off the brain of the readers, saying, "No, that is not what it means." They have been marketed and sold that message, like you said, Tom. It is going to bounce off their brain. The truth does not land. The fact that this person is stating what the law is, is being discarded.

That is why a meme like this is important. It amplifies a message. It has us look at a different way. It sinks in. There is another one that I read that was a statement that was being critical of the 50 senators and congress who are Republicans. Even though 90% of Americans want more regulation on firearms to help protect the citizens of the country from gun violence, they are blocked because of the powerful gun lobby.

That is supporting their campaigns. They will not even entertain the idea of passing legislation or even considering legislation that is going to be in alignment with the 90% of Americans that want it. The statement that was made is one that catches your attention. I read those 50 senators care more about protecting embryos than they do 10-year-olds at school.

It's very unsettling. Where does the battle get won here for truth? More importantly, when a person's belief and bias get to be advocated for by the powers that be, and the powers that be are not accountable for the good of the nation, they are only accountable for the values of their constituents at the local level. There are some problems. A local problem is different than a national problem. It is like, "This is a local problem here." What would it be like because there is already counter-programming already taking place in mass media for Sean Hannity getting on and spelling out his plan?

Sean Hannity spelled out a plan about how they could arm the teachers, arm the principals, get retired law enforcement, get the retired military to volunteer to work at the school, and only have one exit going in and going out of a school and militarize a school setting. The numbers are not there to get it done. The ability to run such a program called militarizing or protecting schools from these kinds of situations is so not feasible. It is just as not feasible as putting a border wall for immigrants from one part of the Pacific, all the way to the Atlantic, all the way through to the Gulf of Mexico along the Mexican border.

It is not realistic, cost-effective, or financially viable to do that idea, but that is okay. The person that is listening to it says, "I am in agreement with that bias. My bias is I do not want anybody to take my guns away, so therefore, the environment has to change to me and my bias." Rather than, "The environment does not have to change to your bias, we would want to buy your gun back." The alternative narrative is, "We do not want as many assault rifles to take place."

I heard those messages being amplified by many people on Fox News. The naivety of the argument. Especially our schools here in California are all open air. There is not one entrance into a typical elementary school. There are about twenty different entrances because each classroom is its own separated thing with a door to the outside.

You are going to have twenty volunteers. You are going to be able to get enough volunteers who are willing to carry a gun and stand at the side of a school all day and protect them. It is unrealistic. Are you going to create a border wall around the entire school property? It is not a realistic solution. The idea that you are going to get enough volunteers to do it, so you do not have to pay them, I do not think there are enough retired military or police willing to do that. 

It is very challenging. There is a battle for perspective. My request or my creative idea to purchase truth back is for some Democrat that has the courage and languaging skills to promote a bill called the Protect School Children for America Act. It is spelling out a multibillion-dollar project to fund the protection of the schools. Out of the start of 2022, there have been school shootings. That is clear enough to make concerted efforts to protect children. How much is it going to cost? How are you going to run it? Immediately, it will fall apart. It falls apart because the argument is not there, that it is feasible, doable and cost-effective. There are other ways to solve or, at least, take a step toward that problem.

If a Democrat brought that bill forward and then got Republicans to engage in it, the Republicans would eventually abandon the idea because they were going to say, "It costs too much. We cannot afford that." The budget-conscious, fiscally responsible Republicans, which traditionally has been one of their absolute bedrock principles, are not going to want to deficit spend enough to do what it would take to protect all the schools in America. It could amplify that that is not the solution.

You want to create the absurdity of the experience. It makes the promise and the hollowness of, "You are not doing anything other than saying something that will not work." You got to tether out. You and I both have children, and they say nutty things. They say things that do not work. The main thing is not to get into an argument with something that does not work, to pull the thing out of them that does not work and says, "I see that you are using some creativity around that thing," and then, "I wonder how that is going to work." You are practicing good thinking with them.

You are tethering out the illusion and the ability. "You are six years old, and you want to go to the pub? Let's go to the pub. You want to go to the pub?" It is like, "Mom, I want to go to the pub." There is a great short video of a little Irish girl that is six years old that wants to go to the pun. It is a very funny meme, a short video on TikTok. The challenge we have as human beings is that we do not have a safe place to talk about putting things into perspective. How much will it cost to protect every school? How much staffing would you need? How much training would you need? You do not even want to buy crayons for teachers. How are you going to buy guns for teachers?

That is going to eliminate the absurdity of the suggestion. There are so many communication challenges around this issue, Bill. We could spend days on it and talking about it. I appreciate your perspective. What we have been able to accomplish in this episode is at least putting some perspective on some of the challenges and hopefully can convince some people to think about it differently.

Safety, protection, how do you balance that with freedom and choice? How do we deal with the mourning now that is necessary? The action that is required to do something that is going to make a policy change, move beyond thoughts and prayers, and move to change in policy. That is where we got to stick the landing. Change the policy.

It is very much needed. That is painfully obvious.

Thanks, everybody. There is more to come. This is a big issue. It is important to discuss it and get multiple points of view out so that we can find an answer to prevent this tragedy from taking place.

Thanks, Bill.