Ignorant New York Times Sunday Lead: ‘Gun Sellers Stoke Fears to Boost Weapon Sales’

“Gun Sellers Stoke Fears to Boost Weapon Sales” is an alarmist 2,800-word investigation that led Sunday’s New York Times. It started with a little light mindreading. However, the most serious offense to fairness was the breathless depiction of gun companies marketing as every other industry.

Last November, hours after a jury acquitted Kyle Rittenhouse of two shooting deaths during antiracism protests in 2020, a Florida gun dealer created an image of him brandishing an assault rifle, with the slogan: “BE A MAN AMONG MEN.”

He was only 17 when Mr. Rittenhouse killed 2 people in Kenosha and wound another one. He aspired, however, to be just like him. This is what the industry of firearms knows, thanks to decades of research and focus group discussions.

Reporters Mike McIntire, Glenn Thrush, and Eric Lipton omitted the fact Rittenhouse acted in self-defense.

Gun companies have spent the last two decades scrutinizing their market and refocusing their message….The sales pitch — rooted in self-defense, machismo and an overarching sense of fear — has been remarkably successful.

….WomenAppealing to fears of being unprepared and crime, they are arouse by these appealsThey are the most active segment of buyers.

The reporter trio didn’t quite have the nerve to claim crime fears were unjustified these days, but certainly implied that gun marketing was distressingly “fear”-heavy. It shows they hate guns — because they don’t mind if you use “fear” of climate change to sell electric cars.

The Times examined firearms marketing research to imply standard marketing techniques are somehow sinister when gun firms do it: “….the firearms industry has sliced and diced consumer attributes to find pressure points — self-esteem, lack of trust in others, fear of losing control — useful in selling more guns.” They accurate noted gun sales rise after major shootings “as buyers snap up firearms they worry will disappear from stores.”

Whatever the source of Americans’ sense of unease,This has led to a nation flooded with firearms, and it is not ending soon enough.

“Fear,” said Darrell Miller, co-director of the Duke Center for Firearms Law, “is an incredibly powerful motivator.”

The Times marked the transition in gun advertising campaigns through the decades, from hunting to “armed self-defense….accompanied by a surge in popularity of the Glock semiautomatic handgun and AR-15-type rifle.”

The aggressive message around the topic has also helped define a newer crop of gun rights groups that increasingly overshadow the more deep-pocketed, but troubled, N.R.A. These groups, supported by the industry, have adopted a raw, in-your-face advocacy of near limitless freedom to own and carry firearms….They have become more extreme in their toneAlongside the public conversation about guns generally.

Reporters half-heartedly suggested racism

The image of Mr. Rittenhouse was put on Facebook by Big Daddy Unlimited, a firearms retailer in Gainesville, Fla., whose owners have said they started selling guns after the Sandy Hook massacre raised fears of new restrictions. “Be a Man Among Men” was a recruiting slogan used by the colonialist army of Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, and has gained popularity among white nationalist groups in recent years, although it is also used outside of that context.

The reporters did interview a gun-owning black woman who said, “We cannot expect the government to protect us, because they haven’t.”

The above exchange was the closest thing to a hint that in the Times’ dream world, only the government, i.e. The military and police would no longer be able to own guns, despite being savaged by the left. After two years of police-bashing by the newspaper, this is finally happening. It doesn’t mention self-defense and police inability to confront armed criminals, even elementary schools. This is what Uvalde (Texas) saw.