Another anti-gunner has sprinkled salt and a little bit of ketchup on their foot before planting it firmly in their mouths. This time, it was Fox News’ Geraldo Rivera who decided to dine on this part of their body, when he made himself look like an utter imbecile while shilling for the anti-gunner lobby.
While the level of ignorance Rivera displayed was comical, there is also a lesson here when it comes to the debate over gun rights. The fact of the matter is that most who are anti-gun are just as ignorant as the Fox News host, which should inform how we, as proponents of the Second Amendment, approach the discussion.
During a Tuesday episode of “The Five,” Rivera went full clown mode as he waxed hysterical about the fact that some Americans own AR-15s and other scary looking black guns. He went on a diatribe in which he attacked people who own the rifle, accusing them of acting “macho”; Co-host Greg Gutfeld attempted to educate Rivera, telling him “it’s a rifle,” to which Rivera dug the hole even deeper, arguing that “it’s not a rifle, it’s a machine gun.”
Gutfeld then asked Rivera what AR stands for, and Rivera donned his red wig, clown nose, and oversized shoes and answered, “automatic rifle.”
After being corrected once again, Rivera said: “All I know is AR-15s have no place in American society, other than sport clubs.”
But, as RedState’s Nick Arama pointed out:
It isn’t a machine gun, it’s an ordinary semi-automatic rifle that fires one bullet per trigger pull. But Geraldo is showing the incredible ignorance that much of the liberal media shows — they have no idea what they are talking about when it comes to guns. All they know is what the current talking point is — that AR-15s are evil and machine guns.
Nevertheless, even after humiliating himself, Rivera went on Twitter and continued the clown act, doubling down on his absurd comments. He wrote:
Heard the Daily Caller and fellow travelers are ranting about my incorrect definition on-air of “AR” as in AR-15. Whatever. Point is, there is no place (other than sporting clubs and similar skilled settings) for assault rifles.
They’re substitute appendages.
Heard the Daily Caller and fellow travelers are ranting about my incorrect definition on-air of “AR” as in AR-15. Whatever. Point is, there is no place (other than sporting clubs and similar skilled settings) for assault rifles.
They’re substitute appendages.— Geraldo Rivera (@GeraldoRivera) January 18, 2023
I’m normally not this crude, but I can’t resist the temptation to point out that if AR-15s are “substitute appendages” as Rivera suggests, then he is in dire need of an AR-15.
Just saying.
Rivera and his anti-gunner comrades are dead wrong about the AR-15 and the idea of “assault weapons” in general. But they prey on the rest of the public, most of whom do not know that the percentage of those killed by rifles is miniscule compared to that of knives, fists, handguns, and other methods. Indeed, a Pew Research poll showed that 81 percent of Democrats and 50 percent of Republicans believe the federal government should ban “assault-style rifles.”
However, the Foundation for Economic Education pointed out that one is more likely to be stabbed or beaten to death than killed by someone using a rifle. “With an average of 13,657 homicides per year during the 2007-2017 timeframe, about one-tenth of one percent of homicides were produced by mass shootings involving AR-15s,” the author wrote.
I have long contended that the primary reason why average anti-gunners are afraid of gun ownership is because they are ignorant on the subject. Typically, these folks know little to nothing about guns and do not understand how they work. In fact, I have seen countless instances in which a gun owner takes a gun control type to the range to educate them. By the end of the session, they are no longer anti-gun. Here’s an example:
What Rivera’s buffoonery tells us is that if we want to win this debate, we have to educate, educate, educate. Indeed, I suspect that in many cases, persuasion won’t even be necessary – the facts speak for themselves. But after explaining the truth about guns, people will come around. The good news is that attitudes on guns are gradually changing as more people realize the government is not going to protect them. Now is a prime opportunity for those who love liberty to change more minds.
