Misleading Headlines Demonizes Virginia Gun Owners

Misleading Headlines Demonizes Virginia Gun Owners

Richmond, VA –-(Ammoland.com)- Lobby Day in Virginia was a great success. Through the pressure of thousands of gun owners taking to the streets of Richmond, we were able to sway some Democrats to vote against the Virginia assault weapons ban (HB 961).

State Senator Chap Petersen confirmed to Fox News that Lobby Day and other second amendment activist activities directly led to the defeat of the flawed bill. Gun owners throughout the Commonwealth flooded county board meetings and city council meetings demanding that they declare themselves second amendment sanctuaries. In the end, over 96% of the state said they would not enforce any unconstitutional gun laws.

In anti-gun media didn’t take this defeat of their Draconian bill too well. An Associated Press report in the left-leaning British paper the Independent declared, “Virginia lawmakers reject assault weapon ban after white supremacists said it would spark civil war.”

The report referenced a couple of white supremacists that the FBI arrested days before the rally. According to reports, they planned to start a civil war in Richmond. The paper headline ignored the tens of thousands of average citizens that gave up their day to come to the Capitol to lobby their Senators and Delegates about their rights. The sensationalized headline even ignored the body of the story.

When a paper like the Independent syndicate stories from the AP and other sources, they can make whatever headline they want. We live in a culture where people just read the headlines and not the body of the article. That is precisely what the editors of the Independent want from their headline. Misleading headlines can sway public opinion.

This headline harkens back to a headline that ran in the RVA Magazine right after Lobby Day. Since Lobby Day was peaceful, they couldn’t push the idea that we were a bunch of terrorists because of our activities, so they ran the headline “LOBBY DAY: A PEACEFUL EVENT FILLED WITH INFLAMMATORY IDEAS.”

These gun-grabbers will use headlines to try to bend the story to fit their narrative. It is a form of yellow journalism that has plagued our field since the beginning of time. Still, now in the clickbait era, it seems to be ramped up to demonize anyone that doesn’t fit into their idea of a liberal utopian paradise.

Fighting back is against these underhanded techniques is not easy. Gun owners have to share articles that are based on facts and not on conjecture and emotion. Big tech has been censoring our voices, but we need to use those platforms to share the post organically.

We also need to read sites like AmmoLand. Too many people just read what Facebook tells them that they should read. Taking two extra minutes to go to the actual sites makes a world of difference and breaks big tech’s stranglehold on information.

At the same time, we need to read those articles with misleading headlines. That way, when someone posts those articles to social media, you can explain to them what the articles say and not what the editor wanted to insinuate.

We can fight back against misinformation, but it takes a concerted effort from all of us.

About John Crump

John is a NRA instructor and a constitutional activist. He is the former CEO of Veritas Firearms, LLC and is the co-host of The Patriot News Podcast which can be found at www.blogtalkradio.com/patriotnews. John has written extensively on the patriot movement including 3%’ers, Oath Keepers, and Militias. In addition to the Patriot movement, John has written about firearms, interviewed people of all walks of life, and on the Constitution. John lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and sons and is currently working on a book on leftist deplatforming methods and can be followed on Twitter at @crumpyss, on Facebook at realjohncrump, or at www.crumpy.com.

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