On the off chance that you haven’t read my previous post, please take a couple of minutes to do that. At the end of it I said I’d share my thoughts on the intent of one of the videos linked to that post.
My thoughts, as promised:
The video, like a number of others from the National Rifle Association, was crafted to support more than one objective. The intent isn’t to support the safe, responsible use of firearms, as I remember the NRA doing when I learned about those things as a Boy Scout in the 1960s.
No, today’s NRA wants people to be afraid of each other, so it uses frightening imagery and scare words, often in the form of lies, to engender fear and hate.
Why? The other reasons are pretty clear from this and other NRA messaging:
The NRA does this because its leadership, supported by what we must infer is a large percentage of its membership, believes in white supremacy.
The NRA does what it does to maintain and increase its membership.
The NRA does what it does so that people will buy more and more guns and ammunition.
The NRA’s intent is to maintain and increase its own clout and to keep the American people buying guns and ammo from the association’s corporate backers.
This is all revealed more grotesquely in a newer NRA video that I will not even share here. It is that vile. In one sense, what the NRA does is akin to going armed with intent. That’s a felony in some places.
There’s no doubt that writing with intent and passion can be effective. Depending on the intent, such content can be destructive and even deadly.
The Smith Compound 