The UK's Finest Independent Forum for Shooters and Gun Owners. Est 2010.

I am finding the post by lovemovies22 very strange to say the least!

PeterN wrote:Dignified silence.
The shooting organisations did little to defend pistol shooting. They didn't make a case against the hatred directed at pistol shooting and shooters. The media called us perverts and worse. It would be classed as a hate crime now.
Individuals did their best, but it was like peeing in the sea for what difference it made to the witch-hunt against us.
The national organisations like the NRA sat back and, in effect, pleaded guilty and awaited sentencing.
Regard
Peter.

It would appear as though very little has changed - you only have to look at the shambes over the OWA and the loss of LR for proof of that.

Shame on both the Home Office and the House for such a blatant gun grab. The conservatives are supposed to "conserve"... not sell out the most law abiding when faced with "what on earth can we do in response to ever escalating gun crime". Try stop and search or more Police as a good starter for ten...

As for the "may be taken and used in crime" strapline, that's a mindset worthy of a third world dictatorship! It is an afront to every working day that I have given to my country in service!

I can wager that not one criminal has handed anything in (balanced against the many millions that the OWA would have cost).

It's a shame that the press aren't so keen to haul HMG over the coals as to such a waste of taxpayers millions!

PeterN wrote:Dignified silence.
The shooting organisations did little to defend pistol shooting. They didn't make a case against the hatred directed at pistol shooting and shooters. The media called us perverts and worse. It would be classed as a hate crime now.
Individuals did their best, but it was like peeing in the sea for what difference it made to the witch-hunt against us.
The national organisations like the NRA sat back and, in effect, pleaded guilty and awaited sentencing.
Regard
Peter.

Sorry Peter, but that last is a misrepresentation at best.

The shooting organisations tried. Nobody would publish their view. They paid for space in the Telegraph. No other newspaper would carry their material at any price. They used what political capital they had. It was indeed like peeing in the sea. With the Conservative party's desperate need to appeal to voters disillusioned with the lacklustre post-Thatcher government, and the master self-publicist Blair ready and eager to trample on anyone to get elected, even damage limitation turned out to be a lost cause. Almost the first legislative thing Blair did was the Firearms (Amendment) (No2) Act 1997.

IainWR wrote:

PeterN wrote:Dignified silence.
The shooting organisations did little to defend pistol shooting. They didn't make a case against the hatred directed at pistol shooting and shooters. The media called us perverts and worse. It would be classed as a hate crime now.
Individuals did their best, but it was like peeing in the sea for what difference it made to the witch-hunt against us.
The national organisations like the NRA sat back and, in effect, pleaded guilty and awaited sentencing.
Regard
Peter.

Sorry Peter, but that last is a misrepresentation at best.

The shooting organisations tried. Nobody would publish their view. They paid for space in the Telegraph. No other newspaper would carry their material at any price. They used what political capital they had. It was indeed like peeing in the sea. With the Conservative party's desperate need to appeal to voters disillusioned with the lacklustre post-Thatcher government, and the master self-publicist Blair ready and eager to trample on anyone to get elected, even damage limitation turned out to be a lost cause. Almost the first legislative thing Blair did was the Firearms (Amendment) (No2) Act 1997.

I am trying to remember what the NRA did exactly ....................

I suppose to their credit they were not as useless as the NPA .

Or Sebastard Coe.

Regardless of what was done our representative bodies have failed miserably in stemming the persecution of legal gun owners. It is as though they learn nothing from each erosion to gun ownership.

We are in a different world now and not beholden to paper news for getting information out. But no our lack of representation bodies still do the same old thing that has let us down time and time again, a no doubt well considered response which as usual gets ignored.

We should not be coming to this legislative table as a supplicant, but every time our national bodies doff the forelock, jump through the hoops, to no avail and then we have to bend over and drop our breeks/lift our skirts for the shafting.

I believe that this behaviour is called hypernormalisation. Where every one pretends to believe that everything isn't as shite as it really is.

We should be mobilising gunowners and getting the message out that it is the doer of the deed that is culpable not the instrument that is used.

At least then we would loose our legal firearms fighting rather than just lying on the tracks waiting for the train to come.

No doubt the NRA will bleat the usual about charitable status preventing them from being political, well maybe they should forgo that status in exchange for some rectitude and balls!

Two committee members of our club were at the house of commons regarding the then proposed handgun ban to see somebody, they saw Sebastian Coe tried to speak to him & he ran away.

David

Aye, the epitomy of a gutless, self serving bastard.

dromia wrote:Or Sebastard Coe.

Regardless of what was done our representative bodies have failed miserably in stemming the persecution of legal gun owners. It is as though they learn nothing from each erosion to gun ownership.

We are in a different world now and not beholden to paper news for getting information out. But no our lack of representation bodies still do the same old thing that has let us down time and time again, a no doubt well considered response which as usual gets ignored.

We should not be coming to this legislative table as a supplicant, but every time our national bodies doff the forelock, jump through the hoops, to no avail and then we have to bend over and drop our breeks/lift our skirts for the shafting.

I believe that this behaviour is called hypernormalisation. Where every one pretends to believe that everything isn't as site as it really is.

We should be mobilising gunowners and getting the message out that it is the doer of the deed that is culpable not the instrument that is used.

At least then we would loose our legal firearms fighting rather than just lying on the tracks waiting for the train to come.

No doubt the NRA will bleat the usual about charitable status preventing them from being political, well maybe they should forgo that status in exchange for some rectitude and balls!

As many will be aware from my previous posts, I am far from "content" with yet another shafting...

The same was apparently true of the other 19 people in my county who also had to "surrender" under the OWA - all being described as "very angry" at the political reaming and the loss of their personal possessions. Compare and Contrast with only a handful of other OW handed in - what an impact such a loss is going to have on the criminal fraternity (other than to turn otherwise law abiding into criminals through a lack of awareness)!

Whilst I am not always with Dromia, he has somewhat stolen my thunder in the above... as I was going to raise a post on how best to move forward?

I cannot help but feel so let down by our representative bodies - a false pretence at representation coupled with an inability to look past vested interests and actually bring the sport together as one. As a million strong (and with many influential people in our midst), it surely cannot be beyong the whit of man (or woman) to support a fighting fund / challenge the HO through the courts as necessary / drive home political lobbying...

The above would therefore appear at odds with charitable status!

Any thoughts???

If we had a rabid, unrelenting NRA, that wasn't able to hide beyond 'charitable' status as an excuse for being feeble, and instead went for the bo...cks every time the government considered yet more smoke and mirrors firearm legislation I'd pay double my subs. If they were prepared to go further and get the dirt on politicians and use blackmail and other dirty tricks to get things done, I'd pay triple my subs. I want an NRA that will lock up the government in expensive, long drawn out, legal challenges that will make politicians instinctively recoil at the thought of even considering pointless 'seen to be doing something' legislation. 'Do we really want to f*** with these guys after last time? For something we know won't make a jot of difference to crime?'
I want menacing pit bulls representing me and my sport not some chihuahuas dressed up in cute little tweed coats.

I'm with you a 100% on that one... you can try the nicey nicey but that just gets you shafted time after time.

I would gladly pay good money to an organisation (or even a few beer tokens into a fighting fund) that would defend the sport against all adversity - and if that means the Courts or lobbyists then so be it. If every shooter paid just a tenner a year into a legal pot then that would change the landscape considerably. How and who would administer that would be a right minefield...

Whilst I am a member of the NRA and will support them where possible / I enjoy shooting at Bisley, they are not in my experience the "national" defender of the sport... the name is just a fallacy that actually does the sport harm.

Fight, or don't bother... and leave the fight to someone more willing / better placed.