Posted on 06/11/2011 9:04:12 AM PDT by marktwain
About a year ago, the Brady Campaign warned that “gun rights” activists were converging on Washington, D.C., seething with threats of right-wing violence.
Of course, the Brady Campaign rejected the “bumper sticker logic” of the gun lobby. The gun control group called for a new reality-based discussion of guns and violence.
Someone at the Brady Center wrote a book titled “Lethal Logic: Exploding the Myths that Paralyze American Gun Policy.” The author dissected the superficial appeal of bumper sticker logic (e.g., when guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns).
While I don’t normally display bumper stickers, I am convinced that the stickers provide profound sociological data. Which brings us to the question posed in today’s column: What does it mean that the Starbucks lady is now on a bumper sticker carrying a handgun?
In California a few years ago, some folks were offended by fellow coffee drinkers in Starbucks (and other spots) with pistols and revolvers visibly hanging from their hips. Organizations like the Brady Center, which wants to take guns away from the rest of us, demanded that armed customers be prohibited from such publicly “lethal” expressions of free speech.
Some retailers reacted by announcing a “no guns” policy. Starbucks, on the other hand, allowed guns in its stores. The anti-gun groups held demonstrations around the U.S. to try and coerce Starbucks into changing its policy. The demonstrations spread to Seattle and resulted in swarms of reporters, demonstrators and armed caffeine addicts intermingling in an exchange of viewpoint that could have become lethal to Starbucks’ profit and loss statement.
Did the Brady Campaign encourage the bumper stickers in order to shame the coffee chain? Or did the open-carry crowd adopt the image as a means of trumpeting their victory over the progressing forces of tyranny?
There has always been a certain mystery surrounding the Starbucks lady with the star above her head. Her mermaid-like mien is normally encompassed by porpoise tails. Thus, the image of her brandishing a gun could be a shout of indignation against environmentalism — or even a new breed of environmental radicalism?
Maybe she is just a symbol of Seattle rising amid the splendors of an Emerald Sea. The Starbucks logo certainly offers something for everyone.
The next time you visit a Starbucks, thank your favorite barista for keeping us caffeinated and for protecting our First and Second Amendment rights. And give the Starbucks lady the respect she deserves for sticking to her guns!
I just do not understand the fear and hatred of guns. I have knives in the kitchen, I have poisons in the garage, I have gasoline and matches, if I REALLY wanted to kill someone I could do it WITHOUT a gun. A local man was beaten to death with a tennis racket.
I love the photoshop job! I don’t know where you found it, but I’m totally stealing it for my FB profile pic!
It was at the source article.
Years ago, I had a verbal argument with a total libtard nutcase about guns. I simply told him, “if I wanted to, I could smash this chair over your head or use my hands to strangle you to death, are you going to start banning hands and chairs then?” Sure, i should have used better words but I was pissed off at that moment how these idiots are able to breath and vote.
Where can you buy the bumper stickers?
Or will we ban bathtubs since that 5-year old girl drowned that 18-month old? Oh wait, the hippies have already done that.
I am stealing this logo.
No bathtubs in my house.
I just added it to my Photobucket account...
It is very significant that STARBUCKS is doing this! It is often the preferred den of latte liberals, in fact is directly responsible for that conceptual connection. I wonder exactly what the corporate minutes and moments on this issue read like.
But you can’t really fight big brother will all of those things, which is what the whole deal is all about.
Anything can serve as a weapon. Years ago in my basic training unit a joe snuffy recruit attacked one of our drill sergeants, who grabbed his porcelain coffee mug and beat the living cr@p out of said recruit with the leverage of his index finger in the mug handle.
The bloodstained coffee mug was unfortunately seized by the MP’s. First sergeant wanted it enshrined in his office.
I like my quote better, “When they outlaw guns only the state will have guns.”
That quote only encourages Leftists.
“It is very significant that STARBUCKS is doing this! It is often the preferred den of latte liberals, in fact is directly responsible for that conceptual connection. I wonder exactly what the corporate minutes and moments on this issue read like.”
I think conservatism does itself no favor, trying to stereotype so many things.
Conservatives drink coffee. I bet it is as simple as Starbucks being first a for-profit business, and hoping to sell coffee to conservatives.
I noted last August the Starbucks a few blocks from the capitol building, in Cheyenne, Wyoming.
There sat several folks who might be presumed ato be your “latte liberals” for they wore suits, and sat with laptops, sipping their drinks.
And also in the shop was a dude dressed in cowboy hat and boots, and black duds. He had a gun on each hip.
Now I had no real way of determining if the suit wearing ones were liberals or conservatives, nor did I really know about the cowboy dresser, either.
Now did any of them know we were stereotype defying conservatives from California.
>>> Most of the anti gunners I know and come to believe make up the majority of the anti-gun establishment are EMOTIONAL.
When you dig through the layers of rhetoric, it’s not so much they dislike guns as they dislike the people who like guns.
>>> I just do not understand the fear and hatred of guns. I have knives in the kitchen, I have poisons in the garage, I have gasoline and matches
In fairness guns are a lot more serious then knives, poisons, and gasoline. I’d have a fair chance of escaping someone assaulting me with these. Not much chance though that I’d outrun a bullet.
Words of wisdom from Jimmy Hoffa (really). “Charge a gun and run from a knife”. I always wondered if he had time to try that.
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