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Enough of being respectful. Those of us who want gun sanity must demand it
Walmart’s decision to limit ammunition sales and ask its customers to refrain from openly carrying guns in its stores represents more than just a routine business move....
To say “it’s about time” is to understate. Years of living in the shadow of massacres has left us a nation on tenterhooks, 330 million people all sharing the same case of PTSD. One recalls the panicked stampede in Times Square last month when motorcycles backfired. One observes that children are being sent back to school this year with bulletproof backpacks. And one is glad businesses are willing to “respectfully request.”
...So it’s good to see American business taking a stand American lawmakers won’t, the marketplace of commerce reaching a consensus the marketplace of ideas can’t. That said, this polite pleading is not enough. Asked about Walmart’s policy, even David Amad, a gun rights activist in Texas, told the Times, “They are ducking the issue.”
Which they are. Walmart and other retailers seek a path of least resistance that will relieve them of the responsibility of taking a stand. But no such path exists: sides must be chosen and lines must be drawn, because this is, quite literally, a matter of life and death. And death and death and death. As a private entity, Walmart, like CVS, Starbucks and Kroger, can simply say, Do not bring guns into our stores. They have that power and they must use it. The majority of us who want gun sanity in this land must require them to. They’ve made their “respectful request.”
We must answer with an impatient demand.
To say “it’s about time” is to understate. Years of living in the shadow of massacres has left us a nation on tenterhooks, 330 million people all sharing the same case of PTSD. One recalls the panicked stampede in Times Square last month when motorcycles backfired. One observes that children are being sent back to school this year with bulletproof backpacks. And one is glad businesses are willing to “respectfully request.”
...So it’s good to see American business taking a stand American lawmakers won’t, the marketplace of commerce reaching a consensus the marketplace of ideas can’t. That said, this polite pleading is not enough. Asked about Walmart’s policy, even David Amad, a gun rights activist in Texas, told the Times, “They are ducking the issue.”
Which they are. Walmart and other retailers seek a path of least resistance that will relieve them of the responsibility of taking a stand. But no such path exists: sides must be chosen and lines must be drawn, because this is, quite literally, a matter of life and death. And death and death and death. As a private entity, Walmart, like CVS, Starbucks and Kroger, can simply say, Do not bring guns into our stores. They have that power and they must use it. The majority of us who want gun sanity in this land must require them to. They’ve made their “respectful request.”
We must answer with an impatient demand.
https://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/leonard-pitts-jr/article234957757.html