We will stop referring to ourselves as a “civil rights” organization that defends “human rights.” It is a sacrilege to people actually killed or harmed by civil and human rights abuses.
We will acknowledge that our membership of 4 million is dwarfed in both size and sympathy by 6.2 million teachers, 76.6 million students and 18 million healthcare workers in the US living with our depraved gun policies.
We will stop our Black Hand, horse-head-in-the-bed bully tactics against lawmakers. Congress has figured out we are all hat and no horse and lawmakers now fear the gunmen our policies arm more than us, starting with Jared Loughner who shot Congresswoman Gabby Giffords.
We will admit we have made background checks a joke. Mass shooters Seung-Hui Cho (Virginia Tech), Stephen Phillip Kazmierczak (Northern Illinois University), Sulejman Talovic (Trolley Square mall), Vincent J. Dortch (Philadelphia Naval Shipyard), Jiverly Voong (Binghamton), Richard Poplawski, (Pittsburgh police killer), Bruce Pardo (Santa Claus killer), Latina Williams (Louisiana Technical College) and Jennifer Sanmarco (Goleta postal facility) sailed through background checks. So did James Holmes who shot 70 in an Aurora movie theater.
We declare that the “gun show loophole” is actually gigantic and that such private sales amount to 40 percent of US guns sales. Yes, almost half.
We regret our obstruction of “one firearm a month” laws to stop straw buyers. Thanks to our obstruction, convicted felon William Spengler, who killed his own grandmother, waltzed into a Gander Mountain in Henrietta, NY and chose the murder weapons with which he killed fire fighters on Christmas Eve. A straw buyer was at his side.
We will stop blaming gun crime on “failure to enforce existing laws” and confess that it is our lobbying that has blocked sharing and computerizing of national firearm sales data so crimes cannot be solved. We also block weapon microstamping, further making sure the “bad guys'” never get caught.
We admit that arming bad guys through such loose laws and then blaming them for the need for more firearms is like killing your parents and crying you are an orphan.
We will see the contradiction in being proud safe gun owners while asking authorities to protect our identities. We realize our belief that criminals will target homes because they believe the homes have no firearms or because they believe the homes do have firearms sounds paranoid and invalidates our core belief that firearms keep homes safe.
We will stop pretending our fear to go anywhere unarmed is somehow a public service and we are the real law enforcers. None of our George Zimmerman-style, self-proclaimed deputies stopped Jared Lee Loughner in Tucson despite Arizona’s many conceal carriers. We’ll take a hard look at all the people—including elderly and 80 pound women—who get to work everyday without a firearm and ask ourselves if, maybe, our problem is us.
We will stop whipping up “preppers” and citizen army extremists into stockpiling bigger arsenals because jack booted government agents are about to storm their homes and disarm them. Though we love the melodrama of being “victims,” the 2008 Supreme Court decision District of Columbia v. Heller means that will never happen. Never. And if we are victims, we’re the best armed victims in the history of the world.
We will stop our compulsive firearms talk about clips, magazines and how a semiautomatic weapon shouldn’t be considered an assault weapon. Though the blather is designed to reveal how ignorant the public is about firearms, even as it tries legislate them, the truth is we get buzzed just talking about weapons.
Help us Prepare for Trump’s Day One
Trump is busy getting ready for Day One of his presidency – but so is Truthout.
Trump has made it no secret that he is planning a demolition-style attack on both specific communities and democracy as a whole, beginning on his first day in office. With over 25 executive orders and directives queued up for January 20, he’s promised to “launch the largest deportation program in American history,” roll back anti-discrimination protections for transgender students, and implement a “drill, drill, drill” approach to ramp up oil and gas extraction.
Organizations like Truthout are also being threatened by legislation like HR 9495, the “nonprofit killer bill” that would allow the Treasury Secretary to declare any nonprofit a “terrorist-supporting organization” and strip its tax-exempt status without due process. Progressive media like Truthout that has courageously focused on reporting on Israel’s genocide in Gaza are in the bill’s crosshairs.
As journalists, we have a responsibility to look at hard realities and communicate them to you. We hope that you, like us, can use this information to prepare for what’s to come.
And if you feel uncertain about what to do in the face of a second Trump administration, we invite you to be an indispensable part of Truthout’s preparations.
In addition to covering the widespread onslaught of draconian policy, we’re shoring up our resources for what might come next for progressive media: bad-faith lawsuits from far-right ghouls, legislation that seeks to strip us of our ability to receive tax-deductible donations, and further throttling of our reach on social media platforms owned by Trump’s sycophants.
We’re preparing right now for Trump’s Day One: building a brave coalition of movement media; reaching out to the activists, academics, and thinkers we trust to shine a light on the inner workings of authoritarianism; and planning to use journalism as a tool to equip movements to protect the people, lands, and principles most vulnerable to Trump’s destruction.
We urgently need your help to prepare. As you know, our December fundraiser is our most important of the year and will determine the scale of work we’ll be able to do in 2025. We’ve set two goals: to raise $125,000 in one-time donations and to add 1400 new monthly donors by midnight on December 31.
Today, we’re asking all of our readers to start a monthly donation or make a one-time donation – as a commitment to stand with us on day one of Trump’s presidency, and every day after that, as we produce journalism that combats authoritarianism, censorship, injustice, and misinformation. You’re an essential part of our future – please join the movement by making a tax-deductible donation today.
If you have the means to make a substantial gift, please dig deep during this critical time!
With gratitude and resolve,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy