I don’t mind biased sources all that much. Most human beings have some degree of bias on many subjects, so I’m fine with it showing up in at least some reporting. What I want, though, is for that bias to be noted somehow.
For example, if there’s a story from Slate or the Huffington Post, we all know it’s going to have a liberal twinge to it, even if the writer is trying really hard to be neutral–which, admittedly, never happens, but roll with me here–because that’s where their biases are. Because we know that, we can adjust accordingly.
But a recent story from Ohio Capital Journal is a real problem. Why? Well, a name like that hints at an attempt at being a neutral media source, but then they drop a headline like this: “Moms Demand Action push for common sense gun legislation in Ohio during advocacy day.”
Of course, Ohio Capital Journal is one of those States Newsroom outlets that pretend to be real news but is really political activism.
And pretending any of these proposals are “common sense” requires a whole lot of bias.
“The young men that he engaged were able to do what they did because they had access to illegal guns,” Hickman said. “That is what we want to stop. We want to take the guns out of the hands of the people that should not have them. … Gun violence is a domino effect that impacts everyone.”
Gun violence prevention bills
A handful of gun violence prevention bills have been introduced in the Ohio Statehouse this year —
- State Reps. Michele Grim, D-Toledo, and Munira Abdullahi, D-Columbus, introduced a bill that would prevent someone who has been charged with or convicted of a first-degree misdemeanor for domestic violence from possessing a firearm.
- State Reps. Richard Brown, D-Canal Winchester, and Dani Isaacsohn, D-Cincinnati, put forth a bill that would repeal the state’s permitless concealed carry law and reinstate the law requiring someone to have a permit to carry a concealed handgun in public.
- State Reps. Phil Robinson, D-Solon, and Isaacsohn introduced a bill to mandate background checks for all firearms sales including private sales.
- State Reps. Darnell T. Brewer, D-Cleveland, Garfield Heights, Maple Heights, and Abdullahi have a bill that would declare gun violence as a public health crisis and create the Office of Firearms Violence Prevention in the Ohio Department of Children and Youth.
- Brewer also introduced a bill that would create an Ohio Task Force on Gun Violence.
“In the state of Ohio you’re still allowed to possess a gun even if you have a domestic violence conviction. That’s absurd,” said Columbus City Attorney Zach Klein.
Now, two of these are for basically a replication of the White House’s Office of Gun Violence Prevention, an office that exists to supposedly coordinate efforts between gun control advocates in various states. Why would Ohio need any such thing since all of Ohio’s anti-gun advocates are, at least in theory, located in Ohio?
The first bullet point basically wants to strip people of their gun rights for crimes that no one seems to think are bad enough to be felonies, but are so terrible that they should lose a constitutional right over. My thought is simple. They just need to make up their mind, is it horrific or nothing?
The kicker to me, though, is the idea that constitutional carry in Ohio needs to be repealed.
As we’ve noted repeatedly, since constitutional carry passed, homicides are down all across the state, and not by any small percentage, either.
Now, I understand data well enough to know that you can’t just ascribe that drop to constitutional carry. It’s possible, to be sure, but unless you can control all of the variables, there’s no way to be certain entirely and most of us don’t have the expertise to control for those variables.
What I can say, though, is that if constitutional carry was so bad and if putting more guns on the streets in the hands of law-abiding citizens without the vetting of the state was such a recipe for disaster, why have homicides plummeted in most communities in Ohio?
See what I mean when I say there’s no common sense involved here?
What this is about is that Moms Demand Action and the States Newsroom crowd think their own personal beliefs are so important that they can’t really be disputed. You’re supposed to just swallow what they’re selling without question.
This isn’t news, it’s indoctrination, and frankly, it pisses me off.
Yeah, we’re biased, but we wear it as a badge of pride. We write in a manner that makes it clear we’re writing opinion. No one gets the wrong idea about what we do here.
What we’re seeing here is activism trying to hide stupidity and pretending it’s sense.
