Grassroots Gun Rights Godfather Massad Ayoob: How To Sway an Anti-Gunner

When Massad Ayoob talks gun rights, people listen. He’ll tell you how to do the same.

He’s the author of In the Gravest Extreme, which is one of the Ur-texts of gun rights and self-defense. He’s been teaching self-defense techniques since 1974. For those not old enough to recall the 1970s and 1980s, it wasn’t all Dazed and Confused and Stranger Things. Those decades were marked by all-time historically high crime rates in the U.S. There really wasn’t any such thing as alternative media; as far as your news and opinion options went, you had three stations on TV and your local paper … and they were all anti-gun. You could expect nothing but the occasional letter to the editor supporting the Second Amendment. Ayoob was one of the people who changed all that, by speaking out about how guns can and do save innocent lives.

What’s more, although he did use statistics and tangible facts to make his case, he never let go of emotion. That’s because many “citizen” anti-gunners–ordinary folks, not paid shills or cynical pols–have come to their stance based entirely on emotion. Rattling off statistics is useless in these cases. You must have a way to connect from heart to heart, not mind to mind.

And yes, it’s something you should try to do if you can. There are so many regular people out there, your neighbors and co-workers, who deserve to understand their rights and the way the government is supposed to guarantee those rights. Maybe they won’t go get a gun themselves. Maybe they won’t change the way they vote. But perhaps the next time they hear a news anchor or politician talking about the Second Amendment like an infected appendix, they’ll notice the bias. Maybe they’ll wonder if they aren’t being gaslighted by their own political party, after all. Don’t miss this great video from our friends at the Second Amendment Foundation!