Armed protesters and COVID-19
Groups of protesters openly carrying rifles and flying enemy flags have gathered in several state capitals to state their objections to quarantine measures during the COVID-19 pandemic. In their view, orders from their state governments to maintain social distancing and to keep places of public gathering closed are akin to the conditions of Nazi Germany, designed to destroy religious freedom and the free market. Edged on by a variety of right-wing funders, the protesters claim to demand a return of their freedom and the end of the “nanny state.”
The grab-bag nature of this leaves a lot open to criticism, undermining the few reasonable points that the protesters have. Swastikas and Confederate battle flags are to many an adolescent’s idea of how to gain attention, while to some, they are an expression of a disgusting ideology. For those of us who care about human rights, those of us who insist that blacks, Jews, and GSRM (gender, sexual, and romantic minority) Americans have the same rights that whites do, displaying the symbols of two governments that committed atrocities in the name of racism erases any moral authority that the protest hoped to express.
For the gun community specifically, I must also take what to some will be a controversial position, namely the suggestion that open carry of rifles was the wrong choice. In my state, Arkansas, carrying a firearm in…
