I am a gun owner and if that is a problem then you do not need to read the rest of this.
I am a sports woman who loves to head to the range with my family, loves to hunt wild game and is a supporter of my local college riffle team. I married a man who reloads his own ammunition and has a back ground in both law enforcement and the military. Guns are a part of who we are and what we do for fun. The point is that soon I and thousands of other Bloggers, Writers, Website designers, may lose the right of ” Freedom of Speech”. If what I read today is true,( the Washington Examiner shared this article) my blog post about my husbands reloading bench,our hunting trip, the information I could share on how being a better marksman or any conversation about guns I have with you my readers could be censured.
I am also worried as a sports person,that I could not write about the specifics about the gun related things we do. In the future I could be fined or sent to jail….. (send me please) for just doing what I love. The penalty for sharing gun and ammunition information over the internet is a fine up to 1 million dollars and 20 years in jail. I worry that when I have a moving post on a topic that is legal and informative, I will be unable to share it, unless the government has a look at it first. Hummm, are any of you feeling like we have moved to a police state here, the results for the general population will be terrible.
I am fully aware that our country is divided on the gun subject. It is a hard subject to debate for those who do not own a weapon of any kind. At first this regulation might appear that the government is only taking the larger public’s safety into account ( I have my reservations about that). But I argue that a lack of information is more dangerous than anything a Gunsmith or Ammunition company can share on the internet. If we as a population can not share ideas, we allow a few to control our future, a future that will always be controlled by people who know weapons.
I want you and I to have the right to send out information about hunting, gunsmithing, reloading, crime and safety. I want these topics debated openly. I have the right to share what we are doing as much as you have the right to NOT READ IT. I want to share what my WVU riffle team is doing and what their Olympic competitor coach is teaching. I want to share the pages from an antique survival manual that shows how to safely use a .22 riffle. I want to tell you about my friend, whose husband got killed, during Turkey Season shooting accident and how it avoid it. If what the above artificial states is true, then my friends you and I will not have the freedom to talk about school shootings or about how to safely clean a pistol.
The idea of protecting the innocent from information that could be used in terrorism is a failed argument. If we are only going to control the information on the internet what is the point… Books have long taught the skills to kill, hunt, reload and build weapons of many kinds. Long before the internet my nephew blew his hand off with a pipe bomb at 14. Where did he learn about the idea ….. movies. If he had been lucky enough to have better supervision in his life he would have never attempted to build what he looked up for free in a book from the library. At 14 he could have used that weapon to kill many and never once looked on the internet for the information.
If this is what the government thinks may stop terrorism, I am very worried about our leaders. Is the public so ignorant to believe that terrorists from middle eastern countries find all of their information on legal American fire arm company websites or blog posts from people like me or even ammunition manufacture Face Book pages. I bet not… but maybe this is the way the government plans to stop the bloggers from writing about the facts about gun ownership, repair and uses, punish the whole because of the few radical writers.
Again it is a sad state that I am even worried about this topic. I love my way of life, I love sharing it, but when my husband decides that he wants to update an antique riffle for my son to use for hunting, I want the right to tell you about it. If the government is so worried about the information that we openly share and are planing to stop the education of its citizens, we are on a very slippery slope, my friends. If I have to ask my government permission to give you information that one day may save your life or a life of your neighbors, I think we are going to wish some one had stopped the government from stepping on the “Freedom of Speech” and if we are lucky our “Freedom to Bear Arms” too.
Mountain Mama Reads and Writes 
Yikes, that’s such a scary thought. The internet is a great resource for newbie gun owners like our family. My husband’s dad didn’t do the whole hunting thing, so he’s having to educate himself. If reliable and safe sources are removed, that will really hurt people that don’t have family wisdom being handed down to them. Ben Franklin said,
”Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both.”
Keep writing!
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Wow I wish that I had been aware of this Quote before writing my post Very Very Powerful. Thank you so much for your support I wonder how long it will be before the haters show up!
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Lots of positive comments I could make, but I’m going to focus on one. I am so glad to see Tom teaching gun safety to Christopher. My father started with that lesson and he repeated it often.
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as always thank you Dan… life is a process of learning and we are glad to be able to share our knowledge.
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I applaud your words. I don’t like guns but my husband has always been a hunter from a young age. He taught our sons about guns including safety and responsibility when they were young. One is a gunsmith and hunter and the other son isnt. Keep speaking out.
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I’m not a gun person, but I fully support the right. I wish everyone who held a gun was properly educated and trained, but I also wish that about a lot of other issues. Hunting is still a vital part of life here in the Midwest.
I wrote my “pro-arms” piece years ago. It’s called Guns are like Pitbulls.
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Mountain Mama, I love this blog and I really don’t want this to come off as disrespectful to you or your readers, but I think your fear might be unwarranted. I should also mention, I am a member of three-gun household (for sport and protection) and always love hearing about other safe and responsible and gun owners out there. Yes! to Dan’s comment 🙂
What you said sounded so 1984 scary that I took a look at the Washington Examiner article that you referenced which in turn referenced an NRA blog as its sole source. And down the internet wormhole to to the NRA blog which led me to the original proposal available here: https://www.federalregister.gov/articles/2015/06/03/2015-12844/international-traffic-in-arms-revisions-to-definitions-of-defense-services-technical-data-and-public#h-9 (by the way there is a PUBLIC COMMENT PERIOD DEAR READERS, so if people have concerns please comment away and let legislators know your feelings on this subject that so many people are passionate about!). The comment period is open until August 3rd! And I’m pretty sure they actually pay attention to those comments if they hear enough voices whether they be in support or opposition.
After going over the proposal I found nothing in to suggest that future bloggers or anyone involved in similar media will be censored for any of the common sense stuff you mentioned, Mountain Mama (and in fact probably not for a lot of non-common sense stuff). In fact, it pretty clearly stated that nothing I think folks generally see as the flow of free speech and information will be affected. It specifically states in one section that the following are not subject to the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) which is pretty much what the proposal is about:
(1) Subscriptions available without restriction to any individual who desires to obtain or purchase the published information;
(2) Libraries or other public collections that are open and available to the public, and from which the public can obtain tangible or intangible documents;
(3) Unlimited distribution at a conference, meeting, seminar, trade show, or exhibition, generally accessible to the interested public;
(4) Public dissemination (i.e., unlimited distribution) in any form (e.g., not necessarily in published form), including posting on the Internet on sites available to the public; or
(5) Submission of a written composition, manuscript or presentation to domestic or foreign co-authors, editors, or reviewers of journals, magazines, newspapers or trade publications, or to organizers of open conferences or other open gatherings, with the intention that the compositions, manuscripts, or publications will be made publicly available if accepted for publication or presentation.
Anyhow my two cents is that I don’t think think folks should worry about censorship, because that truly would be an affront to your freedom of speech. (At least not yet! Who knows what the future may hold and I think it is good to stay vigilant).
I don’t want to start some angry argument or come off as sounding disrespectful or anything, so please feel free not to post this comment! I couldn’t figure out if there’s a way to private message you?
Enough of my rambling! I look forward to learning more gun knowledge from you in the future 🙂
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Quiet owl farm thank you for your response and information… the more the better. I see many of your points and will continue to fallow along with the paper trail of information also. Thank you for your support and interest in my little blog…it dose mean the world to me that you took so much time to write a wonderful response to my venting about some thing that as a writer we should all be aware of and that is the threat to any of our freedoms. Again thank you for your support of my blog
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❤ Thank you for the kind response! I always hesitate diving into what can be contentious topics like this and it's a testament to you and your readers that this is a safe forum to voice thoughts on the subject. And I think it's wonderful that you are such a good responsible gun owner role model and treat the topic with the good sense and respect it deserves.
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I was just wondering what type of revolver Cody is aiming in the above pic? My husband is in bed or I would ask him and he would know right away. I’m gonna throw in a guess – a Colt Python 357? I like revolvers – ‘nuf said:)
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