Hunting Sense

The word radical quickly brings to mind a myriad of negative connotations for most people. It’s a word that is increasingly used and thrown around to label people or groups in today’s world with little regard to the actual definition of the word. Maybe a review of the meaning is in order.

Radical
1. of or going to the root or origin; fundamental
2. thoroughgoing or extreme, esp. as regards change from accepted or traditional forms
3. favoring drastic political, economic, or social reforms
4. a person who holds or follows strong convictions or extreme principles
5. a person who advocates fundamental political, economic, and social reforms by direct and often uncompromising methods

Radical is often times used to label anyone who supports gun rights and the Second Amendment, with little care for the fairness or validity of doing so. How often, though, do you see the term used to describe anti-gun groups and some of the ideas they have? In all fairness, I believe this is one instance where the use of the word radical has become skewered in America today.

Let’s take for instance the recent article by retired diplomat and The Blade and Pittsburgh Post-Gazette editorial board member Dan Simpson about gun control. His ideas and proposals are some of the most extreme I, personally, have ever read. Here is a person suggesting the trampling of numerous fundamental rights of Americans in the quest to lay waste to the Second Amendment of the American Constitution.

By the very definitions listed above, Mr. Simpson deserves the title of radical with no worry of the label being unfair or invalid. Is the term being used to describe him, though, from anyone outside of the gun rights groups? Not that I can find with a simple search.

Sadly, it is the gun rights and Second Amendment supporters that will likely yet again be labelled as radicals for calling Mr. Simpson a radical. This is an unjust wrong delivered to many who are able to see beyond all the media hype and political maneuvering to realize that what is being proposed as a solution to gun violence in wake of the Virginia Tech tragedy is nothing more than a pipe dream. There is something inherently wrong with this from my point of view.

People are in search of a fabled utopia that can never be realized. They are even willing to go so far in their wild goose chase for it that they’re willing to give up the very thing that America is all about: Freedom. And once their freedoms are gone, they will be left wondering why they lost them for a solution that didn’t cure the problem after all, and then it will be too late to change anything.

If people who want to protect the rights of the Constitution are labelled radicals, then that is a label I believe should be proudly worn in regard to above definitions one and four. But when looking at definitions two, three, and five above, I would have to say Mr.Simpson, and people who think like him, are the true radicals of America.

hunting, gun rights, Second Amendment, Constitution, freedom, Dan Simpson, radicals, politics, Virginia Tech