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Black and White Armed Protesters Swarm the Capitol — Can You Spot the Difference?

By: Sarah JonesMar. 11th, 2013more from Sarah Jones

On March 9, 2013 armed protesters “Swarm The State Capitol” in Olympia, Washington to protest the 30 plus firearms related bills on the docket, some of which seek to expand gun rights. They were expecting 2,000 people according to the organizers, but only an estimated 200 showed up.

Watch here:


King 5 News reported:

While those debates begin Monday, gun advocates wanted to make sure House representatives could see them on Saturday.

Rally attendees cheered speeches telling of a “progressive conspiracy,” warning against allowing children to become “slaves of the government” and citing Nazi Germany and contemporary Australia as cautionary tales of a disarmed citizenry.

Multiple speakers encouraged those assembled to keep posting pro-gun sentiments on Facebook even if people unfriend them.

So we have a group “armed with long guns slung over shoulders or holstered handguns” marching on the capitol, giving speeches inferring that America is becoming Nazi Germany because lawmakers are trying to prevent convicted felons and the mentally ill from getting their hands on a gun via a loophole.

They claim they need guns to protect them from the progressive agenda and this President turning American into Nazi Germany (that’s a crazy and insulting claim that diminishes the horror of what the Nazis actually did). This is called rallying for “rights”.

Contrast that with footage from when the Black Panther Party invade the State Assembly Chamber in Sacramento in May, 1967, and were described as angry and violent, although they claimed they needed guns to protect themselves from racists:

Yes, the Black Panther footage is from 1967 and maybe back then we were more prone to associate violence and anger with guns. But we were also more likely to associate anger and violence with black people.

Here’s footage from 2007 showing neighbors chasing the Black Panthers out of town as they try to protest:

A crucial difference between the Black Panthers and the Tea Party type second amendment protesters is that the Black Panthers were initially founded for the protection of African-American neighborhoods from proven police brutality, and later evolved into something else entirely. However, that brutality was a fact, not a hypothetical. It was a reality, not a paranoia.

The entire notion of self-defense demands that there is a real attack or threat. Claiming that you are defending yourself from a Nazi government that has done nothing to indicate that it is indeed operating like the Nazis is not the same thing as defending yourself from unfair policy brutality, which black people were facing in the 1960′s and continue to face to this day.

How would the media describe armed black protesters “swarming” the capitol today?

One group is given the benefit of the doubt that they are protesting their “freedom”, while another is seen as violent and angry. In truth, I find both groups to be violent and angry because it’s menacing and threatening to be carrying guns as a warning to legislators.

But imagine if the press described these second amendment protesters “violent” and “angry” today, just because they were armed. Then imagine if the “second amendment” defenders were black and armed.

Black and White Armed Protesters Swarm the Capitol — Can You Spot the Difference? was written by Sarah Jones for PoliticusUSA.
© PoliticusUSA, Mar. 11th, 2013. All Rights Reserved

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