Pk Pistols: LGBT Gun Owners Une Armg Gay Communy – Rollg Stone

Contents:

• PK PISTOLS: LGBT GUN OWNERS UNE ARMG GAY COMMUNY
• SUBSCRIBESIGN {"@NTEXT":","@TYPE":"NEWSARTICLE","URL":","MAENTYOFPAGE":","HEADLE":"MY JOURNEY INTO THE SECRET SUBCULTURE OF GAYS WH GUNS","SCRIPTN":"WH ANTI-LGBTQ HATE CRIM ON THE RISE, GROUPS LIKE THE PK PISTOLS HAVE SEEN MEMBERSHIP SOAR. AFTER AN ATTACK MY HOMETOWN, I UNRSTOOD THEIR NEED TO FEND THEMSELV.","IMAGE":[{"@TYPE":"IMAGEOBJECT","URL":"}],"DATEPUBLISHED":"2020-09-24T00:00:45+00:00","DATEMODIFIED":"2020-09-24T00:00:45+00:00","ISACCSIBLEFORFREE":FALSE,"THOR":[{"@TYPE":"PERSON","NAME":"EDGAR GOMEZ","URL":","SCRIPTN":NULL,"INTIFIER":"ER:146413267"}],"PUBLISHER":{"@TYPE":"ORGANIZATN","NAME":"NARRATIVELY","URL":","SCRIPTN":"DISVER EXTRAORDARY TE STORI CELEBRATG THE DIVERSY OF HUMANY.","TERACTNSTATISTIC":{"@TYPE":"INTERACTNCOUNTER","NAME":"SUBSCRIBERS","TERACTNTYPE":","ERINTERACTNCOUNT":10000},"INTIFIER":"PUB:1404134","LOGO":{"@TYPE":"IMAGEOBJECT","URL":","NTENTURL":","THUMBNAILURL":"},"IMAGE":{"@TYPE":"IMAGEOBJECT","URL":","NTENTURL":","THUMBNAILURL":"}}}SHARE THIS POSTMY JOURNEY INTO THE SECRET SUBCULTURE OF GAYS WH COPY LKFACEBOOKEMAILNOTOTHERMY JOURNEY INTO THE SECRET SUBCULTURE OF GAYS WH GUNS
• GAY NRA: ‘GAYS WH GUNS’ ARM THEMSELV RERD NUMBERS
• STRAIGHT SHOOTERS: MEET THE GAY GUN-RIGHTS ACTIVISTS
• GAYS AND GUNS
• THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985
• FOR YEARS, HE TRIED TO GET OTHER GAY PEOPLE TO THE GUN RANGE. WOULD THEY E NOW?

PK PISTOLS: LGBT GUN OWNERS UNE ARMG GAY COMMUNY

Meet natnal gay group dited to fightg homophobia wh firepower – and why they thk gay rights and gun rights are a natural f. But I felt nfint my teacher, Jeff Bloovman, a Philalphia gun stctor and a member of the Pk Pistols, an LGBT group based around the belief that guns n go a long way batg homophobia.

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A small, loosely anized group of a few dozen chapters sttered across the stat and Canada, cludg Toronto, San Francis and Charlton, South Carola, the Pk Pistols’ membership has climbed om around 1, 500 earlier this month to about 6, 500 sce the June day Omar Mateen attacked the Pulse nightclub, turng the dance floor to a killg field and crashg together two culture war battlegrounds that rarely nverge: gays and guns. While the majory of LGBT people seem to be llg for more regulatn, Pk Pistols and their alli are hunkerg down and takg up arms, bandg together unr the group’s motto, a nontatnal warng to potential gay-bashers: “Pick on someone your own liber.

The Pk Pistols formed around 2000, after gay journalist Jonathan Rch – still outraged by Matthew Shepard’s 1998 murr, and knowg gay men who stopped attacks wh guns – published an article on Salon. “[Gays] should set up Pk Pistols task forc, sponsor shootg urs and help homosexuals get licensed to rry, ” he wrote, notg that they should do a way to garner as much publicy as possible.

“Pk pistols, ” he wrote, “would do far more for the self-teem of the next generatn of gay men and women than any number of hate-crime laws or anti-discrimatn statut.

GAY NRA: ‘GAYS WH GUNS’ ARM THEMSELV RERD NUMBERS

Rch went on: “If beme wily known that homosexuals rry guns and know how to e them, not many bullets would need to be fired. In fact, not all that many gay people would need to rry guns, as long as gay-bashers uldn’t tell which on did. ” Jt knowg that a gay person uld have a gun would ter a potential attacker.

As Rch has nced, same-sex marriage, the end of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and other ton have empowered LGBT people, but remas that anti-gay attacks, like anti-Amerin attacks, n be vised upon at anytime. (Rch even ed the word “low-level terrorism” to scribe homophobic attacks like the one that end Matthew Shepherd’s life.

) LGBT people know that each new space needs to be navigated litely, lt our mere existence enrage some homophobe. Now, wh Omar Mateen, Amerins are all too aware how anti-gay vlence n explo randomly, terrifygly, and sr more than jt LGBT people. This one featured a silver bullet, the tip of fire blue, next to the words “Gays wh Guns.

STRAIGHT SHOOTERS: MEET THE GAY GUN-RIGHTS ACTIVISTS

How uld any self-rpectg gay person support guns?

Gays wh Guns simply didn’t make sense. Jonathan Fischer is never sure who’s gog to be more surprised when he, as he lik to put , out of the gun closet — the gun aficnados who fd out he’s gay or the gay iends who fd out he lik shootg the 38-year-old televisn edor showed up last month to a fensive handgun class near Pi wh a Glock 27 pistol on his hip, he wore a T-shirt sportg a rabow-lored AK-47.

GAYS AND GUNS

His “gay-K-47, ” he the days after 49 people were fatally shot at the Pulse gay nightclub Orlando, Fla., this summer, Fischer wanted to do somethg to make his muny safer. Fisher is the founr of the Wt Hollywood chapter of the Pk Pistols, an LGBT gun group that formed after the mass shootg at a gay nightclub Orlando, Fla.

THE VOICE OF CHICAGO'S GAY, LESBIAN, BI, TRANS AND QUEER COMMUNITY SINCE 1985

(Luis S / Los Angel Tim) It’s a stark ntrast to how the overwhelmg majory of LGBT activists and anizatns rpond to the Orlando massacre, which has sparked lls wh the muny for gun the wake of the shootg, some gay bars like the Abbey Wt Hollywood beefed up secury. ’s annual gay pri para was rattled after a heavily armed man en route to the event was arrted. For all the anxiety Orlando has ed, many gay activists say beg armed is not the answer.

“We’re — a gay gun group, ” Fischer said hantly. There was such an outpourg of support om firearms traers, many of them straight, that the Pk Pistols’ webse now has a map listg LGBT-iendly firearms stctors every week of the attack, signs pictg a rabow-lored Gadsn flag and the hashtag #ShootBack appeared Wt Hollywood, where an timated 46% of the populatn intifi as lbian, gay, bisexual or transgenr.

FOR YEARS, HE TRIED TO GET OTHER GAY PEOPLE TO THE GUN RANGE. WOULD THEY E NOW?

“Even durg our heightened days of civil disobedience and prott, we have only advoted peaceful means, never armg ourselv and retaliatg wh vlence, ” said Cy Councilman John Duran, who is gay. Some LGBT centers, she said, have even specifilly banned the Pk Pistols om g their group dat to 2000 when gay thor and journalist Jonathan Rch wrote an article for llg for gay people to “set up Pk Pistols task forc, ” get licensed to rry guns and arm themselv to protect their muny. ”“Not all that many gay people would need to rry guns, as long as gay-bashers uldn’t tell which on did, ” Rch told The Tim he wrote the article at a time when the btal murr of gay llege stunt Matthew Shepard was still h the public nscns.

It woke people up, he said, to what gay people had known all along: “that we were targets of day-to-day terrorism.

”“There is a huge amount of anti-gay stereotype Ameri that has to do wh weakns — people llg limp-wristed and fairi, ” Rch said.