The Pink Pistols and Guns in Public Housing in San Francisco
Travis wrote about the Pink Pistols last week. The news story that he quoted and my comment bears repeating here:
SAN FRANCISCO – The National Rifle Association sued the city of San Francisco on Friday to overturn its ban on handguns in public housing, a day after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a handgun ban in the nation’s capital.
The legal action follows a similar lawsuit against the city of Chicago over its handgun ban, filed within hours of Thursday’s high court ruling.
In San Francisco, the NRA was joined by the Washington state-based Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms and a gun owner who lives in the city’s Valencia Gardens housing project.
The gun owner, who is gay, says he keeps the weapon to defend himself from “sexual orientation hate crimes.” He was not identified in the complaint because he said he fears retaliation.
Mayor Gavin Newsom said the city will “vigorously fight the NRA” and defended the ban as good for public safety.
“Is there anyone out there who really believes that we need more guns in public housing?” Newsom said.
Mu.
I really believe that there should be no such thing as “public housing”.
The very phrase is a perversion – an abomination in two words like “poisoned icecream” or “abandoned dog”.
(my comment)
# Lee Says: June 28th, 2008 at 6:08 pm Quote
Putting aside the “public housing” question, I think that the best argument to eliminate the public housing ban are Newsom’s words, “Is there anyone out there who really believes that we need more guns in public housing?”
To reword, “I know that illegal handgun possession is rampant in public housing. We don’t regularly enforce the public housing handgun ban. We would rather there -only- be illegal handguns in public housing.”
On 3 of the last 3 nights I’ve been in Hunters Point (at The Box Shop art space), I’ve heard gun shots coming from the projects. While firing a weapon in San Francisco without cause is illegal, no police ever showed up.
I’ll look into getting behind this Pink Pistols initiative.
[…] this decision, there have been a flurry of lawsuits. One of which is in San Francisco. Take a look. Possibly related posts-What I Did on Halloween-Claria + IPO = Good for Computer Guy-Not […]
Update: On January 29th, the San Francisco Public Housing Gun Ban was defeated. :-) (via and Gunbroker.com Newsletter)