Ending the NRA Is an Antiracist Move
Letitia James, NY State Attorney General, recently sued to dissolve the NRA because of its self-dealing and fraud. Although James cites financial violations, her move to end the NRA is an antiracist one.
As people debate reforming the police vs. abolishing the police, and as government leaders make concessions to appease protesters and activists, the pursuit to end the NRA is an example others should follow. James is not seeking to reform the NRA. According to James, the fraud is so thorough that it requires the dissolution of the NRA.
I wish Congress had impeached Trump for racism, and I wish racism were enough to dissolve the NRA. But America is not a place where racism is enough to stop presidential campaigns or agencies. Instead, racism starts presidential campaigns and agencies. Racism isn't enough because whites haven't had enough of racism. Instead, some legal violation is necessary.
Even so, the NRA is a racist organization that animates and upholds white identity and white violence. And while gun control advocates praise the move to abolish the NRA because of its enormous role in gun violence, the NRA isn't a colorblind agency.
For years, the NRA has been silent as police harmed and murdered Black lives. For years, the NRA has spread racist imagery and stereotypes to stoke white paranoia continuously. White America connected the NRA to whiteness and slavery because gun ownership in the United States is one of the original privileges of whiteness.
History shows that white identity bonded over guns. In the book “Dying of Whiteness,” Jonathan Metzel writes that gun ownership in England was a privilege of the wealthy. But in colonial America, gun ownership became a white privilege due to white paranoia about rebellions and resistance from Black people and Indians.
In his book “The Machinery of Whiteness,” Steve Martinot says that white paranoia is an essential element in white identity, which means white identity requires white paranoia. White paranoia once stoked then calls for white solidarity, and for whites, white paranoia justifies gun violence.
The NRA has thrived because of the white history of gun ownership and white paranoia. Ending the NRA will end a major conduit and outlet for white paranoia and white identity. I'd expect the NRA to be a moving target to keep in our sights.