Template talk:Gun politics interest groups in the United States

"Anti-gun rights"

Would anyone mind if we changed the second half of the template to read "Gun control groups"? It seems like a POV simplification to label these groups "anti-rights". The U.S. Supreme Court has determined that there are limits to all the freedoms accorded by the Bill of Rights, including the hallowed rights to freedom of speech and worship, and the right to bear arms is no different. I think "gun control" is a more neutral term.--Rockero420 17:20, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I mind. It should be Pro-gun control groups for NPOV and for balance. (See discussion for Brady Campaign, Talk:Brady Campaign. Yaf 12:15, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

New section

I've set up a new section in the table for the two organizations (previously classed as "Pro-gun control") that openly support both the right to use weapons (opposing gun bans) and some measure of control. The title of the section is not yet settled, but it did not feel appropriate to class them in one camp or the other. Andrew Levine 17:45, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Have revised the section title a little. It is worth noting that both these organizations are usually identified solely with gun control, at least in most open literature descriptions, at least by the NRA and other organizations identified with gun rights. Their organization names, however, were clearly chosen to provide a modicum of neutrality to their perceived positions. Yaf 18:39, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, I think your title works better. Andrew Levine

More on the new section

I find it questionable to classify either of the last 2 groups as supporting gun rights. Americans for Gun Safety is in no way a gun rights organization. Its wikipedia page states:

"Due to the organization being established by Andrew McKelvey (the founder of Monster.com), a former member of the board of directors of Handgun Control, Inc. and the primary founder of the Million Mom March, gun rights activists frequently make the claim that AGS has all the appearances and affiliations expected of an anti-gun organization. It is thus usually identified as a gun control organization rather than a gun rights organization."

As for American Hunters and Shooters association, its leaders have many, many ties to gun control groups and to anti-gun Democrats. A careful read of their website shows timid support for gun rights, but no concrete evidence of any actual demonstration of support. It reads like they say one thing, and do another (or do nothing!). The behind-the-scenes support for gun control groups and politicians really demonstrates the true intentions of the group.

I challenge anyone to make a case for either of these groups being anything more than wolves in sheep's clothing. Especially the Americans for Gun Safety group, which I am moving in the template. I will leave the Hunting and Shooting association where it is, for now. 24.91.124.199 23:04, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

"Gun centrists"

I'm moving American Hunters and Shooters Association back to the "pro-gun control" group. AHSA's own statements indicate that the group was established to push the Brady Campaign gun control agenda... --tc2011 (talk) 00:33, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Nominating USgunorgs template for POV check

USgunorgs (template) redirects, and thus transcludes the specific content found here ... Tagging this template with POV-check template (to nominate) ... this action intentionally affects all pages that use this template.

Reason being: several articles with LENGTHY dispute (and / or edit wars) resulting directly from this template's NPOV issues, poor formating, and widespread visablity on numerous organization-articles such as LWV (simply because they advocate gun policy one way or another, LWV and many others got stuck with having this eyesore of a template transcluded, as do articles for practically every other organization to even mention firearms one way or the other) ... please see relevant discussions for this nomination on:

• LWV talk page (example of NPOV dispute) and also please refer to...
• WikiProject Firearms (discussion page, navbox section) for this, please refer to the "navbox" section

Thanks to all the of the english wikipedia editors for all their work compiling lists / information such as this one for US gun organizations... this template and it's information is useful, but the widespread placement and content have provoked edit wars and / or NPOV disputes in a few places --Kuzetsa (talk) 19:38, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Have there been any LENGTHY disputes (and / or edit wars) since 2006 on this menu navigation item? The LWV discussions date from then. Yes, there were lots of discussions back then. (I remember them well.) But, I am not aware of any newer issues occurring since then. If there no new issues, the POV claim appears stale and it looks like other than formatting into a navbox, which is certainly the style du 'jour on Wikipedia today vs. back in 2006, there are no existing issues with this content with regards to NPOV issues. (And, I do advocate changing to the navbox version to get a more modern look.) Yaf (talk) 01:21, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

So...what exactly are the POV issues with the template? Or do you just want to replace it with the navbox you put together? I'm fine with replacing it with the navbox. But I think it's a bit extreme to slap the POV template on it which affects some 40+ articles. --Hamitr (talk) 03:31, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Being that there has been no identification of any current POV issues, newer than 2006, have updated the template to a navbox here, and moved the navbox to where it is just before any external links in all the referenced "navigated to" articles. Copies of the pre-existing code and new code are still here if anyone wants to see the two formats. Looks like all the problems are solved. Yaf (talk) 17:52, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

This template is one facet of a large number of articles at risk of systemic firearms advocacy bias at Wikipedia. A huge issue that I see is that it creates an illusion that gun political groups are in 50:50 balance. When the metrics show just the opposite. For instance the political firearms lobby, especially the NRA, in reliable sources is describes as "Arguably the most powerful lobby of any kind in the world with annual budget of approximately $100 million and 2.9 million members."[1]. For the best information conveyance service to our readers this template should be formatted as a graphic showing the relative weight of each of these groups. I suggest a weighted pie chart indicating relative memberships, or indicating relative budgets. In objective, well sourced reliable sources, this is not an equivalence issue with half the political weight on each side of the political interest. SaltyBoatr (talk) 17:20, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

A second obvious POV push is the title. Firearms advocates would frame this topic as pro-gun versus anti-gun, (gun grabber) therefore the title "gun politics". The opposition tends to frame this topic as a societal violence problem. Plainly here, the title skews towards the topic framing favored by the firearm advocates. This is part of a common pro-firearm systemic bias problem in Wikipedia. SaltyBoatr (talk) 17:26, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

A navbox does not indicate "systemic firearms advocacy bias". It simply provides a means by which to navigate. The individual articles are what provide the details on the various organizations. Clearly, not all organizations are the same size. There is no "systemic firearms advocacy bias" issue here, in what is but a navbox. Yaf (talk) 17:30, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Notice that Yaf does not really address my two points, and simply denies them. Also, notice that Yaf is a high profile active participant in the Wikipedia:WikiProject Firearms and has a long history of involvement in firearms political advocacy work at Wikipedia so it is believable that he may not be able to see the problem. SaltyBoatr (talk) 17:41, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Term "gun control" and template section names

Why are the organizations who are opposed to gun violence called by the politically charged term "pro-gun control"? They describe themselves as advocates for "freedom from gun violence"[2] and "leading the fight to prevent gun violence"[3] and "supports public health research and data collection to understand the prevalence, patterns, and costs of gun violence."[4] If they describe themselves as fighting gun violence why should we describe them as "pro-gun control"? The answer is easy to guess. This has been framed in a non-neutral point of view, the point of view shared by the firearm political advocacy editors here. SaltyBoatr (talk) 19:40, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

I disagree and fail to see the point of the recent Hamitr revert[5]. It seems obvious that it fails a neutral point of view standard to describe both groups using the POV frame of just one group. Neutrality can best be achived by respecting the points of views of each group and conforming accurately to their perspective. Hamitr please explain your revert. SaltyBoatr (talk) 15:56, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Same issue today. SaltyBoatr (talk) 13:47, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

The PR/Damage control term, "Gun violence prevention group" turns up just about 7.5k google hits, tho a lot could probably be weeded out. http://www.google.com/#hl=en&q=%22Gun+violence+prevention%22+group&fp=_rpp-4zAm3I However, "Gun Control group" turns up nearly 1.5m hits. http://www.google.com/search?um=1&ned=us&hl=en&q=%22Gun+control%22+group&btnmeta%3Dsearch%3Dsearch=Search+the+Web And, when this subject being discussed on the news, it's almost always described as gun control (for example http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8008682.stm http://spectator.org/blog/2009/04/22/gun-control-battle-erputs-in-p http://www.tauntongazette.com/state_news/x1092977401/Joe-Burns-Common-ground-makes-common-sense http://www.wbay.com/Global/story.asp?S=10216472 , I could keep going with similar links for a very, very, very long time to illustrate the point that most cultures, both in the US, and abroad, refer to "Gun control groups" as just that, and not as "Gun violence prevention groups"). All I was trying to do was refer to them uniformly, using the same, neutral language (if it was good enough for the one, surely it would to be good enough for the other?). I might not have gone about it quite the right way, but at least I tried to fix the problem. I'd just tried to take the most neutrally worded of the two, and adapted it to be applied equally to both. Realistically, "Gun Control" is likely the most appropriate label for that particular section, and, "Pro-Gun rights", would likely be the most appropriate for the other, by the same argument made above by myself, for "Gun control" basically. However, I'm not going to take the route that other editors on this topic seem to favor, and just wipe out others edits in favor of my own preferred wording. I'll leave you guys with this reasoning, and see where it goes from here. 174.101.27.158 (talk) 16:13, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

Neutrality is best achieved by steering clear of the political framing commonly seen for this issue, and this tendency for political framing is confirmed by your Google search counts. Certainly, pro-gun rights people tend to describe what they deem as their opposition as 'gun control' or 'gun grabbers'. The flip side of the would be to call the pro-gun rights people 'gun nuts'. Neither of those characterizations are neutral. When you check the policy statements of both the biggies, "Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence" and "Coalition to Stop Gun Violence" their policy statements emphasize controlling gun violence. SaltyBoatr (talk) 16:59, 22 April 2009 (UTC)

I feel quite strongly that "pro-gun rights" and "pro-gun control" are the best neutral point of view terms for these organizations, which frequently describe themselves with these exact terms. For example the Brady Campaign often says that it favors "sensible gun control laws". Saying that the pro-gun control groups are "gun violence prevention groups" is not neutral, since both sides of the argument want to prevent gun violence. If you look at the Template:USgunorgs/navbox subpage you'll see that the terms "pro-gun rights" and "pro-gun control" are currently in use there. So, I'm going to go ahead and change the section names on the main template. I really think that these are the preferred and most commonly used NPOV terms. — Mudwater ^(Talk) 02:26, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

Mudwater, you claim that "For example the Brady Campaign often says that it favors "sensible gun control laws". ". Often? You appear to be mistaken about that. When I checked I don't see it, please point precisely to your sourcing, thanks. In contrast, I see them saying lots of things on their "about us page[6]" and they pretty consistently avoid the term "gun control", I see it used just once. Rather, that term "gun control" is a partisan framing tool used by their opponents to frame the issue. Use of an opponents term to describe an organization clearly violates WP:NPOV policy. SaltyBoatr (talk) 17:45, 23 April 2009 (UTC)

I agree that use of an opponent's term to describe an organization would violate NPOV, but the organizations in question do generally describe themselves as favoring gun control. Further, I think the term "gun control" has a positive connotation, not a negative one, to those who favor more restrictive laws regulating firearms, and that's why these organizations use it. As you said, the link you gave to the Brady Campaign web site shows one example of this. ("The Brady Campaign, and it network of Million Mom March Chapters, are political organizations dedicated to passing sensible gun control legislation...") Here are a few more, just follow the links and find "gun control": [7], [8], [9], [10], [11]. Furthermore, and even more significantly for NPOV, not only do pro-gun control organizations use the term "gun control", but so do many citizens and politicians who more or less agree with those organizations. "Gun violence prevention" on the other hand is a biased term, for the reason I mentioned above. I believe there will be general agreement about this and I would strongly encourage other editors to state their opinions on this subject. — Mudwater ^(Talk) 02:13, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Does anyone else have an opinion on whether or not "Pro-gun rights" and "Pro-gun control" are the best and most NPOV terms to use for template section (group) names? The more editors who join the discussion, the better. — Mudwater ^(Talk) 14:27, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Mudwater's suggestion here. "Pro-gun control" is clearly the fundamental issue for one side of the ledger. Everyone is against gun violence (pro-gun rights and pro-gun control). The only difference is what the pro-gun rights consider gun violence vs. the pro-gun control gang. Legal law enforcement action and legal self defense are not considered gun violence by the pro-gun rights side of the ledger, but are sometimes considered to be gun violence by some of the pro-gun control crowd. To avoid these confusions, it should be "Pro-gun rights" and "Pro-gun control". Yaf (talk) 15:29, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

I concur. It should be "Pro-gun rights" and "Pro-gun control". --Hamitr (talk) 16:38, 25 April 2009 (UTC)

section break

This needs some more discussion, the key principle here it WP:NPOV. Advocacy groups seeks to frame an issue by defining the label to describe the opponent. This is called "framing the issue" and should be avoided per neutrality policy. Checking how each group defines themselves, and I see that one group predominately self identifies as "gun rights" and the other self identifies as "gun violence prevention". The neutral way to deal with this is to use their self identifying label as opposed to the political framing label. To use the opponents political framing label seems to violate the principles of WP:NPOV. SaltyBoatr (talk) 20:20, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

I really feel like we discussed this pretty thoroughly four months ago in this talk page section, and that the strong majority of editors agreed that "pro gun rights" and "pro gun control" are the appropriate terms to use for the section headers. Feel free to review my posts above, but, to summarize, "gun control" is a neutral term, and is used by organizations such as the Brady Campaign to describe what it is that they favor more of. Even more importantly, the term is viewed as neutral by the general public, or positively by those who favor stricter regulation of firearms. I say "more importantly" because organizations may choose to describe themselves in terms that are not neutral, to try to use the power of words to advance their position and sway public opinion. A clear cut example is the term "gun violence prevention". The implication is that those opposed to the positions of the Brady Campaign are in favor of gun violence, or at least callously indifferent to it. Obviously that's not the case, and in fact the NRA has a large program for training and certifying firearms instructors to teach gun safety. While it's true that consensus can change, I don't see much point in having the same discussion that we had a few months ago, but I would nevertheless encourage all interested editors to state their opinions here. — Mudwater ^(Talk) 21:24, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

Tell us why it is neutral that we should use the self identity of one group and not another? Plainly, using the self identifier is the safest path to neutrality. · Violence Policy Center · Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence · Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. These three major groups self identify as advocates for preventing violence. SaltyBoatr (talk) 03:03, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

My position has not changed, either. I think the consensus remains the same now as it was four months ago. --Hamitr (talk) 14:49, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Hamitr did not explain his position using reason before, nor now. Consensus discussions should always be attempts to convince others, using reasons. What occurred above was not consensus in a Wikipedida sense of the term, but rather a WP:!VOTE. There is still a major WP:Policy issue on the table. The "framing" of the position of one side of the POV using the terms preferred by the other side of the POV. It simply is not true that the "against gun violence" side uses the term "gun control" to describe their agenda. The term "gun control" is a policy framing term used by the "gun rights" POV camp to distort the purpose of the "against gun violence" POV camp. This plainly violates the WP:NPOV policy. SaltyBoatr (talk) 19:23, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

The groups that favor stricter laws regulating firearms do in fact use the term "gun control", often and in a positive way. Please go to my post above, dated "02:13, 24 April 2009", and follow the links and find the term "gun control" in each of them, you'll see lots of examples. But again, for achieving a neutral point of view in the template headings, it's even more significant that the mainstream media and the general public use the term "gun control" in a neutral, or sometimes positive, manner, and that "pro gun control" is the commonly accepted term for this philosophy. I'm sorry that you don't agree but everyone else here seems to. — Mudwater ^(Talk) 23:24, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

So what? Their usage in passing of the term "gun control" says nothing about whether they consider themselves to be "pro gun control organizations". When you check[12], they actually consider themselves to be "gun violence prevention organizations". Again, the label "pro-gun control" actually seems to be the label put on them by their opposition groups, attempting to 'frame' the label issue. I agree that "pro gun control" is commonly accepted by their opposition as a framing label. The burden here is whether it is neutral to use their opponents framing label. Presently we are using the self identity label for one POV (gun rights) and using the opponent's label for the other POV. This is plainly not neutral. SaltyBoatr (talk) 23:35, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Regarding Hamitr revert[13], Considering that consensus is built on reasoned discussion, and I don't understand your reasoning, could you please explain why it is neutral to use the self selected label for one POV group and to not use the self selected label for the other? The gun violence prevention organizations describe themselves[14] to be "gun violence prevention organizations". As an analogy, it would be similarly biased to call the other POV "Gun Lobby organizations", in that they do not call themselves such. SaltyBoatr (talk) 01:45, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Generic political groups

Recently three groups were taken out of the template, with the edit summary "These are generic political groups that happen to have opinions on guns, not actual gun interest groups," and then put back in, with the edit summary "all are gun interest groups". These three groups -- Americans for Democratic Action, Joyce Foundation, and League of Women Voters -- are definitely generic political groups that happen to have opinions on guns. By contrast, all the other groups in the template are organizations devoted primarily, or exclusively, to promoting either gun rights or gun control. So the three groups should be removed from the template, which is "Gun politics interest groups in the United States", that is groups devoted to gun politics. There are a lot of generic political groups with opinions about guns. Adding them to the template is not helpful, and also if we allow it, we could end up with dozens of groups that are not primarily devoted to this topic. — Mudwater ^(Talk) 00:03, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

Except that the 3 groups have been in the template for a very long time, based upon previous lengthy discussions. Unless there is an overwelming reason to take these organizations out due to changes in their anti-gun policies to become neutral on guns, they should remain. For example, don't forget that the LWV was the lead anti-gun interest group in pushing the Assault Weapons Ban, and even lobbied congress. Likewise, with their big bucks supporting an anti-gun agenda, the Joyce Foundation was, is. amd remains a major gun interest group relative to an anti-gun agenda. Similarly for the ADA. Sure looks like these 3 organizations should remain in the template. (Quack like a duck, walk like a duck, swim like a duck, but isn't a duck??? Doesn't seem consistent.) Yaf (talk) 04:22, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

Can you please provide links to the previous lengthy discussions about this question? I'd like to review those. Thanks. — Mudwater ^(Talk) 10:56, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

If you find those previous discussions, please post links to them here, I'd like to see them. In the meantime, I think I get your point: While those three groups aren't devoted primarily to gun control, they're still very involved with it, and have had a significant impact in this arena. And also, there doesn't seem to be a lot of sentiment for removing them from the navbox. It seems like a gray area to me, and I'd like to ponder this further, but for now I don't think the idea of taking them out is worth pursuing further. — Mudwater ^(Talk) 02:46, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Gun Training Organizations

Seems like a section could be added for major training companies, like Gunsite, Front Sight Firearms Training Institute, etc. thoughts? Michaelcox (talk) 23:01, 4 July 2014 (UTC)

But that would create unbalance. What would the equivalent kind of group be for the "Pro-gun control" side? Furthermore, it would drag these types of groups into a Political based category. --Scalhotrod - Just your average banjo playing, drag racing, cowboy... (Talk) 15:18, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

Groups

The template is called "Gun politics interest groups in the United States" and the navbox title is "Gun interest groups in the U.S."

I would like to propose "Pro-gun rights" be renamed "Gun rights groups" and that "Pro-gun control" be renamed "Gun control groups". Lightbreather (talk) 22:33, 21 January 2015 (UTC)

Crap

I dunno what people are thinking - since when are the American Academy of Pediatrics or the League of Women Voters "Gun politics interest groups"? If every group or business that has a position on guns is added to this template it'd be worthless. If their mission ain't about guns then they ain't gun groups. Felsic (talk) 17:05, 6 February 2015 (UTC)