Membership is declining at the gun right's group as it also faces financial difficulties. Critics say the future looks bleak.
Cylusthevirus 79 points 3 years ago
It'd be one thing if they were only opposed by people for more gun control, but they aren't even really good at their core mission. All they do is simp for the GOP, even when doing so runs counter to their stated agenda.
TransplantedSconie 88 points 3 years ago
all they do is simp launder money to the GOP for the Russians.
Fixed it for ya.
Cylusthevirus 10 points 3 years ago
JFC, really? I'm not up on the latest NRA lore but that sounds too bad to be true.
dhork 68 points 3 years ago
path: 0 5372139 5372309 5372388 5372489 5372612, hotness: undefined, score: 68, children: 3
This article is a bit old, after it was written Butina went back to Russia and is now a member of theit legislature.
fuckwit_mcbumcrumble 45 points 3 years ago
The NRA is a marketing team for gun manufacturers, and what sells guns is fear of gun bans. The NRA does everything in their power to fuel those fears.
Pro and anti gun alike hate them. It's mostly just boomers keeping them going.
Rivalarrival 31 points 3 years ago
They aren't a gun rights organization. They aren't even a manufacturer's organization. They are Republican shills, first, last, and always.
I was finally convinced they had abandoned gun owners when they endorsed Mitt Romney in 2012. When a gun rights organization openly endorses the signer of a gun ban, there is something deeply wrong.
Semi-Hemi-Demigod 1 point 3 years ago
Did they endorse Reagan, too? He signed a gun ban.
rayyy 1 point 3 years ago
Exactly. I belonged to the NRA way back when they were a safety and information organization. They began to sell high priced commemorative hunting guns, then commemorative military guns. Soon they started selling military style guns like the M1 Garand rifle and the M1 carbine. I quit. Their push continued into modern M16s while simultaneously pushing scare articles to convince people of dangers so great that they would need buy military style weapons. The NRA degenerated into a money and greed operation that became the opposite of its origins intent.
FlyingSquid 18 points 3 years ago
They've even wormed their way into schools. They have "Eddie the Eagle" that teaches elementary school kids gun safety. With NRA logos all over the place, of course. I was disgusted when my daughter brought the information home.
Absolutely kids should be taught gun safety. They just shouldn't get it with a heaping helping of NRA.
skeeter_dave 16 points 3 years ago
Gun safety was one of their original missions and where quite successful at it before they turned into a fear mongering lobbying group.
FlyingSquid 3 points 3 years ago
Someone else needs to do it now. But I'm guessing the NRA gives school systems plenty of money to use their program.
banneryear1868 -2 points 3 years ago
Gun culture is just a different and insane thing in the US. We have a bit of it in Canada and gun issues in the cities, but guns are highly regulated here, maybe too much in some specific aspects. I'm in favor of less restrictions for historical pieces similar to historical cars where you can apply for that status.
Where I'm from lots of people have guns but there's not really a gun culture, they're basically used for animal defense. Last incident I know of was a deliriously sick coyote getting in to a horse paddock in daylight.
atzanteol 3 points 3 years ago
The NRA changed American thinking from "guns are tools that we sometimes need for protection" to "GUNS ARE THE ONLY THING PROTECTING YOUR FAMILY AND YOUR FREEDOM!!!1!!!".
They can rot in hell.
banneryear1868 0 points 3 years ago
You just know there's so many Americans with guns who can't wait to kill someone for the right reason in the most violent way, it's like their fantasy.
I was listening to an American at a work outing once who got inspected at the Canadian border, and she was ranting about how they thought she had a gun and were checking everywhere. I'm sympathizing cause that sucks, then she's like "but they never checked my purse where I kept my gun!" and it's like fuck sakes woman, you certainly made your point...
spaceghoti 128 points 3 years ago
It can't die fast enough.
NuXCOM_90Percent 45 points 3 years ago
Sadly, those are only to be used on kindergartners.
ArbiterXero 46 points 3 years ago
That’s the real answer. “We’re no longer a foreign asset funnelling Russian money to republicans so we’re broke”
winterayars 7 points 3 years ago
I guess that whole war with Ukraine thing has some side effects!
RememberTheApollo_ 47 points 3 years ago
But the damage it has done to the political landscape by pushing right wing agendas, fearmongering of every sort to get people to buy guns, and tying identity to gun ownership will live on far beyond the useful life of the NRA.
PoliticalAgitator 6 points 3 years ago
The organization may be dead but the propaganda they created lives on in the heart of every gun owner.
Viking_Hippie 44 points 3 years ago
Good news: NRA (maybe, hopefully) dying.
Absolutely horrible news: The void being filled by even more extreme and harmful groups within the same overall ideology, Islamic State style.
FlyingSquid 20 points 3 years ago
A dozen other groups have far less power than one huge lobbying organization.
Viking_Hippie 7 points 3 years ago
Not when they're working together and have taken over most of the billionaire donors
nilloc 2 points 3 years ago
Yeah the No Compromise podcast is a really good primer for what the NRA is done.
Scary listen, especially with the new speaker of the house’s religious statements.
RizzRustbolt 10 points 3 years ago
Do something to put it out of its misery, perhaps?
UnspecificGravity 37 points 3 years ago
Good, even if you are supportive of gun rights there has to be a better option than contributing to a Russian fascist propaganda outlet.
Ranvier 43 points 3 years ago
They've repeatedly attempted to disband and then reform in Texas to avoid New York's lawsuit against them for all the fraud, misuse of donor funds, and other such law breaking. Judges have repeatedly quashed their attempts, as well as multiple other counter suits and appeals trying to get the case dismissed. Lawsuit is still ongoing. Latest update I could find from NY attorney general's office was here:
PeleSpirit 27 points 3 years ago path: 0 5371670 5372288 5372328, hotness: undefined, score: 27, children: 1
Diplomjodler 19 points 3 years ago
I'm sure Daddy Putin will have a replacement ready in no time.
LEDZeppelin 14 points 3 years ago
Too slowly, unfortunately
killeronthecorner 19 points 3 years ago
That doesn't sound like an organized group with lobbying and government presence. I'm fine with that.
Semi-Hemi-Demigod 3 points 3 years ago
If they start going after 3D printers I might join them. I've got an unregistered gun maker sitting in the corner of my office, even though I mostly use it for printing figurines.
Clbull 9 points 3 years ago
The NRA had lost a lot of financial backing because when the main thing you endorse is being used to murder schoolchildren on a borderline industrial scale, of course sponsors and advertisers will want nothing to do with it.
Jimmyeatsausage 9 points 3 years ago
They also got busted for money laundering and being a front for foreign oligarchs to fund US politicians... I'm guessing all those rubles drying up hits the bittom line, too.
Behole 7 points 3 years ago
Oh shit! I saw the gold and purple and the old white man and misread the title as NBA! How did I not see the guns?!
Also fuck the NRA for fucking ever! I wish we could start prying some guns from some of those cold dead hands already. Die.
stopthatgirl7 11 points 3 years ago
Ask the writer, since the blurb was auto-pulled from it.
JeeBaiChow 7 points 3 years ago
Pity the number of victims of gun violence continues to rise, rather quickly.
KingJalopy 5 points 3 years ago
I'm critical of the nra and I didn't think that's bleak, it's fucking awesome
autotldr 4 points 3 years ago
This is the best summary I could come up with:
From 2003 to 2013, the organization scored 230 legislative victories, according to an Insider tally from the time, including passing six state laws that forbid municipalities from limiting gun rights.
Since then its membership has declined to 4.3 million, CEO and executive vice president LaPierre revealed in a January board meeting, according to a report by The Trace, a nonprofit covering gun violence.
Since 2020, it has faced an ongoing lawsuit from New York Attorney General Letitia James, which alleges that its top officials, including LaPierre himself, diverted donations for their personal use, violating numerous state and federal laws, and even the NRA's own bylaws and policies.
James alleged that the funds were used for family trips to the Bahamas and private jets, which contributed to a $64 million reduction in the balance sheet in three years, turning a surplus into a deficit.
"The NRA's influence has been so powerful that the organization went unchecked for decades while top executives funneled millions into their own pockets," James said at a press conference at the time.
Forty-five percent of U.S. households owned at least one firearm in 2022, according to research compiled by Statista, the highest figure since 2011—and 8 percentage points higher than in 2013, the year LaPierre said the NRA was on track for "unprecedented" growth.
The original article contains 1,305 words, the summary contains 217 words. Saved 83%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
BigMacHole 4 points 3 years ago
Democrats going after people stealing MY MONEY is COMMUNISM!
HurlingDurling 1 point 3 years ago
Not slowly enough
TSG_Asmodeus 0 points 3 years ago
🎶 They ain't gonna jump no more 🎶
Amends1782 -4 points 3 years ago
I feel like one of the 7 pro gun people on all of Lemmy, I'd like to share some perspective about the NRA being a boogieman. They absolutely are not the boogiman that leftists and anti gunners think they are. They are a ridiculously bloated, corrupt, beuracracy, no different than our federal government. They are all optics. In fact I'd say their only job is to be the boogieman and absorb negative attention, to allow the real gun rights groups to get some work done.
ilinamorato 5 points 3 years ago
They keep a public list of approved politicians and downgrade anyone who even mentions gun reform. That feels like more than just a bureaucracy; since they're largely funded by weapons manufacturers, it seems more like an extremely influential lobby. And since what they're lobbying for is "keep pretending that there's no way to solve the deadly problem that kills more humans than any other thing you don't do to yourself and literally every other developed nation has solved," it seems like their job is to enforce the prioritization of gun manufacturers' profits over lives.
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Good. The modern NRA has been the worst thing for guns rights in years. Wayne LaPierre can rot in hell.
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