Eden Prairie City Council AW Ban and Age Increase
Posted: Mon May 14, 2018 8:18 amI received the email this morning informing me of the Eden Prairie City Council meeting tomorrow evening over their proposed "assault weapons" ban and raising all other firearm purchases from 18 to 21.
I'm planning on attending for my support in opposition of the measure, and encourage as many others to do so as well. I just shot an email to the council's email address and am planning on making the phone calls to them later today.
For those interested in joining along, here are some details:
5:30 pm - City Council Workshop
6:30pm - Open Podium
7:00pm - City Council Meeting - discussion, debate, vote
Council email address: AllCouncil@edenprairie.org
Council phone numbers:
Mayor Nancy Tyra-Lukens - 952.949.8593
Brad Aho - 952.303.6884
Sherry Butcher Wickstrom - 612.296.3721
Ron Case - 952.949.0915
Kathy Nelson - 952.941.6613
Here's the email I drafted up, so feel free to use it as a template, support it, critique it, tell me to go jump off a bridge, etc.:
Dear Council Members,
I am writing to you to express my concern and opposition to the proposed “assault weapons” ban being discussed for Eden Prairie. Though I know such a decision to be allegorical in nature due to Minnesota’s preemption laws, the meaning and driving force behind the measure is in direct contrast to both my beliefs and to civil liberties whose acknowledgements are outlined in the United States Constitution.
I am a law-abiding gun owner who lives in Hennepin County and a frequent visitor and shopper in Eden Prairie. In fact, my wife and I are currently in the process of looking for our first house to purchase in the West Metro, not one meant to be a short-term starter home, but one we will plan to reside in until our future kids are grown enough to begin searching for their future homes.
If the proposed measure passes, I can guarantee you all that my wife and I will immediately remove any potential listing from our current options that resides within Eden Prairie’s limits. I cannot support, through taxes and other community involvement and volunteerism, a jurisdiction whose leaders propagate false senses of security without merit and at the expense of its law-abiding residents and personal liberty, despite how virtuous that propagation claims to be or appears on the surface. To be further demonized for simply abiding by the law and containing core beliefs embedded in the entirety of the Bill of Rights is not something I would voluntarily choose for my family or friends, which is why I would also eliminate any commerce or support in Eden Prairie and encourage the same amongst my friends, extended family, and other Minnesota communities if this measure passes.
To ban certain firearms because one believes their lethality increases due to aesthetic differences is one not based on sound reason, logic, or rationale. There is no scientific justification or evidence to conclude such a claim. Instead, it’s an easily disseminated falsehood caused possible through the lack of familiarity and ignorance of firearms, their engineering, and their function.
The idea that someone viewed as a legal adult in the eyes of the United States government - one who is trusted with the ability to speak his/her mind, trusted with the responsibility to vote for his/her representatives within government, trusted to help defend the country from enemies foreign and domestic (not always voluntarily) - can somehow be viewed differently when it comes to another constitutionally-acknowledged or granted right, and that the age of trusted responsibility should be arbitrarily increased to another number, is dumbfounding. But why is that idea so common? Because of something so unfamiliar to so many.
There are thousands and thousands of pages of laws currently on the books regarding firearms. And yet, those laws are continually broken. Sometimes, those laws aren’t even enforced or their penalties not delivered. So, what’s the solution to laws being broken by criminals who don’t care, unenforced by executive agents who don’t care, or not delivering penal-sentences by judicial agents who don’t care? Apparently, the answer is more laws for the sake of more laws. At least then those responsible can point a collective thumbs-up at one another for “doing something” to combat problems that don’t exist, deflect from failures of the powers at be, or create an ever-growing society that would rather feel safe than be safe despite the erosion of personal liberty, responsibility, and accountability.
I implore you to consider logic and reason tomorrow evening and drop this proposed measure.
Sincerely,
Baz
I'm planning on attending for my support in opposition of the measure, and encourage as many others to do so as well. I just shot an email to the council's email address and am planning on making the phone calls to them later today.
For those interested in joining along, here are some details:
5:30 pm - City Council Workshop
6:30pm - Open Podium
7:00pm - City Council Meeting - discussion, debate, vote
Council email address: AllCouncil@edenprairie.org
Council phone numbers:
Mayor Nancy Tyra-Lukens - 952.949.8593
Brad Aho - 952.303.6884
Sherry Butcher Wickstrom - 612.296.3721
Ron Case - 952.949.0915
Kathy Nelson - 952.941.6613
Here's the email I drafted up, so feel free to use it as a template, support it, critique it, tell me to go jump off a bridge, etc.:
Dear Council Members,
I am writing to you to express my concern and opposition to the proposed “assault weapons” ban being discussed for Eden Prairie. Though I know such a decision to be allegorical in nature due to Minnesota’s preemption laws, the meaning and driving force behind the measure is in direct contrast to both my beliefs and to civil liberties whose acknowledgements are outlined in the United States Constitution.
I am a law-abiding gun owner who lives in Hennepin County and a frequent visitor and shopper in Eden Prairie. In fact, my wife and I are currently in the process of looking for our first house to purchase in the West Metro, not one meant to be a short-term starter home, but one we will plan to reside in until our future kids are grown enough to begin searching for their future homes.
If the proposed measure passes, I can guarantee you all that my wife and I will immediately remove any potential listing from our current options that resides within Eden Prairie’s limits. I cannot support, through taxes and other community involvement and volunteerism, a jurisdiction whose leaders propagate false senses of security without merit and at the expense of its law-abiding residents and personal liberty, despite how virtuous that propagation claims to be or appears on the surface. To be further demonized for simply abiding by the law and containing core beliefs embedded in the entirety of the Bill of Rights is not something I would voluntarily choose for my family or friends, which is why I would also eliminate any commerce or support in Eden Prairie and encourage the same amongst my friends, extended family, and other Minnesota communities if this measure passes.
To ban certain firearms because one believes their lethality increases due to aesthetic differences is one not based on sound reason, logic, or rationale. There is no scientific justification or evidence to conclude such a claim. Instead, it’s an easily disseminated falsehood caused possible through the lack of familiarity and ignorance of firearms, their engineering, and their function.
The idea that someone viewed as a legal adult in the eyes of the United States government - one who is trusted with the ability to speak his/her mind, trusted with the responsibility to vote for his/her representatives within government, trusted to help defend the country from enemies foreign and domestic (not always voluntarily) - can somehow be viewed differently when it comes to another constitutionally-acknowledged or granted right, and that the age of trusted responsibility should be arbitrarily increased to another number, is dumbfounding. But why is that idea so common? Because of something so unfamiliar to so many.
There are thousands and thousands of pages of laws currently on the books regarding firearms. And yet, those laws are continually broken. Sometimes, those laws aren’t even enforced or their penalties not delivered. So, what’s the solution to laws being broken by criminals who don’t care, unenforced by executive agents who don’t care, or not delivering penal-sentences by judicial agents who don’t care? Apparently, the answer is more laws for the sake of more laws. At least then those responsible can point a collective thumbs-up at one another for “doing something” to combat problems that don’t exist, deflect from failures of the powers at be, or create an ever-growing society that would rather feel safe than be safe despite the erosion of personal liberty, responsibility, and accountability.
I implore you to consider logic and reason tomorrow evening and drop this proposed measure.
Sincerely,
Baz
