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  • 2015-04-07 (xsd:date)
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  • Did the NRA Ban Guns at Their Own Convention? (en)
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  • Ahead of the National Rifle Association's annual national convention, scheduled to take place in Nashville from 10 to 12 April 2015, an online rumor began to spread holding that the organization had paradoxically banned attendees from carrying guns at that gathering: Editorials and online memes started popped up decrying the NRA's purported dissonant and hypocritical standards of gun regulation, as reflected in the following passage from the (original version) of a 10 April 2015 New York Times editorial: The referenced report in the The Tennessean that apparently kicked off the rumor misleadingly suggested that it was part of the NRA's own security plan to require that all guns shown on the convention floor be rendered nonoperational (through the removal of firing pins), and that any guns bought at the convention would have to be picked up elsewhere by their purchasers: However, the NRA did not in any way ban the carrying of guns at their convention; rather, the rumor to that effect stemmed from a misunderstanding of varying convention practices, local regulations, and existing laws. The NRA convention is a very large event, with expected attendance in the range of 70,000 to 80,000 persons, and will sprawl multiple venues. At the primary venue, Music City Center, gun owners with proper carry permits can indeed bring their guns with them during the association's convention. However, one of the auxiliary venues, the Bridgestone Arena (which will be hosting an NRA-sponsored concert by country music artist Alan Jackson and comedian Jeff Foxworthy), is a private venue that prohibits the possession of firearms, and attendees are bound to follow its regulations when they are in that particular arena. When attendees are at other convention locales, such as the main exhibit hall, they will be free to carry firearms in a manner consistent with state law. Moreover, the NRA did not mandate that any firearms displayed on the convention floor have their firing pins removed, nor that guns purchased at the convention be picked up elsewhere. It is common safety practice for guns put on display by their manufacturers at such shows to be non-operational, and state and federal laws govern the sale and buyer pick-up of firearms. The NRA did not originate or insist on these practices for their convention, as Bob Owens, the editor of the gun rights web site BearingArms.com, noted: The NRA also published a message on to their official Twitter account confirming all of this: (en)
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