No doubt Watts hoped to shock her Twitter followers with the gun’s supposedly menacing appearance.
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The rifle she depicted, however, was a Ruger bolt action .22 rimfire, a platform that has safely introduced untold numbers of preteens to the fundamentals of marksmanship and firearm safety, including through programs at summer camps, scouting organizations, and even some public schools. It is a platform so common and uncontroversial, in fact, that it would remain untouched by even the most far-reaching “assault weapon” ban introduced in any American jurisdiction to date.
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Indeed, of all the manifestations of childish entitlement that characterize the gun control lobby, perhaps none is so pronounced as the inverse relationship between their ignorance and their outrage. It’s of course easy to fear something you don’t understand. But gun control advocates take it a step further, resisting attempts by gun owners to set them straight on the facts as a form of “bullying” or mocking efforts at education on firearms as “gunsplaning.” Then they go further still by insisting that not only should their obliviousness inform their own choices about firearm ownership and use but yours as well.
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