Gun Crusaders: The NRA’s Culture War

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NYU Press, Oct 1, 2009 - Social Science - 336 pages
Gun Crusaders is a fascinating inside look at how the four-million member National Rifle Association and its committed members come to see each and every gun control threat as a step down the path towards gun confiscation, and eventually socialism. Enlivened by a rich analysis of NRA materials, meetings, leader speeches, and unique in-depth interviews with NRA members, Gun Crusaders focuses on how the NRA constructs and perceives threats to gun rights as one more attack in a broad liberal cultural war. Scott Melzer shows that the NRA promotes a nostalgic vision of frontier masculinity, whereby gun rights defenders are seen as patriots and freedom fighters, defending not the freedom of religion, but the religion of individual rights and freedoms.
 

Contents

Frontier Masculinity Americas Gun Culture and the NRA
25
Why a Gun Movement?
44
Framing Threats to Gun Rights
73
Under Attack
110
Fighting the Culture Wars
131
The Politics of Commitment
171
Right and FarRight Moral Politics
198
The Ties That Bind
224
Tomorrows NRA
247
Studying the NRA
257
Notes
271
Index
305
About the Author
323
Copyright

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About the author (2009)

Scott Melzer is Associate Professor of Sociology and Chair of the Department of Anthropology & Sociology at Albion College.

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