I Miss Vine, The Revolver Emoji, And When People Weren't All Offended
An open letter to those who do not support the second amendment in pop culture.
I miss the days of old. When I could pull up Vine, watch a man chase a tornado with an American flag and a shotgun, laugh a good laugh, and be on my merry way. I miss the days when I could caption my hunting photos with a revolver emoji and longed for the day a rifle emoji would be able to represent the sport of marksmanship.
Almost every sport known to man has an emoji, but if you're a hunter, skeet-shooting aficionado, mounted shooter or accomplished marksman, I guess you're just out of luck. Am I offended by that? Oh well, my opinion is apparently invalid within the realm of pop culture. Don't tell me a revolver emoji promotes violence while you sit sassy and content on your couch playing "Call of Duty" or "Fortnite."
News flash, just because those little "Fortnite" guns look futuristic and spacey doesn't make the object of the game any different.
The entire object of the game is to kill all the other players. I guess since we're replacing emojis with "less-threatening" counterparts, we should go ahead and change the knife emoji to a plastic butter-knife. It seems strange to me that with an opioid epidemic tearing through the country, you haven't called for the pill emoji to be removed. What about the sword emojis? Shouldn't those be replaced with lightsabers? Maybe replace them with pool noodles?
No. Emojis are not the problem.
TikTok, where's your support for the Second Amendment? Vine was always there for a good laugh and a good dose of 'merica here and there. You still choose to allow videos picturing the act of murder, but with water guns because that's better. A person can hold a gun to another person's head and cause them to "drop dead" to follow popular trends, but since they use nerf guns or water pistols, it's not depicting violence. It's all fun and games to joke about murder, but God forbid someone shows off their marksmanship skills or posts a hunting video. I'm not calling for an end to the trends and all things funny, I just don't understand how nobody is saying a word about this double standard.
I'm not calling for a banning of "Fortnite" or a complete boycott of social media, but I am pleading with you. Don't silence my voice. Don't inhibit freedom of expression. Don't punish those who have followed the laws and taken the precautions. It's my heritage, it's my culture, it's my life. It's a sense of pride when I finally master dismantling a new gun or finally, after weeks of practice, learn to sight in a new rifle. It's knowing I'm not helpless and that I can defend myself in somewhat dangerous situations. It's having peace of mind in a house all alone as a woman who lives on her own. I know many will not agree with me, and that's OK.
I'm entitled to my opinion just as you are entitled to yours. The only difference here is I'm not trying to take away your constitutionally-given rights.
