by Jack Harbinger
jharbinger@msn.com

April 18, 2002

KeepAndBearArms.com -- More Americans participate in the shooting sports than play basketball (America's favorite team sport) or baseball, football, soccer or tennis. More hunt than play tennis or baseball, in fact.

ACTUALLY, ALMOST EXACTLY THE SAME NUMBER OF AMERICANS GO TARGET SHOOTING WITH THEIR EVIL HANDGUNS (11.4 million) AS PLAY BASEBALL, "THE GREAT AMERICAN PASTIME." Baseball comes out ahead by only 3,000 people.

The number of rifle and pistol target shooters combined is slightly more than the number who go skiing. People choose gun sports over soccer 2 to 1. Are you listening, Million Soccer Mom Marchers?

We're mainstream, with 41.7 million or more sport shooters in a population of 270 million!

These numbers are from the Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association's 2002 sports participation report. They reflect Year 2001 survey results, the most recent available. I believe the gun sports statistics are on the low side, because some people aren't going to tell a survey about their guns.

Next time someone tells you hunting is a vanishing cruel and outdated sport for inbred rednecks, inform them that 1.6 million more Americans (16,672,000) hunt (with a rifle or shotgun) than play tennis (15,098,000). Gun hunters log in at only 276,000 fewer than people who do aerobics, and aren't they everywhere? And if you add the 4,435,000 bowhunters.... Rifle target shooting follows close behind tennis at 13,979,000. Pistol target shooting has 11,402,000 devotees, darn close in popularity to the "mainstream" sport of canoeing (12,044,000).

The total number of firearm sports enthusiasts is reported at 41,738,000. That includes hunters, rifle and pistol target shooters, sporting clays (3,324,000), and skeet and trap (3,904,000). Compare that to several other sports:

They can't try to marginalize guns and gun owners any more in the face of those statistics. We ARE America, as much as anyone.

And remember, there are another 40 million or more other gun owners who don't consider their guns "sports equipment" at all. Let them chew on that one.

There are probably 75 million or so of us who need to start sending letters and emails in defense of our gun rights, and not just so we can continue to enjoy our sport. The gun prohibitionists will never stop, not until the last .22 rifle and the last skeet shotgun are in the furnace or under the bulldozer (except for theirs, of course). They've told us that's their intent. They may lie about everything else, but we can believe them on this. We've seen them succeed in Australia and England.

We will not be silenced. We will not be disarmed.

We're not playing games.

Check out the sports participation survey at:

http://www.sgma.com/reports/data/2002/sports-part-topline-report2002.pdf

(Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader to view it, which can be downloaded at: http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep.html.)