War of the Words Response

First of all, I just want to point out how cool I think the name “amidst the noise” is. It’s like all these labels and politics and strategies are the noise, and we have to strip it all down to get to the heart of what is really going on. Pretty cool.

Anyway, after watching this video, I feel so gullible. I never gave any thought as to where these names/labels were coming from, or how they influenced me. “Weapons of War” and even “assault weapons” make things sound a lot worse than they may really to be. Actually, it makes me think about the discussion I had with my group on gun control in class on Monday. My argument is that there may as well be a ban on assault weapons, because nobody should need a weapon like that. They’re for killing, they’re for the military, etc. Will informed me that there are some regions of the country that need them for hunting, or protecting their crops. Now I don’t pretend to know anything about guns or the type of guns, but this took me by surprise. I think it’s because anytime I’ve heard these weapons referred to, they’ve been called a name with a negative connotation, like assault or war, insinuating that they are designed just to kill other people. Which I don’t think anybody is really comfortable with. I’ve totally been manipulated by labels. Not that all of this necessarily changes my opinion, but it is absolutely something to think about and consider.

One thing I didn’t understand about what he said was that these labels are often meant to divide us. I don’t really get that. For example, he says that “No Child Left Behind” is a label. And he’s right, it sounds terrible to say that you’re okay with leaving children behind, even though many people are against the policy itself. But, my question is, isn’t this uniting us? By trying to make us all feel like we should go with the policy? I don’t really understand how the labels divide us. Any thoughts?