You can't discriminate against a gay person just because you don't like the fact they're gay and in their being gay they make you uncomfortable. You can't discriminate against a black person because you've seen black people on the evening news being arrested for committing some crime and therefore black people make you comfortable. You can't discriminate against Jews because you don't like them and they don't share your same belief system. But, if you don't like guns you're in for a treat because Democratic California Assembly Members Nancy Skinner of Berkeley and Das Williams of Santa Barbara have introduced Assembly Bill 1014 giving you the power to do something about your unease with and dislike of firearms. According to CAL-FFL, Assembly Bill 1014 allows you to ask a court for a "Gun Violence Restraining Order" and subsequent "firearms seizure warrant" against California gun owners. And the best part is that you don't have to actually know the person or anything about them other than they own a firearm. So what does that mean? Well, you could find all the people in your local area that own guns - maybe with the aid of one of those helpful CCW maps newspapers are so fond of publishing - and start asking the courts for a "Gun Violence Restraining Order" against each of those individuals simply because you believe they, as CAL-FFL notes, "pose a significant risk of personal injury to himself, herself, or others by owning or possessing" guns. We would never accept this kind of unwarranted harassment of other groups, such as gays, blacks or Jews, because we inherently understand that to be morally wrong. But when it comes to gun owners, that seems to be a whole other issue and people are completely fine and utterly unfazed by applying a standard they would never dream to apply to groups identified by their sexual preference, ethnicity or religious beliefs. As gun owners though, we are simply fair game. We can be as law abiding as we want. We can be upstanding members of our communities. We can be philanthropists and generously volunteer our time for important causes. But, if we own a firearm then we are a separate kind of citizen, a second-class citizen, and all our contributions to society are for naught and we are deemed undeserving of the same constitutional protections others are entitled to and enjoy. All this is because somebody somewhere committed a crime with a gun. In their zeal to pass legislation that reflects their doing "something, anything" to address gun violence, the California legislators reveal their true, horrifying nature. And that is the harboring of a casual indifference to gun owners as a group which perilously borders on dangerous because it serves to fuel the misdeeds of a governmental system that plays to public outcry by taking advantage of isolated tragedies, such as the recent Santa Barbara area shooting. I could suggest parallels like the rounding up of Japanese Americans by the U.S. Government and placing them in internment camps during World War II, but they'd say "that's entirely different." I could point to Russia's reported recent registration of Ukrainian Jews, which was met with global damnation, but that would again be "entirely different." In fact, I was told just that by a friend whose view on guns is that they are inherently dangerous and therefore registration of gun owners is perfectly justified, as opposed to the registration of Jews which is horrifying. I did not ask how they proposed handling registration of a gun owner that was Jewish. I could point to the systemic isolation and subjugation of blacks through past racist laws and societal norms, but that too would be "entirely different." The fact is that we are being further marginalized as a group, but because we are not identifiable by sexual preference, ethnicity or religious beliefs it doesn't rise to the level of discrimination - regardless of how specifically and narrowly targeted their efforts are. We are entering a climate increasingly reminiscent of something out of George Orwell's classic, 1984, where our fellow citizens are encouraged to report us to the authorities. Of course, we have already been through this with the fight against the red menace during the McCarthy era...but "that's entirely different." The turning of citizens against citizens is exactly what Assembly Bill 1014 would implement. And the bill proves that the road to Hell is indeed paved with good intentions but they should at least be honest about their intentions and rename this Assembly Bill 1984. - Paul Erhardt, Editor, the Outdoor Wire Digital Network Got shooting sports news? Send us an email at info@shootingwire.com.