A New York Daily News reporter who said his experience with an AR-15-style rifle gave him temporary post-traumatic stress disorder said Wednesday that he has never received so much hate mail in his three decades in journalism.
“I don’t mind spirited debate, but many correspondents told me that even expressing an opinion about today’s high-powered weaponry is off-limits to those of us who don’t own such guns,” wrote the Daily News’ Gersh Kuntzman.
He claimed he received emails calling him a liar and challenging his masculinity “— often in graphic terms that would sound more appropriate in a magazine about erectile dysfunction or an ad for Depends.”
One reader reportedly called him a “sissy,” another referred to him as “cupcake,” and yet another called him a “f—-ing p—-y.”
“And that’s just the printable stuff,” Kuntzman wrote. “To summarize, this line of argument suggests that I’m not a real man because I am frightened by the awesome power of an AR-15, which despite however you willfully misread my story, can discharge dozens of rounds in mere seconds.”
“Yes, this weapon scared the crap out of me,” he added, arguing that the AR-15 is a “weapon of mass destruction” that should be available only to law enforcement and military personnel.
Kuntzman said in an article published Tuesday that his first experience with a semi-automatic rifle left him horrified.
“It feels like a bazooka — and sounds like a cannon,” he wrote. “The explosions — loud like a bomb — gave me a temporary case of PTSD. For at least an hour after firing the gun just a few times, I was anxious and irritable.”
The article, titled “What is it like to fire an AR-15? It’s horrifying, dangerous and very very loud,” was published just days after a gunman, 29-year-old Omar Mateen, shot and killed 49 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Fla.
Mateen was armed with a handgun and a Sig Sauer MCX rifle, which fires a 5.56 NATO. Though the Sig looks much like an AR-15, it is in a different class of rifle altogether.
Kuntzman explained he wanted to figure out what it is about semi-automatic rifles like the one used by Mateen that appeals to gun owners, and said he hoped his experience would shed light on the matter.
However, he added, his quest left him not so much enlightened as it left him with emotional scars.
On Wednesday, Kuntzman stood by his characterization.
“I found the sheer power of the weapon horrifying. I found the noise deafening and anxiety provoking,” he wrote. “Using an AR-15 made me irritable and jittery for hours afterwards. To me, it felt like a bazooka.”
“[I]f masculinity is defined by the power to commit violence on a wide scale, I proudly choose femininity,” he continued. “[W]e need more real men in power taking on bullies like the NRA, which seeks to bolster the Second Amendment by shutting down opponents’ right to the First.”
The Daily News’ editorial board is a longtime opponent of the National Rifle Association, and has compared the gun rights group to terrorist organizations including the Islamic State.
“I sincerely do believe that the Bill of Rights protects Americans’ right to bear arms, albeit under very strict regulations — the ‘well-regulated militia’ part of the sacred text,” Kuntzman said Wednesday. “And I even agree with one letter writer who pointed out that hammers can kill people, too, but we don’t ban them.”
“But what if a weapons manufacturer could fashion a handgun that would fire a nuclear blast — an atomic version of an AR-15, if you will,” he asked. “It would look like a gun, but it could kill thousands instead of dozens. Like a rifle, it’s one of many arms that we are allowed to keep and bear. But would we really stand idly by as people buy a nuclear gun in the name of the Second Amendment?”
He concluded by conceding he’s a “wimp.”
“I simpered because my experience with the AR-15 bruised me, body and spirit. But there’s nothing unmanly about reminding my readers that mass murder is much easier to commit with a semi-automatic killing machine than it is with a hammer,” he wrote. “If that makes me a girl, well, maybe we should have a girl running the country.”
