Wow

We aren't sure what line The Reader is taking on this, but we don't think it's the one they think they're taking:

• Paragraph #1 - A new analysis from the Chicago Appleseed Center for Fair Courts shows that criminalization of firearm possession increases incarceration and fails to reduce gun violence.

Um....so you want to DE-criminalize gun possession? Is that what we're reading?

• Paragraph #2 - The report, Punishing Fear: The Devastating Impacts of the War on Gun Possession in Chicago, confirms what many in marginalized groups have long argued—targeted and racialized policing of gun possession, strict gun laws, and increased investment in surveillance technologies, especially within the city’s Black and Brown communities, fail to address safety concerns and, instead, add to them.

Um....so you DO want to DE-criminalize gun charges, but only in minority communities, which are Ground Zero for....gun crime. We got it.....maybe.

• “The criminalization of gun possession and the conflation of gun possession and gun use have made communities less safe by entangling more people in the criminal legal system,” the report states. “Time and time again, Black men, teenagers, and children are targeted, arrested, and criminalized for carrying guns that they feel are necessary for their own protection in areas with high rates of gun violence and low clearance rates by police.”

There's a lot to unpack there. "Possession" is okay, but "Use" is bad. People (or folks) who are black are carrying guns (illegally) for protection because where they hang out happen to be....areas of high rates of crime.....

You mean like Gun Possession?

And those low clearance rates aren't for lack of effort by the police - it's because of low rates of cooperation with the police, intimidated witnesses and a States Attorney who has destroyed any faith people once had in the system.

And then this word salad of bullshit:

• They pointed to figures that illuminate the current state of gun ownership in Black communities, such as an Urban Institute survey of a nearly all-Black group of participants that found that more than 90 percent of male gun carriers in Chicago do so to protect themselves or others.

  “People who possess guns without the proper licensure are often demonized in the media,” Johnson says. “However, many of these people are themselves survivors of gun violence who are taking measures to protect themselves and their families from violence. We believe it is critical to center their voices in this conversation.”

So, because they are "survivors of gun violence," they should be permitted to break the law?

Here's a novel idea - go get licensed, go get qualified, and carry a gun legally! You jump through the hoops put forth by Springfield and you can avoid all of that law breaking hassle you keep bitching about. 

But that might mean you don't get to play the victim any more....hmmmm.