While waiting to pick up a prescription at CVS today the December edition of
Gun World magazine lay discarded on the counter under the checkout card reader. Out of boredom I picked it up and aimlessly thumbed through until something unusual caught my eye. On page 33 an ad for BlackHawk “items for discreet carry” showed a picture of two white people at an outdoor gun range. My eye was drawn by the layout to the target the woman was apparently shooting at. It seems to show a large black man embracing or otherwise in conflict with a white woman and a child or perhaps two white children. In the infinite realm of possibilities, the pixelation of the original layout might have distorted an otherwise benign image for use as a target. However, the image appears twice, once on the far right near the edge of the page and once dead center an inch and a half below the top. The center image is framed neatly by the black boxed text and the head of the female shooter. The caption reads, “Gear As Prepared As You Are.” And of course the BlackHawk slogan is “Honor As A Way Of Life.”
The target is small relative to other images on the page so I might be tempted to rate this ploy as more subliminal than overt. After zooming in on the target though, I'm less inclined to be so charitable, as if anyone needs anymore confirmation about the motivation of some gun enthusiasts. I wonder how much more money the gun business is going to make on the Ferguson “wedge” du jour?
The specific issue of Gun World is December 2014, Volume 55, No.12