The NRA's Amazing Hypocrisy About Hollywood Gun Violence

One of the NRA's coolest gun-violence movies ever.

In his press conference after the mass shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, last December, Wayne LaPierre of the National Rifle Association blamed mass murders on everyone from legislators who pass gun control laws to the makers of videogames–everyone except gun manufacturers and sellers, as I wrote at the time.

He was especially hard on Hollywood. "Isn't fantasizing about killing people as a way to get your kicks really the filthiest form of pornography?," he said. "In a race to the bottom, media conglomerates compete with one another to shock, violate and offend every standard of civilized society."

The NRA is singing a very different tune today. Its publication American Rifleman just came out with its list of the 10 "coolest gun movies" ever. They include The Terminator, admired for how "Arnold Schwarzenegger played an advanced killing machine that is almost completely unstoppable," and The Godfather, which "affected millions in many different ways with its cinematography, plot and underlying themes, such as how with determination anyone can become powerful, even if that power is of the criminal nature."

Zombieland makes the list because it not only "has introduced a new group of people to preparedness and firearms" but "has also provided some awesome targets and produced a new type of training that is fun and useful in a world-gone-crazy situation. Besides, the final fight scene is just awesome." The Matrix is cited for

a controversial scene that portrayed a shootout in an almost dancelike way, paired with the high-pace song Spybreak by the Propellerheads. This followed a scene containing a line that could easily be the catchphrase of many gun owners when asked what they need: "Guns. Lots of guns."

The full list of all-time cool gun movies is:

1. Red Dawn
2. The Terminator
3. The Alamo
4. Die Hard
5. The Godfather
6. Zombieland
7. The Matrix
8. The Delta Force
9. The Road Warrior
10. Tremors

So now the NRA is praising, among other things, a movie hero who's an "almost unstoppable" "killing machine," a career in criminality, and making a shootout a dance with great music. Talking Points Memo's Hunter Walker writes that "TPM called the NRA to ask how celebrating gun movies fit with the group's past comments criticizing Hollywood. No one from the organization responded."

See the NRA's full slideshow of the coolest-ever gun movies here.

rest at http://www.forbes.com/sites/frederickallen/2013/05/21/the-nras-amazing-hypocrisy-about-hollywood-gun-violence/