Smith & Wesson Cutting Work Force (Product Boycotts DO Work!!! - October 2000)

Associtated Press via KC3.Com ^ | October 19, 2000 | JEFF DONN

[Sender]

I don't think we should continue to snub S&W today, they got the memo from us loud and clear. I have no problems at all buying a Smith or Walther product today. All major gun manufacturers (well, most) have done something bad at one time or another, like Colt and Ruger, but if we boycott them all we are only hurting ourselves.

Boycott the VPC, Brady Center, antigun Senators, antigun media and their sponsors! Let's kick a** but kick the right a**es.

[Joe Boucher]

Glad you mentioned Levi's. I buy Wranglers now that Levi's has moved its manufacturing overseas. I started purchasing only Levi's in 1967 when I was 14. Until 2 years ago I never bought another companies product. Now I refuse to give Levi's a penny.
Hell with them.
Sort of like Disney, it used to be a great thing until they became an international company and said the hell with the U.S.A.

[PoorMuttly]

now there's a thought...hmmmmmm

[Shooter 2.5]

Yep, the boycott worked. Now they're an American Company with a good product.

[oncebitten]

Hey, I'm glad you are all so very smart and get off on the misery of laid-off manufacturing employees. I live in Springfield, a once proud manufacturing city, and believe me we don't need more folks on the welfare roles. Management made a mistake in a move to head off the Clinton administration - I think they were forseeing a possible ban on handguns and wanted to try and get special agreement ahead of that event. At the time it was very possible in the minds of many.

[RANGERAIRBORNE]

Agree with you- didn't Bill Ruger, practically the patron Saint of a lot of shooters in this country, jump into the large-capacity-magazine ban as if he had thought it up himself? And pretty much ALL of themanufacturers are pushing stupid trigger-lock "solutions" that will never work, and only render the weapons useless for self-defense.Mp>
There is enough blame to go around, and S&W makes a fine product (although I'm liking SIG more and more...)

[RANGERAIRBORNE]

By the way, it is less than honest to post an article from 2000 as a 2003 article, especially in "Breaking News". There is a general problem on FR with misleading headlines, but this one looks to be deliberate falsification.

[Coral Snake]

We all have to remember that the historic gun manufacturers such as Smith & Wesson, Colt, Winchester, IthicaGun etc. all come from what are now very LIBERAL "blue" areas of the country such as Taxachussets, Conneticutt and Ithica (the city of evil) New York. We have to take these locations into account when we hear anti gun pronouncements from companies we think should be pro gun.

[PJ-Comix]

I only posted this to show that boycotts do work. Yes, it is now good to buy from Smith & Wesson since they have new management now.

[PJ-Comix]

My mistake. I meant to put 2000 and just now noticed when you drew attention to it. It's kind of like writing 2003 on documents in 2004 since 2003 is still on your mind.

OK, everybody. This article is from 2000, not 2003. My mistake. I honestly meant to put 2000 but goofed.

[Sloth]

Can it be clarified somehow that this is an OLD out-dated article?

[PJ-Comix]

Either that or pull it. I honestly meant to put the 2000 date on it but goofed. Hey, I also mispelled Leslie Moonves' first name on a thread today as "Lesle" so I am not error-proof. But maybe the best thing is to pull the thread. I'll live. It was my honest goof.

[Sender]

Yes, Bill Ruger decided a long time ago, back in the '80s, that he wasn't going to sell large-capacity magazines or folding stocks or flash suppressors and bayonet lugs to the general public. I remember trying to order a folding stock for a Mini-14 back then, and being told it would have to be sold to police only. When you bought a Mini-14, you got a 5-round mag but back then you could find real Ruger 20's pretty easily and cheaply. I bought a GB series mini from a police dept trade-in and I thought that was really hot *stuff*.

I try to always remember that when I see a major manufacturer do something stupid, at least they are out there actually making a good product that I want. They don't have to, they could get a lot less grief making lawn furniture or valves or something. I don't want them to go under. I want the antigunners to go under.

[Jack Black]

I wish they would build guns with out the absurd and unneccessary "pimple lock". I've wanted a Model 29 for a while, but just can't enjoy buying a gun with a part on it that has been designed by Sarah Brady, Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi. This very visible "cave in" is located just next to the cylinder latch on every current S&W revolver. Just what every gun needs. A buch more little parts that serve no intrinsic purpose, and allow grit into the mechanism.

Yuck! The Redhawk or maybe the Anaconda look better every time I visit my dealer.

[Atlas Sneezed]

Yep, the boycott worked.

---

Correction: The boycott is WORKING. it will never have "worked" until there are no products being produced under that name.

We don't boycott just to punish the wrongdoers. We boycott to teach a fearsome lesson to ALL other businesses that might contemplate caving at any time in the future, for generations to come.

And our lesson is far more effective if the owners of such businesses know that even if they change management, come out with appealingly politically incorrect revolvers, and offer their shares to new prospective owners with a clean record on liberty, that NO SANE BUYER WOULD PAY THEM A PENNY FOR THEIR TAINTED SHARES.

Let the name "Smith and Wesson" perpetually stand for "anti-liberty", and never be forgotten as such. This will help to preserve our liberties. When you buy Smith, you are putting money into the pockets of those who put money into the pockets of the evildoers. Worse, you show the owners of other companies that if they get their tit caught in a wringer, they can always sell out at a high price, using the Smith recovery as a model for why they should be well paid.

Smith and Wesson must die.

(I confess slight guilt for having traded earlier this year some spare machine gun magazines at a gun show for a S&W 357 magnum revolver, since it should have been sold to someone who had a demand for a Smith, and who might now buy a new one to enrich the current company, when they could have been satisfied with the old one.)

[Atlas Sneezed]

didn't Bill Ruger, practically the patron Saint of a lot of shooters in this country, jump into the large-capacity-magazine ban as if he had thought it up himself?

---

Yup. His guns weren't hurt by the ban, but his competitors were.

But the key is the lesson we teach future company owners: "Ruger got lucky, and Smith got the death penalty. Do you feel lucky?"

[Joe Brower]

Ah-hah! OK, got it. Memo to self: read the whole post before saying anything! $8-)

Yes, the boycott worked. SW is now an American-owned company and back on the right track. The boycott was extremely effective.