Publishing Gun Owners' Addresses

http://news.yahoo.com/someone-sent-white-power-paper-published-gun-permit-151541248.html

I am more than just a little concerned over the New York Journal News' decision to post the names and addresses of people locally who have applied to purchase guns.

As I recall (and this is from memory of TV reports), the paper claimed that its reasons for publishing such a list were: It was public record, and the paper "thought its readers would be interested." (my paraphrase)

In my opinion it's a blatant attempt by the Journal News to sell more papers (or obtain more Internet hits).

The horrible truth is that by identifying homes where guns are present, thieves now have a road map to a source of easy money.  I'm sure we all know that guns are readily sold on the black market where they likely will be used to commit a crime against another human being.  And there's a ring of truth in the fact that thieves, browsing the Internet for their next crime, will be more likely to visit the house next door, where the Journal News has told them there are NO guns present.

I think that if I was a thief, I might do a number of things now that the newspaper has been so helpful.  I could:

• quietly case the house with guns for a few days to see when the residents would not be at home.
• possibly burglarize the vehicle in the driveway, since it's a good chance the person who bought the gun wanted to keep it in the car.
• terrorize the neighbors next door, where there are no guns -- because you can be sure I'll be brandishing a gun.  No need to case the house to see if it's empty.

The fact that the newspaper claimed that the gun ownership information was public is no excuse.  The News, in fact, had to file a "Freedom of Information" request to obtain the data.  This information was in no way "readily" available.  You had to go after it; dig for it.  Why, the News was so driven in its desire to get Internet hits that it assembled the data into a "point-and-click" Google map.  Just mouse over the dot and you get the name and address.

Data, you see, is not inherently good or bad.  But it can take on a dark side when it is assembled into "information."  By zealously publishing the data points on a map, the data became actionable information because it was graphically displayed -- spatially.  One dot, as it relates to another, to a street or thoroughfare.

These innocent, law-abiding gun owners have now been made targets by this despicable publication.  I hate to even call the Journal News a "newspaper," because it's obvious to me that it lacks even basic journalistic ethics.

The men, women and children who live in the houses where guns are present now have a heightened chance of facing their worst nightmare -- some drug-addled thief, crashing through their front door, holding them at gunpoint while the house is ransacked in a search for weapons.  Their guns, likely purchased for self-protection, now have a more immediate need.  All because the News saw fit to identify their location.

Today there are news reports about the fact that gun rights supporters have published on the Internet the names and addresses of the news and editorial staff of the Journal News.  How horrible! When the paper first published the names, on-air reporters wondered whether it would be "turn-about fair-play" for someone to "expose" the writers and editors.  Honestly, I didn't think anyone would be so irresponsible.  But it has been done.  Also, someone has sent "white powder" to the newspaper in a further attempt to punish the errant journal.

I'm hoping that cooler heads will prevail and that all the information will be removed from public view -- journalists' and gun-owners' names.

And I would call for respectable, ethical news organizations to speak out loudly against the Journal News and its shameful expose.