The following is the speech given at the Second Amendment Sisters' Richmond Rally on Mother's Day, May 13, 2001

Happy Mother's Day to everyone out there. First and foremost, I'd like to say "Thanks, Mom!" to every woman who has ever given a helping hand. I'd also like to "give a hand" to the Second Amendment Sisters, and especially Melinda Gerisch, for this great opportunity to speak to you on such a lovely day as this.

As Melinda said, I represent the Virginia chapter of the Pink Pistols, a young and vigorous new player on the national gun ownership stage. We've been featured in Newsweek, several newspapers, a few radio shows and apparently three guest appearances in Jay Leno's opening monologue.

The Second Amendment Sisters play a vital role in the continuing battle for our rights as gun owners. In this battle, it is a constant fight against not only politicians and power mongers, but against stereotypes and misinformation. You've heard the stereotypes before. Stereotypes such as gun owners are ignorant rednecks. Women are all against gun ownership. Gays are all a bunch of liberal gun control freaks.

Well, let's put a stop to that right now. You know the truth about gun owners because you are here living that truth. Look at the faces around you! Gun owners are male, female, black, white, rich, poor and everything in between. The stereotype of the typical gun owner falls woefully short when smashed against a Second Amendment Sisters rally! I'm here today to show you that one more stereotype is going to have to go. Not everyone in the gay community wants guns to go away.

The key to the destruction of these stereotypes is the diversity of the gun owner. Here in Virginia, we have the Second Amendment Sisters, the Virginia Citizen's Defense League and the Pink Pistols to name but a few. Like the Sisters, the Pink Pistols is a visible and vocal representation of the diversity of gun owners and is working to bridge the political stereotypes surrounding the debates about gun ownership. We cater to those who do not fit the mold and then show the world that the stereotypes do not apply. It is rather difficult for the media to portray an urban female computer programmer as an uneducated reactionary.

The debate over gun control always seems to run into the realm of statistics. You've heard most of them before. This many number of defensive gun uses. That many number of concealed weapons permits. Some other percentage drop in the crime rate. I bet that some of you out there know the statistics better than I do, and I try pretty hard to stay current. Well, I'm going to give you a few more statistics to play with, ones that you may not have considered.

According to the FBI's Uniform Crime Report, there were 7,876 hate crimes in 1999. Of those, 1,317 were based upon the victim's sexual orientation. That's just the stuff that the FBI knows about. There probably are more. Whatever the true number is, it's too many.

Just recently, Massachusetts passed Chapter 180, which allows discretionary licensing for concealed weapon permits. You know the outcome of these types of laws: any permit may be denied to anyone for any reason. Anyone want to take a wild guess as to the chances of some local sheriff with a stereotype firmly in his mind allowing a gay person to get one of these permits?

I have heard from fellow members of the Pink Pistols who were laughed out of police stations when they went to inquire about a concealed permit. This is self-defense! How would you feel if you asked the authorities here in Virginia for permission to protect yourself and your family as a mother, a father, a home-maker and a caretaker... and the police laughed at the idea?

The laws of Virginia have made a good start by moving to the shall-issue method of awarding concealed weapons permits. We can now legally protect ourselves and our loved ones in most parts of the state. But there is room to grow. I'm sure all of you are familiar with the ban on legally concealed weapons in places that serve alcohol for consumption. On September 22nd of last year, Ronald Edward Gay walked into the Backstreet Café in Roanoke armed with a pistol and started shooting. After killing one (Danny Lee Overstreet) and wounding six, he calmly walked out. As a member of the Pink Pistols, this incident is of particular concern to me because it was a gay bar and the victim was homosexual. As a member of the human race, I'm horrified because this was an act of savagery inflicted upon us by bigotry. And as a Virginian, I'm ticked off because the laws guaranteed that he would have an unarmed pool of victims. I'm sure it is very comforting to his victim's family that there was a ban on concealed weapons in that bar. The ban didn't stop the criminal. So what good did it do?

Thanks to the efforts of groups such as the VCDL [Virginia Citizens' Defense League] and the Second Amendment Sisters, we're on our way to removing such nonsensical restrictions on our ability to protect ourselves. We're on the path to getting reciprocity between Virginia and other states. Laws that make sense instead of laws born of stereotypes. While the Pink Pistols is a relative newcomer to this arena, we will support you and your efforts. For every bone-headed gun law we get removed, we all get that much closer to being able to protect ourselves. Everyone benefits from these efforts. The avid sports shooter, the working woman, your husbands, your wives, your children, everyone. Even the senator who was mugged last week.

The gay and lesbian community is but a small segment of this country's citizens. The Pink Pistols organization was founded specifically to support and encourage this "pink community" to exercise this right of self-defense. Not because we want gays and lesbians to be special. Not because the gay movement has the ear of politicians at the moment. No. We will protect these rights because personal freedom from hurt and harm is a human right and we will not have it taken away from any of us.

Thanks to the national media, you know of tragedies such as Matthew Shepard and James Byrd. They died horrible deaths born of hate and bile, delivered by the ignorance of monsters. Laws will not stop those who ignore the law. The time has come for all targeted minorities to look at their lives and step up to the responsibilities of protecting themselves. And when they do, the Pink Pistols will be there for them. Not just gays and lesbians. All lifestyles are welcome, all religions and all colors. We are ready to give them a group to belong to where their lifestyle is accepted and their rights are given respect. Give us your shy, your outcasts and your socially strange. We will give them friends to shoot with. We are artists, computer geeks, journalists, instructors, lawyers and teachers. We are white, black, pink, green and perhaps even polka dot. Heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, transgender or just plain wanting to shoot; come join us and be accepted.

This is the t-shirt of the Pink Pistols. There are many like it, but this one is mine. The question that this shirt brings up is "Are you, personally, gay?" My favorite answer is "Does it matter?" I am a law-abiding citizen who refuses to be a victim. I have the same rights to self-defense as every other person here because in the end, self-defense is not a right of the white or the wealthy. It is neither a religious right nor a right of passage. It is a human right and it belongs to us all.

Being a good citizen and a full participant in modern society requires self-reliance, discipline and self-confidence. Myself and other concealed weapons permit holders have proven that we are responsible adults. Willing and able to be trusted by those around us.

What we need to do here is to show Richmond that we want the legal right to protect ourselves effectively anywhere, at any time. The stereotypes of the gun owners are wrong. The facts are on our side. While the politicians sit surrounded by comfort and armed security, we, the real people, are out here amidst the noise and thunder doing our best to keep ourselves and our loved ones safe. The gun owners of this great country defy all attempts to categorize, generalize and compartmentalize. We are everywhere. We are everyone. And we vote.