Opinion
“As iron sharpens iron, so does one person sharpen another.” ~ Proverbs 27:17.
As I prepare to head out to Dallas for the 2024 NRA Annual Meetings and Exhibits, I’m thinking about the years I’ve spent banging my head against the stone wall that has been the NRA establishment and the frustration I’ve felt seeing good people shunned by the NRA Board and its “leadership” for having the temerity to question certain policies and activities within the Association.
Since my election to the NRA Board last month, I’ve noticed some shift in the way my soon-to-be fellow Board members deal with me. I don’t become an official member of the Board until the meetings in Dallas, but my election was a major milestone, and I’m ready for the difficult work to come.
The first order of business will be to convince my fellow Directors that I’m not the enemy.
Too many Directors have simply gone along with the “leadership” for all these years, believing what they told them about NRA finances and the various scandals while also believing the propaganda that anyone who questions the actions of the top brass is out to destroy the NRA, and that I personally am some sort of petulant child still fighting a decades-old feud between my father and Wayne LaPierre.
To begin with, I’m no child. I’ll turn 64 next month, and I’ve been a Life Member of the NRA for some 45 of those years. Coincidentally, the feud between Dad and Wayne was based on exactly the things that were exposed in the recent trial in New York, just not at so grand a scale. My objective is and has always been to help make the NRA stronger and more effective. Having witnessed the fights between Dad and the NRA “Old Guard” gives me a historical perspective that few share. It is my sincere hope that now that Wayne is gone and the Directors know the truth that I – we – have been telling them for years, we can set aside our personal differences and work together to restore the NRA to its rightful position as the leading organization standing for the shooting sports and gun owners everywhere.
Whether you’re a believer or not, a lot of wisdom has been accumulated and passed down through the centuries and millennia in the book we call the Bible. One of my favorite nuggets from that book is the reminder that “As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.” The point of this short verse, Proverbs 27:17, is that, just as grinding two blades together in a cooperative manner makes both sharper, so too does discussion, debate, and wrestling over ideas in a respectful process result in all involved coming out with a sharper understanding of the topics at hand, and each other.
Too often, we, as humans, lock into one idea or train of thought and refuse to even hear, much less actually consider, the ideas or positions of others. We seek out those who agree with us and hear only arguments that support our position, pushing away those who disagree or have other ideas. The retreat into echo chambers has become the hallmark of politics in the new millennium. It seems that everyone has chosen sides and gone into their camp, refusing to even hear the ideas, positions, or even questions of others.
It’s come to the point that if you disagree or don’t agree loudly enough, not only are you wrong, you’re evil!
That’s not how any organization, including the NRA Board of Directors, should operate. We have an obligation to our members to not only know the laws, regulations, and policies under which we are to operate but to engage in our duties with conviction and an attitude of respect for all involved. It’s our job to hear each other, hear our bosses – the members – and do everything we can to find the best course for getting where we all want to go, even if that means debating and wrestling over exactly what that “best course” might be.
Unity for the sake of unity is as futile and counterproductive as conflict and disagreement for the sake of conflict and disagreement. There are very few of my soon-to-be fellow Directors with whom I have had personal disagreements and hard feelings. I hope we can set those differences aside and avoid the bickering and back-biting to focus on the real challenges the organization now faces.
Undoubtedly, there will be disagreements and some very difficult and possibly painful decisions. Still, as long as we remember that we are all working toward shared goals, we should be able to have those discussions and debates like adults, challenging one another on the merits of our ideas and arguments, not personal feelings or past conflicts.
NRA members deserve a Board of Directors that does what it was elected to do: oversee the operation of our Association to the best of its ability, always working toward the goals that best benefit our members and fulfill the Association’s mission statement.
Over the course of decades, the NRA brass has developed a culture of fear and intolerance toward disagreement with the “leadership.” That’s a huge problem. We, as a Board, should strive to build a culture where iron sharpens iron, encouraging discussion and debate, refining ideas, and setting egos aside with a sincere desire to understand and improve each other’s ideas and positions, regardless of whose ideas and positions they might be.
With a board of 76 members, it’s easy to assume that someone else knows more about and is in control of any given situation. That’s a flawed assumption. It’s also impossible to get anything done without the support and cooperation of the majority, so we must form alliances to work together. We must avoid forming alliances based on criteria other than commitment to the Association and our members. We don’t need to agree on everything. We don’t even need to like each other. But we must be willing to work together to get the job done.
It is my honor to serve on the NRA Board. I pledge to do my best to act with a spirit of cooperation and work together with all of my fellow Directors, sharpening iron for the benefit of our members. I trust that the other Directors will, for the most part, do the same.
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About Jeff Knox:
Jeff Knox is a second-generation political activist and director of The Firearms Coalition. His father Neal Knox led many of the early gun rights battles for your right to keep and bear arms. Read Neal Knox – The Gun Rights War.
The Firearms Coalition is a loose-knit coalition of individual Second Amendment activists, clubs and civil rights organizations. Founded by Neal Knox in 1984, the organization provides support to grassroots activists in the form of education, analysis of current issues, and with a historical perspective of the gun rights movement. The Firearms Coalition has offices in Buckeye, Arizona, and Manassas, VA. Visit: www.FirearmsCoalition.org.
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